Die Geschichte der Armut in der Region des Südlichen Roten Meeres
Afrika-, Amerika- und Ozeanienbezogene Wissenschaften
Islamwissenschaft, Arabistik, Semitistik
Zusammenfassung der Projektergebnisse
The development of widespread structural poverty in the Southern Red Sea Region was the result of the break down in longstanding patterns of human-environment interaction. This process was driven partially by environmental changes. Climatological variability has long been the norm in this region, making short term droughts routine. In addition, there are other endemic environmental hazards that pose periodic challenges to local communities. Examples of these hazards include long-established human, animal, and plant diseases, as well as locust plagues. Traditional social, economic, and political structures responded to this normal variability in ways that ensured the minimum distribution of the resources that communities recognized as necessary to individual physical and social survival during periods of scarcity. Though these structures were robust enough to withstand normal inter-annual variability, they offered little protection during two moments of significant environmental change: 1) the Little Ice Age Mega-Drought (c1640-c1820); and 2) the transformation of the regional ecosystem following the 1887 introduction of rinderpest into Africa via Massawa. The resulting disruptions to rural livelihoods were not experienced equally by all segments of society. Though elites were traditionally expected to redistribute some of their wealth during periods of scarcity, from the seventeenth century onwards they increasingly chose not to do so. Instead, the wealthy and powerful competed amongst themselves to increase their standings, often at the expense of their less fortunate dependents. The breakdown of the traditional social safety net and the resulting competition for resources opened the door to European imperial incursion in the region at the end of the nineteenth century. Rather than rebuild the social safety net, officials in the twentieth century appropriated key productive resources to modernizing states. Impoverished communities actively pushed back against the dismantling of the traditional social safety net. They rightfully recognized that their lot could not be improved without insurance against normal environmental variability. They continued to demand that elites provide for their minimum needs in times of scarcity. As social expectations changed, the list of ‘needs’ increased. To the traditional list of grain and potable water was added sugar and fuel. The poor utilized several tactics, including forming alliances with more favourably disposed political and religious leaders, forming new collective organizations, protesting publicly, and taking up arms in open revolt. However, the ability of local elites to form strategic allies with important international players allowed them to ignore the demands of the poor. The link between the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine and the current food crisis on the African Side of the Southern Red Sea Region can be traced to the introduction of rinderpest into Africa in 1887. Previously, local produce formed the near totality of local diets and food production was dependent on cattle-pulled ploughs and cattle-driven water wheels. The introduction of rinderpest led to the rapid death of over 90 percent of all cattle in the region, causing food production to collapse. In the wake of this humanitarian disaster, states worked with private enterprise to develop a new market-oriented food system dependent on the long-distance trade in staple foods. Rather than encourage increased local agricultural production, this new system undermined the rural economy and encouraged imports of staple foods. As a result, Sudan, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Djibouti, and Somaliland (Somalia) cannot produce enough food, rendering their populations structurally vulnerable to global price spikes.
Projektbezogene Publikationen (Auswahl)
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Horses and Power in the Southern Red Sea Region Since the Seventeenth Century. Animal Trade Histories in the Indian Ocean World, 125-146. Springer International Publishing.
Serels, Steven
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Poverty and the Transition to Instability: The Italian Lira in Eritrean History. Palgrave Studies in Economic History, 161-183. Springer International Publishing.
Serels, Steven
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A Global Vision of Local Poverty. The Journal of Law, Social Justice and Global Development(26), 62-68.
Serels, Steven
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The History of Southern Red Sea Salt in Indian Ocean Trade.’ Cargoes in Motion: Materiality and Connectivity across the Indian Ocean 53-70. Athens, OH: Ohio University Press.
Burkhard Schnepel & Julia Verne
