Governing Dissent in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve: ‘Development’, Governmentality, and Subjectification amongst Botswana's Bushmen

Abstract

This article explores the theme of ‘disciplining dissent’ by examining how dissenting conduct is channelled into ‘acceptable’ and ‘productive’ practices. To this end, it uses Michel Foucault's framework of ‘government’ in order to highlight the operations of a diffuse and generalized form of ‘disciplining’, where this refers to the directing or ‘structur[ing of] the field of action of others’. Through this framework, the article illuminates that subjects do not cease to be governed when they undertake certain practices customarily categorized as ‘resistance’ or ‘dissent’. On the contrary, the article explores how dissenting practice itself ‘disciplines’ the conduct of subjects. The article analyzes the pivotal role played in this by processes of subjectification, highlighting how ‘governing’ (dissenting) behavior may well require the incitation of forms of subjectivity, and ways of being, that are open to such acceptable forms of dissenting and resisting. The article examines the case of Botswana's Bushmen and their attempts to resist and revoke their relocation by the Government of Botswana from the Central Kalahari Game Reserve since 2002 as an important contemporary site illustrative of the interplay of governing, dissent, and subjectification.

Este artículo explora el tema de la ‘disidencia disciplinaria’, examinando cómo la conducta de disidencia se canaliza dentro de prácticas ‘aceptables’ y ‘productivas’. Con este fin, usa el marco de ‘gobierno’ de Michel Foucault, para resaltar las operaciones de una forma difusa y generalizada de ‘disciplinar’, en lo que se refiere a la dirección o ‘estructura[ción] del campo de acción de otros. A través de este marco, el artículo ilustra que los sujetos no dejan de ser gobernados cuando asumen ciertas prácticas, usualmente categorizadas como ‘resistencia’ o ‘disidencia’. Por lo contrario, el artículo explora cómo la propia práctica de disidencia ‘disciplina’ la conducta de los sujetos. El artículo analiza el papel fundamental que juega en este proceso de subjetivación, resaltando cómo la conducta de ‘gobernar’ (disentir) quizás requiera la incitación de formas de subjetividad, y maneras de ser, que están abiertas a tales formas aceptables de disidencia y resistencia. El artículo examina el caso de los bosquimanos de Botswana y sus intentos de resistir y anular su relocalización de la Reserva de Caza del Kalahari Central bajo el gobierno de Botswana desde el 2002, como un importante punto contemporáneo e ilustrativo de la interrelación entre gobierno, disidencia y subjetivación.

通过考察异议行为如何被导入为“可接受”和“富有成效的”实践活动，本文对“规训异议”这一主题进行了探索。为此，本文采用了米歇尔•福柯的“治理”框架，以强调“规训”在广泛和普遍表现形式上的运作，这里的所指，是“对他人行为领域的控制或安排。”通过这个框架，本文阐明了行为主体在进行通常被归为“抵抗”和“异议”这类实践活动时仍然受到统治。相反地，本文探讨了异议实践活动自身如何“规训”主体的行为。本文分析了主体化过程在其中扮演的极重要角色，强调了“治理”（异议）行为多么需要主体形式的激励，及其存在的方式，它们是向这种可接受的异议和抗议形式开放的。本文考察了博茨瓦纳丛林居民及其2002年以来抵制和抗议博茨瓦纳政府强制他们从中卡拉哈里禁猎区搬迁的努力，这是一个能够说明关于治理、异议和主体化彼此互动的重要的当代案例。

Keywords:

• Bushmen
• Botswana
• dissent
• indigenous rights
• human rights
• subjectification
• governmentality
• development

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank the two anonymous referees, Laura Aikio-Junka, Lara Montesinos Coleman, Jane Cowan, Stefan Elbe, Alan Lester, Anne Nuorgam, Andrea Oelsner, Mustapha Kamal Pasha, Julian Reid, Adam Stepien, Andrea Teti, Karen Tucker, and Ritu Vij for their comments, critique, and suggestions on earlier drafts of this article and during presentations at the Universities of Aberdeen and Lapland.

Notes

All these terms are linguistically and culturally foreign to them and, indeed, have problematic lineages (Hitchcock, 1996, p. 14). Recognizing the difficulties of all terms, here I retain the term ‘Bushmen’ used widely in the international media.

Botswana's reliance on resource extraction and the unequal distribution of the wealth and surpluses generated by the diamond industry have come under critique (IRIN News, 2003a, 2004f), as have President Khama's ‘autocratic tendencies’ and restriction of the Bushmen's dissent (Duval Smith, 2009).

I follow Foucault's use of the term ‘men’ and ‘men's activity’, while not denying the differential impact of the discourse and activities of development on women.

On the tension between the ‘liberal’ and ‘pastoral’ elements of government, see Kalpagam (2000) and Firth (1998).

It must also be acknowledged that the Bushmen do not speak with one voice (cf. Borchgrevink, 2004).

The 2006 judgment gave the legal applicants the right to return, ‘but does not compel the government to provide services such as water, clinics and schools in the park’ (Duval Smith, 2006, p. 32). The January 2011 Court of Appeal decision restored the right to drill for water, going some way to reversing this trend.

In privileging legal and rights-based dissent the article does not question the success of the media campaign which has made this case prominent and which has associated Botswana with genocide and blood diamonds; even critiques of this campaign acknowledge its success (e.g. Solway, 2009).

Moreover, as indigenous, the Bushmen are acknowledged as having a ‘special relationship to the land’. In acknowledging spiritual and cultural ties to the land, the judgment agreed that their land was not ‘a commodity which can be acquired, but a material element to be enjoyed’ (Martinez Cobo, 1986, cited in LRC, 2007, p. 64).