Human Porterage and Colonial State Formation in German East Africa, 1880s–1914: Tensions of Transport (Cambridge Imperial and Post-Colonial Studies)

A Note on Spelling, Currencies, and Measurements Acknowledgments Praise for Human Porterage and Colonial State Formation in German East Africa, 1880s–1914 Contents List of Figures Chapter 1: Introduction: Tensions of Transport The “Porter Question” and the Tensions Within State, Mobility, and Caravan Transport: A Research Agenda Historical Context: The Long-Distance Caravan Economy Sources and Chapter Outline Chapter 2: Shouldering the State: Violence, Coercion, and Professionalism in State-Organized Transport The Colonization of Transport Military Porterage During German Conquest, 1889–1893 Early Interventions into the Labor Market A Bifurcated Recruitment System Making Transport Calculable Spaces of Violence Chapter 3: Facing an Established Business: The Self-Limitation of Colonial Rule State-Making and the Ambiguity of Caravan Transport, c. 1890 Colonial Rule and the Balance of Interests The Codification of Caravan Mobility Challenges from the Inside and Outside Trade Slump and Outmigration After 1900 Chapter 4: Carrying On: Caravan Labor and Legislation in the Colonial Era Colonial Capitalism and Porter Labor The Casualization of Transport Labor, c. 1900 An Economy Not Fully Colonized Old and New Forms of Worker Resistance Labor Migration and Policymaking in a Trans-colonial Sphere Chapter 5: Managing Mobility: The Colonial State as a Gatekeeper of Caravan Travel Legal and Spatial Tools of Gatekeeping, 1889–1906 Policing Trans-border Mobility Health Regimes in the Borderlands Chapter 6: Challenging Spatial Relations: The Colonial Quest for New Infrastructures Infrastructure in Transition, c. 1890 A Growing State Apparatus Investment and Divestment in Roads Caravan and Railway Chapter 7: Epilogue Concluding Remarks Glossary Bibliography Archival Sources Bodleian Library, Commonwealth and African Manuscripts, Oxford, United Kingdom (BDL) British Library, Endangered Archives Programme, London, United Kingdom (BL) Bundesarchiv Abteilung Berlin-Lichterfelde, Germany (BAB) Geheimes Staatsarchiv Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Berlin, Germany (GStA) Evangelisch-Lutherisches Missionswerk Leipzig, Halle/Saale, Germany (ELM) Leibniz-Institut für Länderkunde, Leipzig, Germany (IFL) National Archives of the United Kingdom, Kew, United Kingdom (KEW) Reiss-Engelhorn-Museen, Mannheim, Germany (REM) Royal Museum for Central Africa, Tervuren, Belgium (RMCA) Staatsarchiv Hamburg, Germany (StAHH) Tanzania National Archives, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (TNA) Zanzibar National Archives, Stone Town, Zanzibar, Tanzania (ZNA) British Parliamentary Papers German Parliamentary Papers Annual Reports Law Books Newspapers and Periodicals Books and Articles Index This book explores the role of caravan transport and human porterage in the colony of German East Africa (present-day mainland Tanzania, Rwanda, and Burundi). With caravan mobility being of pivotal importance to colonial rule during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the exploration of vernacular transport and its governance during this period sheds new light on the trajectories of colonial statehood. The author addresses key questions such as the African resilience to colonial interventions, the issue of labor recruitment, and the volatility of colonial infrastructure. This book unveils a fundamental contradiction in the way that German administrators dealt with precolonial modes of transport in East Africa. While colonizers championed for the abolishment of caravan transport, they strongly depended on porters in the absence of pack animals or railways. To bring this contradiction to the fore, the author studies the shifting role of caravans in East Africa during the era of high imperialism. Uncovering the extent to which porters and caravan entrepreneurs challenged and shaped colonial policymaking, this book provides an insightful read for historians studying German Empire and African history, as well as those interested in the history of transport and infrastructure. Andreas Greiner is a research fellow in global and transregional history at the German Historical Institute Washington (GHI), in the USA.. Before joining the GHI, he was a postdoctoral fellow in the Max Weber Program at the European University Institute in Florence and a research assistant for the Chair of Modern History at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich (ETH Zurich)