Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Land and languor: ethical imaginations of work and forest in northeast Madagascar

2004; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 15; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/027572004200315381

1477-2612

Genese Marie Sodikoff,

Agriculture and Rural Development Research

Abstract Since the early twentieth century, the practice of slash‐and‐burn agriculture by Betsimisaraka subsistence farmers of eastern Madagascar, and their reluctance to engage in wage labor processes, have been interpreted by French and other Malagasy people as symptoms Betsimisaraka laziness. Colonial officials' idea of remedying Betsimisaraka laziness justified the imposition of wage work and forest conservation. The paper argues that colonial settlers, by conflating their vision of lazy labor and a victimized landscape, did not apprehend the co‐existence of an alternative work ethic which entailed a different time‐space orientation and social relationship to land. While scholars have analyzed the "laziness" of colonial subjects as a form of subaltern resistance to colonial domination, resistance alone does not account for the fact that under certain conditions Betsimisaraka people have also willingly partaken in wage labor. This article reveals how the labor and land ethics of Betsimisaraka farmers have actively contributed to the social and natural environments of capitalism. Keywords: laborlandethicsconservationresistanceMadagascar Acknowledgements This article draws upon 14 months of ethnographic research in Madagascar, between October 2000 and February 2002, as well as on archival research at the Centre des Archives d'Outre‐Mer (CAOM) in Aix‐en‐Provence, France (my document referencing follows the CAOM filing system). Funding sources include Fulbright‐Hays, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation for the Social Science Research Council, and the Program in Labor and Global Change of the International Labor and Industrial Relations Department at the University of Michigan. An earlier version of this article was presented at "Trans/formations of the Disciplines", a conference organized by the Interdisciplinary Program in Anthropology and History in February 2004 at the University of Michigan. I am grateful for the time and hospitality of Varary residents, to whom I have given pseudonyms in this article, and to Gillian Feeley‐Harnik, Jennifer Gaynor and Julie Skurski for their comments on drafts of this paper. Notes Correspondence to: Genese Sodikoff, 323 Montgomery Avenue, Ann Arbor, MI 48103, USA. E‐mail: gsodikof@umich.edu. In Mananara‐Nord, the Merina residents I knew resented but tolerated the denomination "hôva", explaining that Betsimisaraka called them this due to their ignorance of the real meaning of the term. Merina society was historically divided as follows: andriana represented the noble class, hôva represented free people and andevo represented slaves. Merina today of the middle or upper classes take pride in their right to claim noble heritage; thus the term "hôva" may be degrading. It is difficult to determine the total hectares of forest within the Mananara‐Nord district in 1900. It constituted the "grand forest" stretching from the southern limit of Tamatave province to the Anove River of the Mananara region, starting about 40 kilometers inland and parallel to the coast (M. Jeannelle, Rapport de Tournée, 5 mai 5, 1900, CAOM MAD GGM d/6(9)/7). None of the early annual reports about Mananara‐Nord offer a total surface area size for forest, only the sizes of individual concessions. Exploitable concessions granted to French entrepreneurs between 1901 and 1903 alone comprised a total of 121,690 hectares (Etat des Exploitation Forestières en 1er janvier 1903, CAOM MAD GGM 2/d/153PO). Williams (Citation2003) summarizes arguments about the precolonial forest coverage of Madagascar, noting that French botanists, Henri Perrier de la Bâthie and Henri Humbert (Citation1927), had wrongly asserted that the entire island had once been forested, but was denuded over the 1,500 years of human occupation. Nevertheless, Williams (Citation2003: 343) continues, deforestation occurred and was exacerbated after French colonization: "Of the 58 million ha of the island, by 1920 about 20 percent was said to remain in primary forest. By 1949 it was 8.6 percent; 10.3 percent was in savoka, second‐growth bracken fern with bamboos; and the rest was in grass and savanna." For reflections on the analytic limitations of "peasant resistance", see also Stoler (Citation1986); Adas (Citation1986); Fegen (Citation1986). Quartz crystal is also known as "vato mazava" ("clear rock") in Merina. The denomination of "Betsimisaraka" only emerged in the early eighteenth century when Ratsimalaho, the son of a princess from Fenerive and an English pirate, appealed to the heads of numerous coastal lineages to establish what came to be known as the "Betsimisaraka Confederation", a loosely organized group of lineages who collectively named themselves the "the many who will not be separated" (CitationBrown, 1999: 82). Up until the early the nineteenth century, Betsimisaraka people also participated in the capture of slaves from the Comoros or East Africa to sell to Europeans and Creoles arriving