Historical Perspectives on Pre-Colonial Irrigation in Southern Africa

Abstract

One of the basic areas of interaction between water as natural resource and human societies as agents of cultural transformation is the technology of irrigation. In Africa at least 66 per cent of the available water is used for purposes of irrigation. For more than 4 000 years irrigation has secured food supplies for humans on a continent that is noted for its relative shortage of sufficient natural water supplies.

There is a remarkable hidden power of water in the history of southern Africa. This is particularly the case when we consider the development of early irrigation technologies of Iron Age farmers. The small irrigation furrow of the subsistence farmer was just as important to an insular community of Bantu-speaking people in pre-colonial times, as is the sophisticated irrigation technology in present-day South Africa. Currently there is a paucity of information about pre-colonial indigenous irrigation technology. This can be ascribed to a number of factors of which the invasion of modern Western traditions in the nineteenth century is perhaps the most important. A number of other factors for the apparent blind-spot is also presented in this study.

In southern Africa there are traces of indigenous pre-colonial irrigation works at sites such as Nyanga in Zimbabwe; the Limpopo River Valley; Mpumalanga; and South Africa's eastern Highveld. Reference is also made in this article to specific strategies of irrigation used by Iron Age communities, prior to the advent of a colonial presence. Finally, attention is also drawn to pre-colonial land tenure and state formation against the backdrop of Wittfogel's theories on hydraulic society.     

Conflict in Water Use in Victoria,Australia: Bolte's Divide

In 1964, the Premier of Victoria, Australia, Henry Bolte, announced that, in order to protect irrigation interests in the north of the state, he would prevent Melbourne from developing new water resources from the north of Victoria's Great Divide. Neither the water resource needs of Melbourne, the need for irrigation development nor the changing economic structure of the state provides a satisfactory explanation for this decision. Instead, Bolte's policy appears simply to have provided a means of improving the parliamentary position of the Victorian Liberal government. Bolte's principle has never been formally revoked and continues to influence water resource planning in the state. In order to make the most appropriate use of Victoria's limited natural resources, it is imperative that ‘Bolte's divide’ should not continue to influence future resource development and allocation.     

Taming Surface Water in Pre-Islamic Southeast Arabia: Archaeological,Geoarchaeological, and Chronological Evidence of Runoff Water Channeling in Masāfī (UAE)

In semi-arid to arid environments, water is the most constraining resource for agricultural communities. In Southeast Arabia (Sultanate of Oman and United Arab Emirates), the demographic growth and the increase of sites at the beginning of the Iron Age II (1100–600 b.c.) is generally attributed to the development of groundwater harvesting techniques, and more precisely to qanāt technology. While only little is known on the origin of this technology, even less is known about other hydraulic techniques, which could have been used as a complementary source of water. An irrigation system, recently discovered near an Iron Age settlement in the oasis of Masāfī (UAE) was studied thanks to the combination of various methods—archaeology, geoarchaeology/micromorphology, spatial analysis, and chronology—which have allowed us to identify the technological development of small-scale runoff farming and to link this practice to social as well as environmental issues.     

Desertification Processes and the Search for Solutions

Abstract

This paper reviews the evidence of desertification as reported in the scientific literature by ecologists, meteorologists, hydrologists, archeologists and various other disciplines. There is not as yet full agreement as to the extent and causes of this phenomenon. World wide climatic changes have been cited as causative factors, but the influence of man is still considered by most investigators as the dominant cause, possibly exacerbating cyclic climatic changes. Deserts, semi-arid and marginally productive areas vary greatly in extent and for different reasons.

Results of research and development have indicated that the enlightened intercession of man can contain and reverse this process. Sound management and conservation of existing land and water resources seem to be the basic needs and are perhaps the easiest technology to transfer to the desert farmer and nomad. The introduction of drought-hardy tree and bushes of economic value to bind drifting sand dunes and to regenerate overgrazed pastures have also proven their value. Recent research has shown the possibility for better utilization of water resources including brackish water for irrigation of agricultural crops.

Many other fields of technology are being applied to this problem, but the major focus will undoubtedly have to be on man himself and there has been some research on social organization, nomadism and sedentarization, technology transfer, population control, directions of education and a host of similar problems. Much more work will have to be channelled into this direction, however, if real progress is to be attained.     

