The aftermath of the Second World War witnessed a crescendo of anti-colonial sentiment across the world. This prompted European imperial powers in Africa to seek ways to reform colonial structures in such a manner as to legitimize continued imperial rule. To this end, Belgian, British, French, and Portuguese colonies mobilized and deployed knowledge, planning and public funding in unprecedented ways.

Portugal, which had a lengthy history of colonial occupation in Africa, took a particularly uncompromising stance in the 1950s and 1960s. As other empires disintegrated or introduced forms of power sharing, it sought to strengthen its imperial grip. A key element of its strategy was rhetorical—it sought to deny that the empire existed at all. In the early 1950s, the terms “empire” and “colonies” were replaced with “Portuguese overseas” and “overseas provinces” in Portuguese constitutional law. The imperial state now sought to project the idea of a multi-continental and multiracial country, rather than an empire, to justify Portuguese permanence in Africa. In concert with this rhetorical strategy, Portugal initiated a drive to encourage white settlement in Angola and Mozambique. Between 1940 and 1960 the European population of Angola rose from 44,000 to 170,000, while in Mozambique it rose from 27,000 to 97,000.

This policy on demographic colonization constituted a curious experiment which ultimately reveals the fractured nature of mid-century white societies in Portugal’s African colonies. Specifically, to counter the concentration of settlers in cities, Portugal targeted rural areas of its colonies for population with settlers from the metropole. State-sponsored rural settlements were established in Angola (Cela and Cunene) and Mozambique (Limpopo). These settlers, moreover, were mainly impoverished peasants with few prospects in the mother country. For them, colonial settlement presented an opportunity for socioeconomic improvement.

In official communications, these settlements—known as colonatos—were envisioned as archetypes of Portugal in Africa. With reference to Angola, for instance, a colonato was imagined as “an entirely white district in black Africa, a miniature Portugal inside its largest province from which it will radiate colonizing energy.” Such efforts went to extreme lengths. The colonato of Cela in Angola contained a village named Santa Comba, after the birthplace of Portugal’s dictator Salazar, complete with a replica of the village church.