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Periodical article Periodical article Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:Taking Stock: State Control, Ethnic Identity and Pastoralist Development in Tanganyika, 1948-1958
Author:Hodgson, Dorothy L.ISNI
Year:2000
Periodical:The Journal of African History
Volume:41
Issue:1
Period:March
Pages:55-78
Language:English
Geographic terms:Tanzania
Great Britain
Subjects:Maasai
colonialism
development projects
Ethnic and Race Relations
Politics and Government
Agriculture, Natural Resources and the Environment
Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups)
Development and Technology
External link:https://www.jstor.org/stable/183510
Abstract:This article analyses the origins, objectives, implementation and results of the Masai Development Plan (MDP) of 1951-1955 in colonial Tanzania in order to explore the centrality of development to the maintenance, expansion and breakdown of colonial control and the importance of ethnic identities in mediating the relationship between the two. Despite its claims to merely address technical problems - building more water supplies, clearing tsetse-infested bush and experimenting with grazing controls and fodder production - the MDP was deeply entwined with colonial imperatives to expand administrative control over recalcitrant subjects. Broad notions of progress and development were used to justify increased interventions in Maasai lives against the backdrop of ongoing disputes between administrators and Maasai over land alienation, labour and appropriate livelihoods. Designed in part to build confidence among Maasai in government and development, the project backfired, failing to meet its own objectives and fuelling antigovernment mobilization for decolonization. Notes, ref., sum.
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