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The Development of Degradation And THE DEVELOPMENT OF DEGRADATION AND IMPOVERISHMENT: Neocolonialism and the Crisis of People and the Environment in East Africa GAVIN EMMONS A THESIS SUBMITTED IN FULFILLMENT OF A SOCIOLOGY/ANTHROPOLOGY DEGREE AT LEWIS & CLARK COLLEGE 1996 Abstract This thesis focuses on a consideration of the issues of conservation, sustainable development, and environmental management in the East Africa Region - primarily in the East African nations of Kenya and Tanzania - within the larger sociocultural and political framework of the complex diversity of interactions between people and the environment at the international, national, and local levels. In particular, this study examines the power dynamics that have historically characterized issues of human and environmental management, sustainability, and development in East Africa, by focusing on global capitalist and colonial factors, community oppression and resistance, gender domination, and the geographical context of the physical, social, and ideological realms in East Africa. In stressing the exploitation and domination inherent in conservation strategies and development policies in East Africa, this thesis is intended to demonstrate not only that human impoverishment and inequality are inseparably linked with environmental degradation and crises in East Africa, but also that economic wealth, overdevelopment, and dominance in "the North" (primarily Europe and America) are directly connected to this continuing degradation in "the South." This thesis suggests that these power dynamics must be addressed directly if environmental and human sustainability are to emerge, and if ecological and social degradation and crises of epic proportions are to be avoided in East Africa and globally. THE DEVELOPMENT OF DEGRADATION AND IMPOVERISHMENT: Neocolonialism and the Crisis of People and the Environment in East Africa (View Title Page and Abstract...) CONTENTS CHAPTER 3: The Roots CHAPTER 6: The INTRODUCTION:The of Sustainable Worldwide Ivory Ban: Development of Degradation Conservation: The Consequences and and Impoverishment Precolonial Period Considerations CHAPTER 4: The CHAPTER 7: Institutionalization of CHAPTER 1: Research "Northern" NGOs: Oppression and Methods Neoimpeialism and Dependency: The Colonial Dependency Period CONCLUSION: CHAPTER 5: Inheriting a Rethinking CHAPTER 2: Literary Legacy of Domination: Conservation and Review and Framework The Postcolonial Period Development: Struggling for Justice INTRODUCTION: The Development of Degradation and Impoverishment Exploring East Africa as a student last spring, I was overcome by the beauty and the vitality of the region. The East African countries of Kenya and Tanzania contain nearly 1500 species of birds and hundreds of species of mammals, and are renowned for some of the greatest concentrations of large, mammalian species in the world. Traveling through East Africa, I saw vast biodiversity of flora and fauna, ecosystems ranging from coastal rainforests to semi-arid deserts to alpine moorlands. I also witnessed the immense, rolling plains of savanna and acacia woodlands, which contain the Olduvai Gorge in the Serengeti plains of Tanzania, internationally recognized as the cradle of hominid origins. A vast diversity of cultural groups ranging from pastoralists to intensive agriculturalists have lived in East Africa for thousands of years. My time in East Africa clearly impressed upon me the human and environmental richness that has historically thrived in the region. Exploring East Africa as a student last spring, I was also overcome by the horrible impoverishment and degradation in the region. Soil erosion, wildlife poaching, desertification, deforestation, toxic dumping, industrial pollution, poisoning of coastal waters, and siltation of rivers have been adversely affecting East Africa throughout Kenya and Tanzania on a massive scale. In both urban and rural areas, I witnessed severe human degradation. As human populations continue to skyrocket in Kenya and Tanzania and the majority are denied adequate health care, education, housing, access to resources, and access to the empowerment of their own lives, the social and natural environment in urban and especially rural East Africa continues to worsen. Notwithstanding the "great human and natural resources [in the region], Africa is in crisis" (Veit et al., 1995: 2). The degradation of people and of the environment in Kenya and Tanzania exemplify this crisis situation. The magnitude of this crisis in East Africa truly impressed upon me the importance of the complex geography of the region. The geography of the East Africa Region is a complex tapestry of social and ecological structures that includes within its weave the slum life and the foreign ownership of resources within the urban centers; the impoverishment and marginalization of rural communities; the agricultural expansion and settlement of an increasing human population; the urban migration of an increasing population of rural males; the ineffectiveness of conservation strategies designed by international organizations and elitist national governments; the gender domination of women that prevents them from owning property; the colonial and capitalist domination of East Africa throughout the last century of its history; and the increasing degradation of the environment throughout the region. None of these phenomena in Kenya and Tanzania are separate issues, but rather are part of a greater context of power dynamics, of people interacting with the environment on a number of levels, with a number of ideological frameworks and intentions. East Africa is in a state of human and environmental crisis today, and within the context of this degradation and impoverishment lies a sociohistorical framework of exploitation, "development," and domination that must be critically examined, revealed, and deconstructed. I began to consider the complexity of the dynamic between human impoverishment and environmental degradation in East Africa by exploring conservation policies and sustainable development strategies in Kenya and Tanzania, during the 4 months I spent in the region. Land management, environmental protection, and sustainable development in East Africa have been significant forces in Kenya and Tanzania, especially because tourism (primarily eco-tourism) and the export of cash crops have been the main GNP earners for the country in the context of a global economy. This socioeconomic context is important because it reflects the political, economic, and social power that has been wielded in the East Africa Region historically by the British and by the U.S. In this sense, land management and conservation in East Africa are especially significant because they reveal a greater context of power dynamics that Kenya and Tanzania continue to be involved in at international, national, and local levels. Even as I focused on studying the efficacy and limitations of national parks, reserves, and community-based conservation areas in East Africa, it became clear that conservation exists as one thread within the context of a much larger weave of sociocultural interactions and issues of domination and exploitation in the East African geographical, socioeconomic, and political space. Because Kenya and Tanzania are relatively resource-poor in terms of minerals, fossil fuels, and marine flora and fauna, they depend heavily upon the resources of the land for capital and for the economic and cultural survival of their people. Together, Kenya and Tanzania have about 15 per cent of the countries' space set aside for parks and game reserves, and much of the rest is dependent on intensive agricultural and grazing activities to maintain the livelihood of East African peoples. Within the context of this dynamic of land use and management, the history of colonial domination and of postcolonial, capitalist control of East Africa's resources have continued to significantly shape the interactions between people and the environment; this social and economic partitioning of the land, of the resources, and of the people, is part of an oppressive imperialist legacy of colonial and capitalist involvement in East Africa that continues to be directly responsible for the environmental degradation, the human impoverishment, and the underdevelopment of Kenya and Tanzania within the world economy. Based on my studies of land management and sustainable development in East Africa, my experience of the East African geography on physical, socioeconomic, political, and cultural levels, and my subsequent, critical analysis of works dealing with and related to the subject, upon my return to America, it is the position of this thesis that the ecological and human crisis in East Africa is directly related to a continuing system of imperialist domination and control guided by development and conservation strategies that preserve the oppressive, dependency relationships between the "North" and "South" globally, between the elitist state and the people nationally, and between cultural groups and men and women locally. Through the course of this thesis I hope to demonstrate that the power dynamics that have fundamentally shaped the history and the geography of the East Africa Region have created and perpetuated the crisis situation of impoverishment and degradation in Kenya and Tanzania today; only by actively addressing this complex system of power dynamics and of systems of domination can truly liberating conservation and development efforts emerge in East Africa and worldwide. Tracing
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