Historical colonialism required first and foremost an external colonizer, a group of people who took land and resources that were not theirs. "Appropriation" implies that the land was already occupied by someone, although these colonized, "primitive" inhabitants were not treated as the real owners of the resources. Speaking in general terms, then, colonialism can be said to consist of a global system in which colonizers use power to dispossess the colonized of valuable resources, sending the wealth back to the metropolis or the motherland and all the while justifying their actions with a discourse of hierarchical differentiation between peoples and cultures.

Nick Couldry & Ulises A. Mejias, The Costs of Connection, loc. 246