Abstract
The specific ecology and political economy of the equatorial Atlantic island of São Tomé made it the largest cocoa producer in the world by the 1900s. The environmental degradation of those cocoa plantations inspired conservationist discourses, opening possibilities to think about alternative colonial futures. This chapter discusses how encounters between people and the environment came into conflict with colonial power. By showing how human/nonhuman relations were messier and more contingent than what was acknowledged by actors—planters were not in full control of their enterprise, experts disagreed on how to organize their actions and the colonial state had to negotiate its authority—this chapter examines the multiple ways nature interfered with the aims of those who ruled, thus interrogating the concept of resistance.
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Notes
- 1.
See Kevin Grant, A Civilised Savagery: Britain and the New Slaveries in Africa, 1884–1926 (New York: Routledge, 2005), chapter 4 and Miguel Bandeira Jerónimo, The “Civilizing Mission” of Portuguese Colonialism, 1870–1930 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015), part I.
- 2.
“Acta do Centro Colonial no. 91, 22 de Abril de 1909”, Boletim do Centro Colonial de Lisboa, 1, no. 2 (May 1909), 17. This bulletin was part of the lobbying strategy of Portuguese cocoa planters.
- 3.
Gerhard Seibert, “São Tomé and Príncipe: The First Plantation Economy in the Tropics”, in Robin Law, Suzanne Schwarz and Silke Strickrodt (eds.), Commercial Agriculture, the Slave Trade and Slavery in Atlantic Africa (Woodbridge, Suffolk: James Currey, 2013), pp. 54–78.
- 4.
On the history of São Tomé see: Pablo B. Eyzaguirre, “Small Farmers and Estates in São Tomé, West Africa” (PhD diss., Yale University, 1986); Tony Hodges and Malyn Newitt, São Tomé and Príncipe: From Plantation Colony to Microstate (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1988); Augusto Nascimento, “S. Tomé na segunda metade de oitocentos: nascimento de uma sociedade colonial” (Master diss., Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 1992); Augusto Nascimento, Poderes e Quotidiano nas roças de S. Tomé e Príncipe: De finais de oitocentros a meados de novocentos (Lousã: Tipografia Lousanense, 2002); Marta Macedo, “Standard Cocoa: Transnational Networks and Technoscientific Regimes in West African Plantations”, Technology and Culture, 57, no. 3 (2016).
- 5.
Antonio de Almada Negreiros, Les colonies portugaises; études documentaires sur les possessions portugaise et leurs produits d’exportation: Exposition Coloniale de Paris 1906 (Paris: A. Challamel, 1906), p. 93.
- 6.
Auguste Chevalier, Le cacaoyer dans l’Ouest africain (Paris: A. Challamel, 1908), p. 24.
- 7.
Geraldo A. Lorenzino, “Linguistic, Historical and Ethnographic Evidence on the Formation of the Angolares, A Maroon-Descendant Community in Sao Tome (West Africa)”, Portuguese Studies Review, 15, no. 1–2 (2007); Gerhard Seibert, “Castaways, Autochthons, or Maroons? The Debate on the Angolares of São Tomé Island”, in Philip J. Havik and Malyn Newitt (ed.), Creole Societies in the Portuguese Colonial Empire (Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2015).
- 8.
Richard H. Grove, Green Imperialism: Colonial Expansion, Tropical Island Edens and the Origins of Environmentalism, 1600–1860 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996) and Richard H. Grove, Ecology, Climate and Empire: Colonialism and Global Environmental History, 1400–1940 (Cambridge: The White Horse Press, 1997).
- 9.
Helen Tilley, Africa as a Living Laboratory: Empire, Development, and the Problem of Scientific Knowledge, 1870–1950 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2011).
- 10.
Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing, Friction: An Ethnography of Global Connection (Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2005). The creative collaborations between humans and nonhumans in damaged landscapes are also the subject addressed in Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing, The Mushroom at the End of the World: On the Possibility of Life in Capitalist Ruins (Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2015).
- 11.
The literature on resistance to different forms of European colonial domination and exploitations is immense. See for instance: Allen Isaacman, The Tradition of Resistance in Mozambique: Anti-Colonial Activity in the Zambezi Valley, 1850–1921 (London: Heinemann, 1976); Terence Ranger, The African Voice in Southern Rhodesia, 1898–1930 (London: Heinemann, 1970); James C. Scott, Weapons of the Weak: Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1985).
- 12.
Nascimento, “S. Tomé na segunda metade de oitocentos”; Nascimento, Poderes e quotidiano nas rocas de S. Tomé e Príncipe.
- 13.
James C. Scott, Seeing like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition have Failed (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998).
- 14.
Grove, Ecology, Climate and Empire.
- 15.
John R. McNeill, “Future Research Needs in Environmental History: Region, Eras, and Themes”, in Kimberley Coulter and Christof Mauch (eds.), The Futures of Environmental History: Needs and Opportunities (Munich: Rachel Carson Center, 2011), p. 15.