at Madagascar's eastern ports (CitationBrown, 1999). Stefani, Rapport Economique, District de Mananara, 1914, CAOM MAD GGM 2/d/140. Rapport Economique 2e Semestre 1906, CAOM MAD GGM 2/D/140. Contemporary Betsimisaraka residents of Mananara‐Nord consider themselves descendents of Tsimihety. The 1908 census report shows Betsimisaraka as the majority and inhabiting the coastal forest, while Tsimihety occupied the less populated, inland mountains. Other ethnic identifications noted include: Hova (Merina), St Marien, Borizono, Taimoro and Zazamanga (Henri Fillastre, Recensement Général, Province de Maroantsetra, District de Mananara, 31 décembre 1908, CAOM MAD GGM 2/d/140). Today, the inland mountains of Mananara‐Nord are inhabited by people who identify as Betsimisaraka, and the identification of Tsimihety is virtually extinct in the region. The colonial reports to which I refer in this article only infrequently mention Tsimihety, as most timber concessions during the early twentieth century were concentrated on the coast. Jeannelle, Rapport de Tournée. Jeannelle's report is addressed to Governor‐General Joseph Simon Galliéni (1897–1905). During this period, Mananara was a county of Maroantsetra province, but by 1932 it was reclassified as a county within Tamatave province, where it remains. Subsequent quotations from Jeannelle derive from the same source. Jeannelle, Rapport de Tournée. Le Chef du District, Rapport Economique 1er Semestre, 20 juin, 1906, CAOM MAD GGM 2/d/140. Rapport de Province, l'Administrateur‐Adjoint des Colonies Spas, Chef du District de Mananara, au l'Administrateur en Chef de la Province de Maroantsetra, 30 septembre 1910, CAOM MAD GGM 2/D/140. Chef du District de Mananara, Rapport Economique 1912, MAD GGM 2/d/140. Stefani, Administrateur‐Adjoint, Chef du District, Rapport Economique, 1913, CAOM MAD GGM 2/d/140. Stefani, Rapport Economique, 1913. Peter Sahlins (Citation1994) discusses the problem of "disorderly" peasant practices in seventeenth‐century France. At this time, the monarchy undertook its first comprehensive steps to administer forest lands and impose order. Stefani, Journal du District de Mananara, 2e semestre, 1914, CAOM MAD GGM 2/d/140. Etat des exploitations forestières en 1er Janvier 1903, Statistiques, Province de Maroantsetra, CAOM MAD GGM 2/d/153PO. E. Lagriffoul, No 769, à Gouverneur Général, 17 juin, 1902, CAOM MAD GGM D/6(5)/8 E.Lagriffoul, No 1160 à Gouverneur Général, 8 octobre, 1902, CAOM MAD GGM D/6(5)/8 Le Chef de District, Rapport Politique et Administratif, Province Maroantsetra, District Mananara, 9 février, 1911, CAOM MAD GGM 2/d/140. In 1933, e.g., Governor‐General Leon Cayla complains: "The natives of the canton of Mananara are not ignorant of the binding law or to the sanctions to which they expose themselves in violating the law. But their natural laziness leads them despite everything to practice tavy" (Governor‐General's confidential letter, 21 February 1933, MAD, GGM, D/6(2)/108; my translation). To solve the labor problem for the public works effort after the First World War, Governor‐General Marcel Olivier instituted in 1926 a forced labor regime through the Service de la Main‐d'Oeuvre de Travaux d'Interêt Général (SMOTIG) intended to develop infrastructure and bring civilization to primitive forest frontiers. SMOTIG conscripted young Malagasy men who were in some way physically unfit for draft into the regular military, the "premier contingent", but were adequate for the "deuxième portion du contingent", alternatively called "SMOTIG". After ten years, France was internationally pressured to dissolve its colonial forced labor regimes. SMOTIG "pioneers", as recruits were called, from Mananara‐Nord are mentioned in the Rapport Annuel 1932, CAOM MAD GGM 2/D/140. The village of Varary was a key site of my fieldwork, where I spent approximately half of every month for 14 months in 2000 and 2002. Letter from Dumont, Directeur du Cabinet, to M. Le Chef de la Region de Tamatave, December 22, 1932, SECRET, No 2634 cf BP, CAOM MAD GGM d/6(2)/108. The fokontany is the smallest territorial division that represents the state. The President‐Pokontany (President of the fokontany) is otherwise called the "President of the Local Security Committee" (CLS). In contrast to the fokontany, the fokonolona represents the customary authority of ancestors and the spiritual chief, or tangalamena (Locatelli, 2000). The dates are uncertain. The tangalemena claimed that the Mananara‐Nord post office was completed in 1920. Elsewhere in Madagascar, however, corrupt work site bosses allowed private entrepreneurs, by the 1920s, to occasionally obtain forced laborers for their private concessions (CitationStratton, 1964). The International Labor Organization's Convention against Forced and Compulsory Labor, which France refused to sign until 1937, put the French on the defensive in international forums regarding SMOTIG and analogous colonial labor regimes. The Betsileo born Ralaimongo, an anti‐colonialist intellectual who disseminated Communist literature in Madagascar, and his followers inspired a popular protest against the prohibition of tavy in Mananara‐Nord in the early 1930s. For several years, district administrative reports focused on the "Ralaimongo Affair" and interrogations of his accomplices