Colonizing landscapes/landscaping colonies: from a global history of landscapism to the contemporary landscape approach in nature conservation

I suggest that to decolonize conservation we must also decolonize our way of seeing land and nature-society relations inscribed in it as landscapes. I proceed in three parts. First, drawing on insights from post- and decolonial studies, critical geography, environmental history and political ecology, I highlight three problems that underpin a landscape way of seeing nature-society relations: depoliticization, simplification/decomplexification, and representation. Second, to illustrate the colonial legacy of the contemporary landscape approach to nature conservation, I revisit the global history of landscapism – the double movement of colonizing landscapes/landscaping colonies. This double movement began with the internal colonization of European landscapes (autonomous political communities), and continued through the landscaping of (settler-)colonies by Europeans outside of their homelands. Third, through the contemporary case of a landscape conservation initiative in Tanzania (the so-called "Tarangire-Manyara Ecosystem"), I illustrate the implications of the double movement in the colonial present of African conservation. I conclude with a few remarks on what decolonization of conservation would have to entail in scientific research and practice

Resisting Legibility: State and Conservation Boundaries, Pastoralism, and the Risk of Dispossession through Geospatial Surveys in Tanzania

This article illustrates how the introduction of modern geospatial surveying technology in Tanzania has failed to resolve a boundary conflict between the state and nature conservation authorities on one side and a rural community of pastoralists on the other. Far from fixing a contested geography by resurveying its boundaries and facilitating stakeholder participation for conflict resolution, digital cartography has made visible and reanimated the buried history of mismatched and conflicting logics between state-led territorial administration and conservation, and pastoral land use practices. The article shows how state and conservation officials have relied on the insights from fact-finding exercises to dismiss rural land use practices that are not represented in official maps. Pastoralists resist these state- and conservation-centred cartographic practices of fixed boundaries to maintain a historical, vital geography of seasonal access to pastures and water. By way of conclusion, this article highlights the pitfalls of geospatial land surveys and fact-finding exercises that unearth and lay bare a boundary conflict previously hidden from the state’s view. Through enhanced legibility, rural communities may become visible to the state, risking dispossession and evictions

Rescaling the land rush? Global political ecologies of land use and cover change in key scenario archetypes for achieving the 1.5 °C Paris agreement target

Advancing future-oriented perspectives in political ecology and critical agrarian studies, this paper examines projected land use and land cover change (LULCC) dynamics in four ‘archetypal’ scenarios foregrounded by the IPCC for limiting global warming to 1.5°C by 2100. Focusing on the Global South, we explore how these archetypes project a radical reversal of historical LULCC and rural population trends, potentially implying a considerable rescaling of contemporary land rush dynamics. Taken together, land-based climate mitigation futures highlight risks related to the (re)production of relative surplus populations through processes of rural enclosure and accumulation by dispossession in the Global South

Rescaling the land rush? Global political ecologies of land use and cover change in key scenario archetypes for achieving the 1.5 °C Paris agreement target

Advancing future-oriented perspectives in political ecology and critical agrarian studies, this paper examines projected land use and land cover change (LULCC) dynamics in four ‘archetypal’ scenarios foregrounded by the IPCC for limiting global warming to 1.5°C by 2100. Focusing on the Global South, we explore how these archetypes project a radical reversal of historical LULCC and rural population trends, potentially implying a considerable rescaling of contemporary land rush dynamics. Taken together, land-based climate mitigation futures highlight risks related to the (re)production of relative surplus populations through processes of rural enclosure and accumulation by dispossession in the Global South.publishedVersio