- 16.
Ellen Stroud, “Does Nature Always Matter? Following Dirt through History”, History and Theory, 42, no. 4, Theme Issue: Environment and History (2003).
- 17.
Pedro Lains, “Causas do colonialismo português em África, 1822–1975”, Análise social, 33, no. 146–147 (1998), 482.
- 18.
Jerónimo, The “civilizing mission”.
- 19.
José Joaquim de Almeida, “Relatório da vista ao Jardim Botânico de Vitória (Camarões)”, Revista Agronómica, 6, no. 4–11 (1906).
- 20.
Christophe Bonneuil, “Crafting and Disciplining the Tropics: Plant Science in the French Colonies”, in John Krige and Dominique Preste (eds.), Companion to Science in the Twentieth Century (London: Routledge, 2003).
- 21.
José Joaquim de Almeida and Acrísio Canas Mendes, Les plus graves maladies du cacaoyer à S. Tomé (Lisboa: Imprimerie “A Editora”, 1910).
- 22.
J. E. Carvalho de Almeida, Impressões de uma viagem à ilha de S. Tomé: a constituição dos terrenos e as vantagens das adubações químicas (Lisboa: Tipografia M. Correia dos Santos, 1911).
- 23.
On March 7, 1876 the colonial government issued a law established the position of an agronomist in each oversee province of the Portuguese Empire.
- 24.
Armando Cortesão, “Relatório de uma missão às Índias Ocidentais I”, Revista Agronómica, 11, no. 21–24 (1915) and Armando Cortesão, “Relatório de uma missão às Índias Ocidentais II”, Revista Agronómica, 12, no. 25–36 (1916).
- 25.
Armando de Seabra and Antero Frederico Seabra, As doenças das plantações de cacau das ilhas de S. Tomé e Príncipe: os serviços técnicos de combate contra as epifitias, Companhia Agrícola Ultramarina, Secção Técnica e de Patologia Vegetal (Lisboa: Tipografia da Empresa Diário de Notícias, 1921). For a complete list of the publications see pages 137–139.
- 26.
Armando Cortesão, “Uma nova doença dos cacaueiros em São Tomé”, Boletim Oficial de São Tomé e Príncipe, no. 19 (March 11, 1918), 233.
- 27.
Amando de Seabra, Estudos sobre as doenças e parasitas do cacaueiro e de outras plantas cultivadas em S. Thomé. XVIII. A moléstia nova dos Cacueiros na Ilha de São Tomé (Lisboa: Tipografia Empresa do Diário de Notícias, 1919); Amando de Seabra, Estudos sobre as doenças e parasitas do cacaueiro e de outras plantas cultivadas em S. Thomé. XIX. A seca dos ramos dos cacaueiros (Lisboa: Tipografia Empresa do Diário de Notícias, 1919); Antero Frederico Seabra, Études sur les maladies et les parasites du cacaoyer et d’autres plantes cultivées à S. Thomé. VII. Quelques observations sur le “Thrips” du cacaoyer (Lisbonne: Société Portugaise des Sciences Naturelles, 1919); Antero Frederico Seabra, Études sur les maladies et les parasites du cacaoyer et d’autres plantes cultivées à S. Thomé. XVI. Note préliminaire sur la Maladie des Cacaoyers connue à S. Thomé sous la désignation de “Seca dos ramos” (Lisbonne: Imprimerie de l’ Empresa Diario de Noticias, Lisbonne, 1921); Antero Frederico Seabra, Études sur les maladies et les parasites du Cacaoyer et d’autres plantes cultivées à S. Thomé. XXX. Encore le Thrips du Cacaoyer (Heliothrips rubrocinctus (Giard)) à S. Thomé (Lisbonne: Imprimerie de l’ Empresa Diario de Noticias, Lisbonne, 1920).
- 28.
In the first months of 1919 the consortium Sociedade Portuguesa de Emigração sponsored the mission of Henry Navel and Martinho da França Pereira Countinho. Pereira Coutinho would return to the island in the first trimester of 1920, accompanied by Manuel Soura da Câmara, this time working for the Companhia da Ilha do Principe. Frederick William Urich, entomologist of the Agricultural Department of Trinidad e Tobago, visited São Tomé in September 1920 invited by the Sociedade Agrícola Vale Flor, Lda.
- 29.
Adolfo Frederico Möller, “Exploração botânica nas possessões portuguesas: São Tomé, Roça Nova Moka, 23 de Junho de 1885”, Jornal de Horticultura Prática, 16 (1885), 199.
- 30.
Júlio Henriques, A ilha de S. Tomé sob o ponto de vista histórico-natural e agrícola (Coimbra: Imprensa da Universidade de Coimbra, 1917), p. 72.
- 31.
Júlio Henriques, “As derrubadas e a cultura do cacaueiro”, Boletim Oficial de São Tomé e Príncipe, no. 9 (March 2, 1918), 111.
