A historical political ecology of land use in the southeastern Peanut Basin of Senegal

Abstract

This article presents a history of twentieth century human occupation and agricultural expansion in the southeastern Peanut Basin in Senegal, West Africa. Using a political ecology conceptual framework, I describe social and cultural characteristics of the region’s population relevant to an analysis of environmental challenges that have affected the region over time. I also address the significance of state intervention, during both colonial and post-colonial times, in agricultural resettlement schemes that were intended to control access to land-based resources in this less densely populated part of the country. A discussion of more recent studies on environmental change and land use in the Peanut Basin illustrates the importance of understanding the region’s past in order to address its contemporary environmental challenges. This examination of historical land use dynamics in the southeastern Peanut Basin informs current conditions and future concerns regarding natural resource management in the region.

Keywords:

• political ecology
• Senegal
• agricultural land use

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank the two anonymous reviewers for their insightful and constructive comments on the original manuscript. Support for the production of the maps in this article from the Faculty Research Committee at Long Island University is gratefully acknowledged. The author also wishes to thank Steve Engle and Katri Mallory at the Center for Community GIS of the Québec-Labrador Foundation for their kind assistance and fine work on the maps.

Notes

1. By ‘leav[ing] the saintly settlements,’ Cruise O’Brien is referring to the end of a disciple’s initial obligation to his marabout in the daara, and not a major movement to some other location.

2. Cercle refers to an administrative subdivision of the colonial period whose chief officer was the commandant de cercle. The former Cercle de Sine-Saloum corresponds to the present-day regions of Fatick and Kaolack. Sine, a precolonial kingdom with its capital at Diakhao located north of the town of Fatick, is the cultural hearth of the Serer ethnic group (see Gravrand, 1983).