in Mananara‐Nord (see, e.g., Leon Cayla, Lettre Confidentielle au Ministre des Colonies, Direction des Affaires Politiques, No. 356 cf BP; 21 février 1933, CAOM MAD GGM D/6(2)/108; Rapport sur les collectes d'argent dans le District de Mananara, 30 janvier 1933, CAOM MAD GGM D/6(2)/108). Etat des exploitation forestières en 1er Janvier 1903. Rapport Economique 1er Semestre 1906. Rapport Economique 1er Semestre 1906. Valmy (Citation1959) notes that porters (mpilanja) who carried goods or people on palanquins spoke of their low wages as "adimbilany" ("a potful of rice"). Rapport Economique 1908, No 179, CAOM MAD GGM 2/D/140. Henri Fillastre, Rapport 19, Avril 1910, No 63, CAOM MAD GGM 2/D/140. Rapport Economique, L'adjoint des affaires civiles, Royet, chef du district de Mananara District, à l'administrateur chef de la province de Maroantsetra Province, 31 Janvier, 1901, CAOM MAD GGM 2/D/140. Rapport Economique 2e Semestre 1906, CAOM MAD GGM 2/D/140. The change in wages may be attributed, I speculate, to workers' preference for receiving rice as part of their wages in the lean months before the harvest when farmers' rice stocks are scant, or to Le Conte provisioning workers with meals at the concession site. Fillastre, Rapport 19, Avril 1910. Rapport Politique et Administratif, Janvier–Février 1911, Province Maroantsetra, Disctrict Mananara, CAOM MAD GGM 2/D/140. Rapport Economique 2e Semestre 1906. Cooper (Citation1996: 236) writes that elsewhere in Africa, as in Kenya, colonial officials were opposed to the presence of "casual laborers", who escaped "the discipline of regular work". Even though no proof existed that casual labor was less efficient than regular labor, "casual laborers exercised too much choice in the labor process" (see also CitationCooper 1992). Rapport Politique et Administratif, Janvier–Février 1911, Province Maroantsetra, Disctrict Mananara. The preference for piecework at the concession of M. Le Conte reflects a trend that Bundy (Citation1979) noted in the case of South Africa, where the African peasantry responded to market opportunities in the late nineteenth century by cultivating and selling a portion of what they raised. In this way, peasants managed to "meet the new demands of the state and of landowners by adapting their existing farming methods rather than by entering wage labour on the terms of the white colonists" (CitationBundy, 1979: v). Jennifer Gaynor (personal communication, 2004) writes that "pre‐1996, the monopolistic practices of one of Suharto's sons in the clove industry, especially in North Sulawesi, drove clove farmers to utterly 'neglect' their trees, basically in protest of the meager prices they were offered". R. Devrieux, Monographie 1950, District de Mananara (Provide de Tamatave), CAOM MAD GGM D/6(9)/57. From November through January of 2000 (a bumper year for cloves), farmers in the countryside labored from dawn to midnight harvesting cloves, snapping the buds off their stems, and setting the buds out to dry in order to sell them by the kilo (the per kilo wholesale price reached 35,000 FMG—about US$6—at its height) to intermediate buyers who trekked to remote villages searching for the cheapest price. Vanilla plants—reaching upwards of US$100 per kilo for dried, high‐quality beans—have become a prime target of night‐time theft by interlopers (not from Mananara‐Nord). Gillian Feeley‐Harnik (Citation1991: 169, 184) notes that among the Sakalava, shrubs called "matambelona", or "dead‐living" were planted with those called "hasina", or "generative", whereas in the village of Varary in the Mananara‐Nord region, Betsimisaraka pronounced the shrubby tree "mahatambeloña". The prefix "maha" in Malagasy typically denotes "that which makes", and "veloña" signifies "living" or "alive". Two friends performing fatidra each cut their skin at the heart to draw blood, and drink the mixed blood from a cup from the leaf of longoza (Afromomum angustifolium), a plant that grows in fallow soil. The leaf must be torn from a single shoot of longoza, a plant "without a mother". Over a plate of water and ashes, an oath of loyalty is spoken. The participants and their family members create a column of hands over which water is poured to seal the bond (Mme Navony, Author's fieldnotes, 16 March 2001). If one person in this bond should betray the trust of the other, a ritual curse is performed. The one who is betrayed twists the neck of a grasshopper to symbolize broken trust in fihavanaña. A money bill is placed over the grasshopper and ashes are thrown on top and the following words uttered: "That he will be small, that he will be thin, that he will become ashes, diminish the days, diminish the nights." One then pours water on the ashes to activate the curse (President‐Pokontany, Author's fieldnotes, 15 March 2001). Williams (Citation1991) illustrates the meanings of work for Guyanese of African, East Indian and Portuguese descent. She explores how members of each group define and balance "work" and "sociability", and relates how each group negatively assesses the traits of others according to their displays of work and socializing. Additional informationNotes on contributorsGenese Sodikoff Footnote Correspondence to: Genese Sodikoff, 323 Montgomery Avenue, Ann Arbor, MI 48103, USA. E‐mail: gsodikof@umich.edu.