The violence of spectacle: Statist schemes to green the desert and constructing Astana and Ashgabat as urban oases

Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan have been home to the most impressive urban development projects in the entire post-Soviet world. Their capitals, Astana and Ashgabat, now boast uniquely monumental architecture and local leaders have invested heavily in ‘green belt’ projects to surround the cities with lush vegetation, as well as developing green and water-laden public spaces. In doing so, elites have drawn on Soviet-era ‘garden city’ idealism, as well as more recent environmental sustainability narratives. Yet these schemes are anything but sustainable. Unfolding on the arid Central Asian steppe, they depend on heavy irrigation, with water diverted from rivers that already fail to meet regional demands. Employing a comparative approach, I ask why and with what effect state planners have sought to craft Astana and Ashgabat as spectacularly green ‘urban oases,’ when their local climates should defy the logic of sustainability. In so doing, I consider urban greening in the two countries as part of a wider phenomenon of statist schemes to green the desert, which have a long and diverse history. Extending the literature on desert greening, I argue that the structural violence they manifest and perpetuate is best understood by attending to how they operate as a form of spectacle.     

石寨山文化农业述略

以考古发现及既有研究成果为基础,可对战国秦汉时期滇池区域石寨山文化农业面貌进行讨论。石寨山文化有完整的农业技术体系。该文化居民有一套完整的以锄、铲、镰、斧等为代表生产工具体,且工具种类的使用具有倾向性,牛耕还尚未运用到农业生产中,稻、麦、粟复种的作物结构已形成,掌握一定的灌溉以及粮食储存技术,并且还可能有一套较为完整的农业仪式。     

Land Reforms at Centre Stage: The Evidence on West Bengal

The debate on the agrarian problem in developing countries has alternated between a stress on the necessity for land reforms and an emphasis on the introduction of productivity-enhancing technology, leading to a trickle-down effect. In the Indian state of West Bengal, the former strategy has been pursued since the mid-1970s. Most observers agree that this approach has stimulated a ‘virtuous circle’, leading to higher production, a decrease in poverty and in polarization, and a perceptible improvement of the human development index. This article addresses the causality sequence, namely, whether land reform or irrigation has acted as the kick-start mechanism to these improvements. The irrigation figures are not impressive, either in comparison with the outlay in other Indian states, or in terms of crop coverage. The explanation for activation of a virtuous circle may therefore be found in land reform, at least if land reform is considered and implemented in its comprehensive meaning: intervention in the relations of production, the forces of production and the broad social and political parameters.     

Milton’s Euripides and the superior rationality of the heathen

ABSTRACT

If arguments have always been made either that Milton maintains the primacy of the Bible over classical literature, or that he often presents classical sentiments as congruent with the biblical, one claim that has rarely been made is that Milton is willing to assert the truth of classical literature over that of the Bible. This article argues that there are moments in the canon that show him capable of doing precisely this, with particular reference to the invocation of his favourite Greek dramatist, Euripides. The article considers Milton’s reading and interpretation of Euripides in his early poetry and prose, before examining more closely the citation of Euripides in two of the prose works which bear heavily on the question of how politically and religiously radical Milton was: The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates and De Doctrina Christiana. The turn to Euripidean authority over the biblical reveals Milton’s willingness to subject Scripture to the test of pagan wisdom, if he judges that wisdom to have superior claims to rationality. This willingness derives from the development of his ethical thought in the 1630s and early 1640s, and from his understanding of classical, patristic and contemporary authorities, including John Selden.     

FDI and Local Economic Development: The Case of Taiwanese Investment in Kunshan

The extent to which foreign direct investment (FDI) can foster the long-term economic development of lagging regions remains a highly debated issue in the literature, even in the current era of intense territorial competition for mobile investment and resources. The emergence of new industrial spaces in China that have flourished through FDI offers a good opportunity to revisit the topic. Kunshan in Suzhou, China has evolved from an impoverished area into a world-class information technology (IT) centre within 25 years. FDI, mainly from Taiwan, has enabled Kunshan to gradually upgrade its economy, following a development path that has been largely based on the transplant of entire production chains from Taiwan. Local innovative strategies for attracting and increasing the embeddedness of Taiwanese FDI are also an important element of Kunshan's success. This paper discusses the positive aspects, as well as the potential costs and negative facets, of FDI in Kunshan, with the view to draw some policy lessons regarding the impact of FDI on the economic development of lagging regions.     

Networks and place in Montreal's independent music industry

The significance of networks for independent music producers has been well established in the urban‐economic geography literature and the literature centred on cultural industries. In this article, we seek to build on this literature by considering how place‐based attributes mediate network development; that is to say, how the unique characteristics of place (such as historical and cultural attributes) determine networking outcomes among spatially proximate actors. Specifically, we consider the importance of place through an examination of Montreal's independent music industry. Drawing on 46 semi‐structured interviews with key actors in the industry, we illustrate how Montreal's bilingual identity contributes to network dynamics within the industry.     

