(Post)Colonial Cattle Frontiers: Capitalism, Science and Empire in Southern and Central Africa, 1890s-1970s
Having played a key role in economic, social and cultural life in many African societies for centuries, cattle became a focal point of colonial intervention, capitalist enterprise and veterinary science after
European conquest in the late nineteenth century. Driven by negative views of ‘traditional’ and ‘uneconomic’ pastoralist practices, colonial governments, scientists, entrepreneurs, settlers and other actors promoted a broad range of interventions aimed at turning cattle into profitable imperial and global commodities. While triggering manifold African strategies of resistance, adaptation and accommodation, these interventions gradually transformed pre-existing cattle economies, pastoralist societies and animal landscapes in many and often unexpected ways.
My ERC Starting Grant, which I will present here, sets out to offer a first more comprehensive history of these transformation processes, which are still marginalised and only partially understood in both African and global history. Through a series of interlocking case studies on French, Portuguese and Belgian (post)colonies in Southern and Central Africa, it analyses how the interplay of global capitalism, science and empire created new ‘cattle frontiers’ and transformed pre-existing cattle regimes in Africa.