Maria Sapignoli

Indigenous Peoples in Southern Africa

Abstract This article considers the complex cases of indigenous peoples in three Commonwealth countries in southern Africa: Botswana, Namibia and South Africa. In terms of national-level policy, the governments of these countries do not differentiate indigenous peoples from the rest of their populations. They do, however, have programmes aimed at assisting ‘marginalised’ or ‘disadvantaged’ communities. In this article, three main dimensions related to indigenous peoples’ rights in southern Africa are discussed: national policies, indigenous peoples’ rights, and rights to representation; land and resource rights, including rights to water; and language and gender rights. The paper concludes with an assessment of where indigenous peoples stand today in southern Africa.

Settler colonialism, conflicts, and genocide: interactions between hunter-gatherers and settlers in Kenya, and Zimbabwe and northern Botswana

Violent and non-violent conflicts and interactions between hunter-gatherers and settlers took place in a number of areas in eastern and southern Africa during the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Foragers had to cope with the incursions of settlers in their territories, which resulted in significant competition over land and natural resources. This paper examines two such cases: (1) Kenya, looking specifically at conflicts between settlers and local foraging peoples (e.g. Ogiek, ‘Dorobo’, Mukogodo, Boni, Waata, Dahalo, and Aweer, among others) and (2) western Zimbabwe and north eastern Botswana (Tshwa San) and the Zambezi Valley (Doma) of Zimbabwe. In these cases, lands populated by indigenous hunter-gatherers were taken over by settlers, ranchers, state institutions, and private companies. Conflicts between the groups occurred, although there was variation in the degree to which relationships were characterized by violence. Settler colonialism had diverse impacts. Not all of the situations involved deadly conflict; some also involved coercion, collaboration, and co-option. In some instances, settlers and immigrant pastoralists and agriculturalists negotiated with hunter-gatherers to enable them to gain entry to their areas. Some of the questions addressed in this paper include: (1) whether the interactions between hunter-gatherers and settlers can be characterized as cases of either physical or cultural genocide, neither, or both; (2) the role of the state in favoring certain groups (e.g. settlers) at the expense of others; (3) the effectiveness of strategies employed by hunter-gatherers to resist or go along with the agendas of settlers, ranchers, and companies; and (4) the importance of reconciling competing agendas of these different groups.

Dispossession in the Age of Humanity: Human Rights, Citizenship, and Indigeneity in the Central Kalahari

Over the past 50 years, the Central Kalahari region of Botswana became a site of struggles over land and resources rights, identity, citizenship, and indigeneity. The policies of the government of Botswana towards the San express the dominant Tswana perspectives on humanity and what is considered human. Since independence in 1966 the goals of the government of Botswana have been to sedentarise the San and to transform them into ‘modern’ citizens who live in villages, keep livestock, and engage in agriculture and business. In this paper I analyse the case of the people of the Central Kalahari Game Reserve and their battles over rights and recognition as citizens of Botswana and as human beings. I examine how the governments decisions to deny Central Kalahari residents their distinct rights to natural resources such as wildlife—in spite of High Court decisions in the Sans favour—as well as rights to services and development shared by other citizens—are linked to the dominant Tswana understanding of humanity.

Mobility, Land Use, and Leadership in Small-Scale and Middle-Range Societies

Over the past century, the fields of archaeology and anthropology have produced a number of different theoretical approaches and a substantial body of data aimed at ways to understand hunter-gatherer, horticultural, and agropastoral societies. This review considers four recent edited volumes on foraging and food-producing societies. These books deal in innovative ways with a broad array of issues, including transitions in human prehistory and history, mobility, land use, sharing, technology, social leveling strategies, leadership, and the formation of social hierarchies. Small-scale societies include hunter-gatherers or foragers, while middle-range societies may include complex hunter-gatherer (ones with storage and delayed return systems), horticultural, and agropastoral societies, some of them with institutionalized leadership, status hierarchies, and differential access to power and resources. An important set of themes in these books includes diversity in adaptations to complex social and natural environments, the significance of (1) matter, (2) energy, and (3) information in small-scale and middle-range societies on several continents, the persistence of foraging, and the development of inequality. The roles of sharing, exchange, and leadership in small-scale and middle-range societies are explored, as are explanations for social, economic, and political transformations among groups over time and across space.

THE POLITICS AND ECONOMICS OF COMMUNITY-BASED NATURAL RESOURCE MANAGEMENT IN /XAI/XAI, NGAMILAND, BOTSWANA

This study examined assumptions surrounding the issue of community-based natural resource management (CBNRM) projects in southern Africa. Data were drawn from the village of /Xai/Xai in Ngamiland (North West District), Botswana, a multi-ethnic community consisting mainly of Ju/’hoansi San and Herero located on the Botswana-Namibia border in the northern Kalahari Desert. The /Xai /Xai people formed the /Xai/Xai (Cgae Cgae) Tlhabololo Trust in 1997, the first of its kind in Botswana. An examination of the /Xai/Xai Trust’s activities and implementation over time reveals some of the complexities of CBNRM projects, including those relating to management, transparency, benefit distribution, equity, and the impacts of decision-making on local people. Gender, ethnicity, and class issues are examined along with the problem of elite capture of resources, the tendency of the state to favor private companies, the challenges of conflicting government policies, and power relations at the local, district, and national levels. The analysis shows that if CBNRM projects are to be successful, then community-based institutions and their members as well as district councils and the central government must be able to come to agreements about benefit distribution, ways to resolve conflicts, provision of investment in livelihood-related activities, and security of tenure over land and resources.

Development and Dispossession: Impacts of Land Reform in Botswana

This chapter considers changes in land tenure over time in Botswana, looking at the processes of change in land distribution and land tenure reform. Two general processes of change in land tenure are considered: (1) the establishment of freehold areas under the colonial government, and (2) the post-independence land reforms in the tribal lands. The chapter also considers the various factors that led to dispossession of sizable numbers of poor people in Botswana. Particular emphasis is placed on the processes of dispossession of some of the poorest people in Botswana, the San, or, the Basarwa. The issue that remains to be solved is what rights local people will have to ensure that they benefit from the presence of commercial cattle ranches, private hunting concessions or mining operations on the lands which they have fought so hard to retain. Keywords:Botswana land reform; land tenure; post-colonial period; post-independence land reforms; private hunting; San