Technology and crisis; Marx,Schumpeter and beyond

Observing that the notion of economic crisis per se has, from its origins, been closely tied to the idea of technological progress, this article examines the roots and development of this liaison in Marx, Schumpeter and the recent contribution of Freeman, et al. (1982). A concept (the Third Sector) is proposed for the relation between the structural evolution of economic organization and technological progress; this concept is developed through a critique of Marx and Schumpeter in the light of contemporary economic circumstances, and as complementary to the more technology‐generic “new technology systems” approach of Freeman, et al. In conclusion it is found, on a cursory examination, that the organizational changes implied by the Third Sector are corroborated by the evolution of technology‐based multinational corporations, while echoing Marx and Schumpeter in their possible consequences for economic crisis in the 1980's.     

都江堰:东亚本土知识及其普世意义的一个案例

Dujiangyan irrigation system of more than 2000 years history is a symbol of originality of Chinese ancestors both in its conception and project mode. It is still working well and benefit Chengdu Plain nowadays while other comparable water conservancy projects of the same or later age have vanished and been forgotten. More than just a world-famous cultural heritage, it shows the harmonious relationship between man and nature. And it also reveals us how to solve problems in the era of economic globalization, such as the constantly silt up of the dams, the exhaustion of the energy and the crisis of the deterioration of ecosystem. The inspirations it gives us range from technology to humanities, from economy to various aspects in social life. In a word, Dujiangyan irrigation system demonstrates the wisdom and creativity of Chinese people and has a universal significance despite the change of time and space. Translated by Li Dan from Shijie wenhua de dongya shijiao: quanqiuhua jincheng zhong de dongfang wenming 世界文化的东亚视角: 全球化进程中的东方文明 (East Asia’s view on world culture: East civilizations in the process of globalization). Beijing: Beijing daxue chubanshe, 2007, 127–141.     

Exploitation of groundwater in the oasis of Masāfī (UAE): A diachronic perspective

In order to understand the role of water resources in the establishment and long-term evolution of settlements investigated by the French Archaeological Mission in the UAE in the oasis of Masāfī, wells and springs of all periods, identified at the surface and in stratified contexts, were mapped and studied thanks to a multidisciplinary approach combining archaeology, geomorphology, geoarchaeology and ethnography. Our study demonstrates that:

• – The Masāfī oasis was located in a specific geological setting entailing the accumulation of groundwater resources at reachable depth.
• – The groundwater resources remained rather stable from the mid-second millennium BC to the second half of the twentieth century AD. In this respect, the apparent abandonment of the oasis during some periods cannot be explained by water depletion.
• – The groundwater resources have decreased sharply since the second half of the twentieth century AD, due to the introduction of new water extraction technologies, motor pumps and then drillings, as a result of the modernisation and industrialisation of UAE economy.

Our study also stresses the importance of well and spring irrigation in the development of the sedentary settlements in south-eastern Arabia, technologies that have often been neglected in the regional archaeological literature in favour of the qanāt.     

From interdisciplinary to inter‐epistemological approaches: Confronting the challenges of integrated climate change research

Spurred by the literature on climate change and its calls for undertaking holistic research that more fully integrates the work of biophysical and social scientists, this article responds to the question: To what extent has climate change research in Canada embraced and been guided by the theories and tenets associated with interdisciplinarity and to what extent have integrated approaches been sensitive to cross‐cultural perspectives? It provides an overview of some of the epistemological issues raised in the interdisciplinarity literature that particularly impact research development and design. Furthermore, since much of the climate change literature that claims to be integrated or interdisciplinary draws from Indigenous Knowledge (IK), additional insights are provided from this perspective. The article develops a framework that can be used to undertake and/or evaluate research in a way that acknowledges “upstream” epistemological issues. The framework is then used to evaluate a comprehensive database (n = 282) of Canadian climate change articles. It is argued that an interdisciplinary approach adds a critical voice to the literature on integrated climate change research and is valuable because of its focus on epistemology and methodology. The article advocates the creation of a space for inter‐epistemological acknowledgement in which the academy develops an ethos of self‐reflection, while simultaneously respecting and integrating parallel knowledge frameworks, such as IK.     

Decadent Conservatism: Politics and Aesthetics in The Senate

Abstract: The relationship between late-Victorian Decadence and Aestheticism and politics has long been vexed. This article explores the hitherto under-explored confluence of conservatism and avant-garde literature in the period by introducing The Senate, a Tory-Decadent journal that ran from 1894-7. While Decadent authors occupied various political positions, this article argues that The Senate offers a crucial link between conservatism and Decadence The article presents the journal in its political and publishing context, outlining its editorial position on such issues as the Liberal Unionist-Conservative coalition governments, Britain's relationship with Europe and the threat of ‘State Socialism’, as well as its valorisation of Bollingbroke and eighteenth-century Toryism, and its relationship to, and difference from, key Decadent journals the Yellow Book and The Savoy. It then goes on to articulate its relationship to Decadence by focussing on the presence of Paul Verlaine in its pages and its vitriolic response to the press coverage of Oscar Wilde's trials. The article concludes by exploring the surprising wake of The Senate, briefly tracing the editors' influence in the development of Modernism and links with the journal BLAST.     

