The motor-vehicle, be it car, bus, lorry or motor-cycle, was introduced in sub-Saharan Africa in the early 1900s. Initially the plaything and symbol of colonial domination, the motor-vehicle transformed the economic and social life of the continent. This panel invites papers that explore the social history of the motor-vehicle in Africa.
The introduction of the motor-vehicle into Africa led to far-reaching and complex transformations of African economies, politics, societies and cultures. Until now no systematic historical research has been conducted into this complex topic. Yet its impact extends across the totality of human existence; from ecological devastation to economic advancement, from cultural transformation to political change, from social perceptions through to a myriad of other themes. There has been a tendency to see motor-vehicles as being attached solely to the state and the political and economic elite, yet their impact stretches far beyond and into everyday lives of people in the smallest villages at the furthest reaches of African states. The bus, mammy truck, car, pick-up and so forth reach far beyond where railways, ferries and boats can reach. There has been a tendency to see Africa as pre-dominantly rural.Yet Africa is highly urbanised in sprawling cities that are often serviced solely by motor-vehicles. It is clear that the effects of the introduction of the motor-vehicle into Africa are to be found and studied in many overlapping fields of academic endeavour. The panel will explore the complex relationship between people and motor-vehicles in Africa in the Twentieth Century; from car and bush mechanics, to callboys and prostitutes, from new market opportunities, to the social organisation of taxi-ranks, from political sloganeering and organisation through to the use of motor-vehicles in policing and warfare. In short, to explore the social history of the introduction of the motor-vehicle in Africa in the Twentieth Century.
Everybody who has been to places like Pakistan, the Philippines or to Africa is familiar with the sight of ingenuously and sometimes beautifully modified lorries. My paper describes the process of modifying (customizing, modding) Bedford TJs in Sudan’s small workshops and proposes to examine the cultural and organizational conditions for the creativity involved.
Over the course of the last century, trade in khat (or miraa as it is known locally) from Kenya’s Nyambene District has grown from being just a local phenomenon to being in demand as far away as Manchester and Minneapolis. This globalised demand and the perishability of the substance means that the few hundred kilometres between the Nyambenes and Nairobi (where khat is repackaged for air transportation) have to be covered at great speed. The Hilux pick-up is the vehicle mostly used along that crucial section of the khat network, and this paper looks at perceptions of the vehicle and of the dare-devils who drive it, one of whom is nicknamed ‘Body Thrower’, as his driving suggests a man prepared to throw his body away.
In dealing with the social history of the motor-car in Zambia, the paper presents an overview of the manner in which transport was organised in Zambia prior to as well as following the introduction of the motor-vehicle. In describing this social history, the paper concentrates on the social, cultural, economic and political aspects of transport prior to and following the introduction of the motor-vehicle.
With the advent of ‘pacification’ and the establishment of a colonial administration from 1915 onwards in ‘Portuguese’ Guinea, the motorcar makes its first appearance. Initially, its impact remains very limited, despite an ambitious road programme that was initiated with military style planning in 1919-20. Its aims were threefold: the opening up of the interior which was previously only accessible by maritime and riverine means; the collection of taxes from a recently subdued population; and encouraging the commercial exploration of land concessions. The privileged few who drove around on the unpaved roads were generally colonial administrators, doctors and a few private traders. By the mid twenties when just over 2500 kms of roads had been made and ‘progress’ seemed within reach of tabankas or villages, it grindingly came to a halt. Until the mid 1940s precious little is added by the administration in terms of infrastructures or transport facilities. During this period, a few bridges are built, while the number of vehicles - motorcars and trucks - pertaining to the colonial administration, actually diminished. At the same time, the projected railway never materialises, and riverine transport continues to rely on canoes. In season, roads were mainly used by trucks belonging to trade houses in order to transport groundnuts to Atlantic ports such as Bissau. In contrast to neighbouring French West Africa, this Portuguese enclave appears suspended in a limbo of underfunding and understaffing. Focusing on a few towns rather than on developing the interior and with little support from a stingy metropole, governors dream of rivalling their richer neighbours but fail to keep up with the Joneses.
