Patrolling Kariba's Waters
State Authority, Fishing and the Border Economy
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4866322 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Jodie Mcgregor (0000-0002-9028-4363, University College London, corresponding author), Joann Mcgregor |
| Year | 2008 |
| Volume | 34 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 861-879 |
| Publication date | 2008-12-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of Southern African Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0305-7070 • E-ISSN: 1465-3893 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/03057070802456797 |
| OpenAlex | W2049241413 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 6 |
In 2001, as Zimbabwe's crisis deepened, the long-established conservationist regime governing Lake Kariba was increasingly incapacitated and sidelined. At the same time, unregulated economic activities were burgeoning in this marginal frontier, clustered around the productivity of the water and state border. This article examines the reconfiguration of state power and informalisation of livelihoods, as they are revealed in the activities and perspectives of Tonga fishermen in Binga District, whose fishing ‘patrols’ circumvented the lake's rules and whose knowledge of the waters provided opportunities for a stake in other more lucrative trades. These Tonga fishers were the descendants of those displaced by the Kariba Dam and defended their activities in terms of the economics of survival and their identity as ‘river people’ with historic rights to the lake, as they had borne the costs of its creation. Their ability to etch out new informal economic spaces in a time of austerity and inflation was not about the emergence of spaces outside state power, but indicated a re-crafting of the role and nature of the state. Although fishermen's accounts of their everyday life cast state agents as simply one relatively minor component of a network of adversaries that also included poachers, thieves and wildlife, state power was thoroughly implicated in the configuration of risk on the lake and structured the violence and lack of protection intrinsic to illegal activity. The mythologised figure of the crocodile, which featured so prominently in fishermen's stories of the dangers of the water, thus could stand as a metaphor for the state itself, embodying past conservationist priorities and Tonga fishers' marginality, enmeshed with older ideas about power
Agriculture · Economics · Economy · Fishing · Geography · Livelihood · Mainstream · Political economy · Political science · Sociology · Wildlife · African studies and sociopolitical issues · Anthropological Studies and Insights · Law · Socioeconomic Development in Asia
| Unique citing works | 6 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,5 |
| Citation span | 2014 - 2026 (13) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 6 |