Teaching “notre littérature”: The Place of la littérature québécoise in the Curriculum in Quebec

Recent calls for a greater emphasis on the teaching of Quebec literature from primary school to cégep once more link the teaching of Quebec literature with the survival of a language and a culture. The current debate echoes those which have taken place over the last 100 years, both under the denominational system of education and since the Révolution tranquille. Different pedagogical and ideological factors have influenced not only whether Francophone Canadian literature has been taught, but also what has been taught and how it has been taught. Anxieties about the status, history and definition of “notre littérature” have recurred throughout the century, as have concerns about the relationship between the literature of Quebec and the literature of metropolitan France. This article will discuss the teaching of literature in Quebec since 1900 to conclude with a consideration of the teaching of Francophone Canadian literature in Quebec today.     

Rethinking Western Motu Descent Groups

The Motu‐Koitabu are the traditional inhabitants of the site of Papua New Guinea's capital city, Port Moresby, and well represented in a body of literature, from the 1870s on, encompassing oral history, archaeology and social anthropology. A basic unit of Motu‐Koitabu society is the iduhu, a corporate group which is nowadays conventionally glossed locally as a ‘clan’ in English, but represented in anthropological literature as more ambiguous in nature than the gloss implies. Considering the literature in the light of recent fieldwork in a Motu‐Koitabu village, this article takes issue with an argument developed in the 1950s, which has become an accepted wisdom, that the structure of iduhu was threatened by the social consequences of missionisation and colonialism, and that iduhu were saved from collapse by new leaders, church deacons, who replaced traditional leaders. A re‐examination of the nature of iduhu, a partial reinterpretation of notions of leadership and prestige and an account of two recent disputes brought to a village court inform an argument that iduhu have been more resilient than previous researchers have thought. In this regard concepts of leadership among the Motu‐Koitabu need clarification, and it is suggested that the importance of landholding has been underestimated in previous attempts to understand what iduhu are.     

Vegetation,land, and wood use at the sites of Bat and Al‐Khashbah in Oman (fourth–third millennium BC)

About 4200 charcoal fragments have been identified from the fourth‐ to third‐millennium BC archaeological sites of Bat and Al‐Khashbah in order to gain an understanding of plant resources available at the sites. Acacia sp., Ziziphus sp., and Tamarix sp. were the main taxa identified at both sites and indicate a similar vegetation composition as today. Phoenix sp. (date palm) charcoal also has been found at both sites. Whereas the cultivation of date palm for the 2700–2300 BC layers from Bat was likely, given other circumstantial evidence (i.e. local cereal cultivation and floodwater irrigation), it is unclear whether date palm was cultivated at Al‐Khashbah. Especially for the older periods (3300–2700 BC) it is possible that nomadic pastoralists were exploiting and/or managing wild date palms. The find of Avicennia marina at Al‐Khashbah indicates long‐distance contacts with the coast.     

Local Intermediaries? The Missionising and Governing of Colonial Subjects in South Dutch New Guinea, 1920–42

This paper will show that the colonial project in south Dutch New Guinea was a joint project in which evangelisation, education, ‘civilisation’ and ‘pacification’ were taken up by the Dutch Catholic mission in close collusion with the colonial government. This was also a project in which a few Dutch missionaries deployed many goeroes (teachers) from elsewhere in the Dutch East Indies. These goeroes had an important position assigned to them by the Catholic mission and colonial government in the development of the Papuans and the area. This colonial structure utilised by both Dutch colonial administrators and missionaries has been labelled in the literature as a system of ‘dual colonialism’. Drawing on records held in missionary and colonial archives, the paper explores this dual colonial structure by analysing the roles of Catholic goeroes from the Kei and Tanimbar islands. This is done by taking Felix Driver’s concept of local intermediaries as the point of departure. While this concept makes visible the key role of goeroes, it is not without its issues, which will also be explored.     

Talent,technology and tolerance in Canadian regional development

This article examines the factors that shape economic development in Canadian regions. It employs path analysis and structural equation models to isolate the effects of technology, human capital and/or the creative class, universities, the diversity of service industries and openness to immigrants, minorities and gay and lesbian populations on regional income. It also examines the effects of several broad occupations groups—business and finance, management, science, arts and culture, education and health care—on regional income. The findings indicate that both human capital and the creative class have a direct effect on regional income. Openness and tolerance also have a significant effect on regional development in Canada. Openness towards the gay and lesbian population has a direct effect on both human capital and the creative class, while tolerance towards immigrants and visible minorities is directly associated with higher regional incomes. The university has a relatively weak effect on regional incomes and on technology as well. Management, business and finance and science occupations have a sizeable effect on regional income; arts and culture occupations have a significant effect on technology; health and education occupations have no effect on regional income.