Salvaging empire : sovereignty, natural resources, and environmental science in the South Atlantic

**__Salvaging Empire__** **probes the historical roots and current predicaments of a twenty-first century settler colony seeking to control an uncertain future through resource management and environmental science.** Four decades after a violent 1982 war between the United Kingdom and Argentina reestablished British authority over the Falkland Islands (Las Malvinas in Spanish), a commercial fishing boom and offshore oil discoveries have intensified the sovereignty dispute over the South Atlantic archipelago. Scholarly literature on the South Atlantic focuses primarily on military history of the 1982 conflict. However, contested claims over natural resources have now made this disputed territory a critical site for examining the wider relationship between imperial sovereignty and environmental governance. James J. A. Blair argues that by claiming self-determination and consenting to British sovereignty, the Falkland Islanders have crafted a settler colonial protectorate to extract resources and extend empire in the South Atlantic. Responding to current debates in environmental anthropology, critical geography, Atlantic history, political ecology, and science and technology studies, Blair describes how settlers have asserted indigeneity in dynamic relation with the environment. __Salvaging Empire__ uncovers the South Atlantic's outsized importance for understanding the broader implications of resource management and environmental science for the geopolitics of empire. Contents 7 Acknowledgments 9 Abbreviations 15 Reference map of oil drilling areas licensed by the Falkland Islands Government 17 Introduction: British to the Core 21 Part 1: Dispossession 47 1. Settler Safe Zone Or Colonial Staging Ground? 47 2. Company Islands 68 3. Imperial Diaspora 92 Part 2: Wreckage 119 4. Does the Sea Lion Roar? 119 5. Grounding Offshore Oil 146 Part 3: Survival 165 6. The Geopolitics of Marine Ecology 165 7. Colonizing with Natives 189 Conclusion: Unsettled Claims 210 Notes 219 References 257 Index 303 "Drawing on ethnographic and historical field research in the Falklands, Argentina and the UK, this book argues that by claiming self-determination and consenting to British sovereignty, the Falkland Islanders have crafted a settler colonial protectorate to extract resources and extend empire in the South Atlantic"- Provided by publisher