Setting an eye on Ghana’s busy roads, its vehicles and passengers allows to discover some sort of religious appropriation of the road. This paper examines ‘the road’ with its capacity for integrating people’s religious beliefs and practices – as a platform for spirituality that faces the dangers and blessings of travelling.
The Hajj, the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca, is the largest international annual gathering in the world. Each year, a growing number of West Africans perform the pilgrimage, fulfilling one of the five pillars of Islam. The growth in their numbers over the past century is largely due to the successful introduction of mechanic forms of mass transport, starting with steamships and temporarily ending with airplanes. This paper deals with a number of changes the introduction of motorized transport in West Africa has caused in this spiritual journey. These will be highlighted by the story of a group of West African pilgrims who traveled the overland road from Niamey in Niger to Suakin in Sudan by way of Citroën trucks in 1946.
This paper explores the emerging nature of Luanda's minibus taxi industry and Huambo's motorcycle-taxi and describes and characterizes the previous referred process of transformations, based on a bibliography review, direct observation and information collected in the field from September 2003 to August 2004.
To understand who the actors involved in these activities are, what kind of relationships can be identified and which patterns are presents in the activities working is the purpose of this paper. An additional objective is to understand the articulation of candongueiros and kupapatas activity segments in the urban passengers transport systems of Luanda and Huambo in the context of its historical evolution.
Sawaba was a party in Niger that represented, in the 1950s, a social movement striving for fundamental social-political change. One of its key segments was constituted by so-called ‘small folk’ (‘petit peuple’) – semi-urbanised people who had low-status jobs and an interest in social and economic mobility. Having been evicted from power by the French (1958), the party began to build a clandestine organisation in the country and, later, commenced guerrilla infiltrations with which it hoped to overthrow the French-backed regime. This paper focuses on the role of a particular group of ‘small folk’ in Sawaba’s clandestine life, i.e. lorry and bus drivers, their assistants (‘coxeurs’) and mechanics, outlining their vital role in communication, the collection and transmission of intelligence, and in agitation, in the run-up to the full-scale rebellion.
Passenger cars and other small vehicles have provided since long the backbone for transport in West Africa. These cars are usually second-hand, and they are sourced on overseas car markets, mostly in West Europe. During the 1990s the port-town of Cotonou, Bénin, became one of the most prominent hubs in this Euro-West African car trade: car markets mushroomed, attracting large numbers and a wide variety of traders. The paper discusses the role of Lebanese traders in this trade through a reconstruction of the career history of one of them. It uncovers that Lebanese business careers show a rapid succession of different economic activities. By running such 'multiple enterprises', Lebanese traders progressively incorporate West African contacts in their business network. Close analysis of this practice suggests that Lebanese immigrant traders, rather than following profitable business opportunities, are driven by the ideal of leading an expatriate lifestyle.
The factor time is of particular importance in guerrilla warfare for two different reasons: 1. Because guerrilla warfare does not know large decisive battles, guerrilleros often try to extend the war over long periods of time, in order to wear down adversaries morally and to exhaust them physically. 2. The second reason is that guerrilla warfare is mobile warfare par excellence. Many modern guerrillas are highly motorized wars, often led in spacious movements and in great speed. The paper shows how ordinary four-wheel-drive cars are combined with light weapons in the technology of the modern chariot. This combination is called technology of the modern chariot, because it resembles the technology of the historical chariot in its forms and application: The connection of speed and mobility with relatively high firepower, large operation range and long independence from outside supply make the modern chariot a weapon, which is particularly suited for the highly mobile warfare of guerrilla wars. It is argued, that the unification of two existing techniques, resulting in a new technology, is by no means a simple addition of two existing technical artefacts, but an independent creative act, for which the term of combining invention is suggested. The study of “dialectic processes of appropriation” (Beck 1999), during which both the acquiring society and the acquired artefact as well may be subject to changes, does not only require a long time of exact observation, but also the abandonment of Eurocentric perspectives through which many western social scientists still seem to view African societies.