- 32.
Chevalier, Le cacaoyer, p. 26.
- 33.
Armando Cortesão, Culture du cacaoyer: la crise actuelle de la colonie portugaise de S. Tomé e Príncipe (Lisbonne: Ministére des Colonies, 1921), p. 13.
- 34.
Ezequiel de Campos, Viação de São Tomé: apontamentos (Porto: Livraria Nacional e Estrangeira de Eduardo Tavares Martins, 1904).
- 35.
Ezequiel de Campos, A revalorização agrícola da ilha de São Tomé: subsídios para a política colonial (Vila Nova de Famalicão: Tipografia Minerva, 1921), pp. 51 and 75.
- 36.
Grove, Ecology, Climate and Empire.
- 37.
Lucy Jarosz, “Defining Deforestation in Madagascar”, in Richard Peet and Michael Watts (eds.), Liberation Ecologies: Environment, Development, Social Movements (London and New York: Routledge, 1996).
- 38.
James Fairhead, “Development Discourse and Its Subversion: Decivilization, Depolitization and dispossession in West Africa”, in Alberto Arce and Norman Long (eds.), Anthropology, Development and Modernity: Exploring Discourses, Counter-tendencies and Violence (London and New York: Routledge, 2000), p. 109.
- 39.
James Fairhead and Melissa Leach, “Desiccation and Domination: Science and Struggles over Environment and Development in Colonial Guinea”, The Journal of African History, 41, no. 1 (2000), 38.
- 40.
Ezequiel de Campos, Obras Públicas de São Tomé: plano de melhoramentos locais, projectos de leis (Lisboa: Livraria Ferin, 1912), p. 270.
- 41.
“Decreto de 30 de Setembro de 1912, proibindo a desarborização em determinados terrenos da Ilha de São Tomé”, Boletim Oficial de São Tomé e Príncipe, no. 45 (November 2, 1912).
- 42.
Armando Cortesão, “Sobre as derrubadas em São Tomé”, Boletim Oficial de São Tomé e Príncipe, no. 11 (March 16, 1918).
- 43.
Bernardo de Sousa e Faro, “Sobre as derrubadas em São Tomé”, Boletim Oficial de São Tomé e Príncipe, no. 17 (April 27, 1918), 200 and 201.
- 44.
Egídio Inso, As ilhas de S. Tomé e Principe: terras de Pedro Escobar e João Santarem (São Tomé: Imprensa Nacional de São Tomé, 1922), pp. 97 and 98.
- 45.
Seabra and Seabra, As doenças das plantações, p. 27.
- 46.
Tiago Saraiva, “Laboratories and Landscapes: The Fascist New State and the Colonization of Portugal and Mozambique”, Journal of History of Science and Technology, 3 (2009), http://www.johost.eu/vol3_fall_2009/vol3_ts2.htm.
- 47.
Campos, A revalorização agrícola.
- 48.
Cortesão, Culture du cacaoyer.
- 49.
Campos, A revalorização agrícola, p. 302.
- 50.
Campos, A revalorização agrícola, p. 333.
- 51.
In December 14, 1854, the government issued a decree ordering the registration of all slaves living in the Portuguese colonial territories and creating the category of libertos (freed people). Just five days after, in December 19, 1854, another decree was put forward regulating the sell of state-owned properties in the island of São Tomé, Boletim do Conselho Ultramarino: legislação novíssima, vol. 2, 1852–1856 (Lisboa: Imprensa Nacional, 1869).
- 52.
Campos, A revalorização agrícola, pp. 339–341.
- 53.
See chapters 4 and 5 of Nascimento, “S. Tomé na segunda metade de oitocentos”.
- 54.
Francisco Tenreiro, A ilha de São Tomé (Lisboa: Junta de Investigações do Ultramar, 1961), pp. 220–233.
- 55.
Even if in the 1930s the colonial government put forward an individual tax forcing the natives to work they resisted participating in the plantation economy. In the 1950s labor amounted to almost 70% of the total production costs compared to the 30% in Ghana.
Acknowledgements
I thank the organizers of this volume for their comments and constructive feedback on this chapter. I also want to thank the participants of the panel “The Republic of Plants”, SHOT (Society for the History of Technology) meeting, October 2017, Philadelphia, particularly Tiago Saraiva, for the discussion of an earlier version of this chapter. This research was funded by the ERC Project “The colour of labour: Racialized lives of migrants”, coordinated by Cristiana Bastos at the Institute of Social Sciences, University of Lisbon.
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Macedo, M. (2019). Disrupted Ecologies: Conflicting Repertoires of Colonial Rule in Early Twentieth-Century São Tomé. In: Domingos, N., Jerónimo, M.B., Roque, R. (eds) Resistance and Colonialism. Cambridge Imperial and Post-Colonial Studies. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-19167-2_9
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