Frontier transformations: development visions, spaces and processes in Northern Kenya and Southern Ethiopia

Abstract

African approaches to development have shifted, particularly in northeastern Africa. Donor-driven policies have given way to state-led development 'visions', often with a focus on large-scale infrastructure projects-feeding into and reflecting 'Africa Rising' discourses. In Kenya and Ethiopia, these visions include flagship projects in the geographical frontiers, areas previously viewed as buffer zones, whose people have been historically marginalised. This paper adapts the analytical framework from James Scott's Seeing Like a State in order to compare Kenya's and Ethiopia's state visions, and to understand the risks to the populations intended to benefit from such visions from the unintended (but predictable) consequences such projects have had in the past.

‘Demonstration fields’, anticipation, and contestation: agrarian change and the political economy of development corridors in Eastern Africa

“…77 Cases are reported where beacons demarcating routes and plots have been moved or disappeared, where people have started establishing rights over land along the corridor, where old territorial, and ethnically-defined institutions have been revived to assert claims, and where pastoralist raiding has intensified as different groups jostle for position in the expectation of benefits, or to protect themselves from the effects of enclosure and potential marginalisation. 78 Despite changes in plans and implementation in each case, the corridor investments are nevertheless having significant impacts on patterns of agricultural investment and pathways of commercialisation across eastern Africa. This may occur through investments in particular agricultural initiatives, ranging from the establishment of estates/plantations, the creation of block farms and cooperative groups, to contract farming arrangements, with or without nucleus estates, or through infrastructure development, including roads and rail that change market opportunities and relations.…”

Navigating Contested Winds: Development Visions and Anti-Politics of Wind Energy in Northern Kenya

“…The 1970s saw the introduction of group ranches that were "promoted with the intention of easing the transition from communal tenure and encouraging commercial production by offering veterinary support and better access to markets [16]." However, the group ranches model was incompatible with the way in which pastoralists managed collective access to resources [16], and consequently, critical common property resources were lost, leading to the displacement of pastoralists Recent trends in regional and national development policies towards the ASALs have seen efforts to "rectify" [22] this historical marginalisation through inclusive policies and state-led development "visions" that aim to open up these areas as "new frontiers for development" and incorporate them into the state [5]. These "new visions" of development are being created to increase agricultural productivity [23], generate mineral resources for export [24] and expand infrastructure required for regional economic integration [25].…”

“…Vision 2030 and related policy visions have an array of strategies for transforming the ASALs. First, through the creation of new development corridors-"networks of roads, railways, pipelines and ports that facilitate the movement of commodities" [43]-the frontier areas are expected to be incorporated fully into the state [5]. Second, these strategies aim to "create an enabling environment for private sector participation in infrastructure and technology development, including appropriate tax breaks and incentives, in all areas of infrastructure investment [26]."…”

“…Third, Vision 2030 aims to transform the country into "a newly industrializing, middle income country providing a high quality of life to all its citizens in a clean and secure environment", including sector specific flagship projects. While these visions are conceptualised as transformations to space, there is a great deal of uncertainty on exactly when and where they will materialize [5]. In addition, it is unclear whether the redesignation of ASALs as new frontiers of opportunity is demonstrative of the recurrent reassessment of development concepts witnessed in the last five decades or is, in fact, a reinterpretation of the quality of territory for green and bioeconomic forms of development [44].…”

“…This paper contributes to these debates by emphasizing the role of historical construction and denial of the proprietary character of communal tenure and their reproduction in contemporary technical "development" discourse [4] in creating and perpetuating commons dispossession. Contemporary LSLAs, which are deeply embedded in institutions and policy planning systems of the state, are presented as "new" development visions to throw off aid dependencies [5] and are expressed as an "unavoidable prerequisite for implementing the productivity-enhancing technologies" [6], hence dispossessing indigenous communities by securing exclusionary rights over their common pool resources.…”