Introduction: Multispecies encounters in conservation landscapes in Southern Africa

This special issue, “Multispecies Encounters in Conservation Landscapes in Southern Africa,” investigates the changing conditions of multispecies coexistence in conservation contexts that transform entire ecosystems, including wildlife, plants, microbes and humans. With this focus, we draw from the theoretical field of multispecies studies to stimulate and promote scholarly discussion in this field in Southern Africa. Departing from the postulate that human lives cannot be studied in isolation from other forms of life (Van Dooren, Kirksey and Münster ²⁰¹⁶; Kirksey and Helmreich ²⁰¹⁰; Locke and Münster ²⁰¹⁵), we focus on the dynamic ways in which human inhabitants in the conservation areas of Southern Africa coexist with the plants, mammals, insects, microbes and other non-human species. We do so whilst paying particular attention to the historical and political contexts that shape and are constituted by transforming multispecies relations and whilst reflecting local perspectives on the practicalities of multispecies coexistence and conflicts. The contributions in this special issue are distinguished by considerable diversity. First, they reflect a wide geographic range with research conducted in Namibia, Zambia, South Africa and Botswana. Second, they include a wide range of non-human actors, some of which are often not represented in scholarly social science and humanities studies (including multispecies studies): mammals, from hippopotami to elephants, but also donkeys, cattle and antelopes; plants (honeybush); insects and parasites (tsetse flies and trypanosomes); and landscapes (wildlife corridors and rivers).¹

This introductory chapter starts with an overview of the field of multispecies studies and its criticisms to situate the special issue in this literature. Then, it goes on to detail the overall contributions of this collection of articles. This special issue adds to the field of multispecies studies by developing a distinct Southern African perspective. The articles reflect the specificities of Southern African contexts in three ways. First, they do so by historicising multispecies relations and tracing their genealogies in the contested colonial and postcolonial histories of this region. Second, they delve into local perspectives on the practicalities of multispecies coexistence on the ground in conservation landscapes. Finally, influenced by political ecology approaches, they politically contextualise multispecies relations by highlighting how they connect to power imbalances inherited from the colonial contexts and from socio-economic inequalities. Thus, the special issue rebuts the arguments raised against multispecies approaches of being too abstracted and removed from local realities, insufficiently embedded in historical and political dynamics and lacking actionable knowledge to deal with (environmental) crises in practice (Hornborg 2017; Giraud ²⁰¹⁹; Büscher ²⁰²¹).

The multispecies approach: situating our special issue

The field of multispecies studies points to the entanglement of human lives with processes that involve and are set in motion by non-human beings — animals, plants, fungi, microorganisms. Doing so, it challenges human exceptionalism and the boundaries of what it means to be human (Ogden, Hall and Tanita ²⁰¹³; Van Dooren, Kirksey and Münster ²⁰¹⁶) and redefines human nature as an “interspecies relationship” (Tsing 2012, 141). Beyond the human, the field of multispecies studies questions the categories with which we think about species (Kirksey 2015) and organisms and how they enter relations with humans (Kirksey and Helmreich 2010). It contributes, therefore, to thinking about the world beyond the naturalistic dichotomy between nature and culture (in the wake of Descola ²⁰⁰⁵; Latour ¹⁹⁹³; and others). By decentring the human, multispecies studies shed light on the agency of non-human beings and/or on the agency that emerges from multispecies relations (on relational agency, see Bennett ²⁰¹⁰). The multispecies field emphasises the multiple, the emergent and the relational.

This field, however, covers a wide range of approaches. In The Mushroom at the End of the World, Anna Tsing (2015), for example, follows the matsutake mushroom from the forests of Oregon in the United States of America to the forests of Japan. Tsing shows that forests around the world are bound in global capitalist commodity chains that ultimately destroy them. She investigates a “multispecies assemblage” where the lifeways of the mushroom, the mushroom pickers and traders, the pines and the forests where they grow, the scientists and many others encounter, entangle and transform each other. Her ethnography works in a patchwork, across scales, following the trajectories of human and non-human actors, to understand how they meet and friction, and what emerges from their encounters (for more on the use of multispecies assemblages as analytical and methodological frameworks, see Lacan et al. ²⁰²⁴). Other approaches delve deep into local and/or indigenous understandings of the non-human world. In his seminal work How Forests Think, Eduardo Kohn (2013) conducts an “anthropology beyond-the-human” that thinks from and with the ontologies of the Runa d’Avilà living in the Amazonian forest. Building on the Runa ontology, Kohn develops a theory of thought as multispecies communication, understood as the growth of living beings in response to signs that exceed by far the symbolic realm of the human language. With his theory, Kohn succeeds in conceptualising humans in the web of their relations with other living beings. Deborah Bird Rose, too, thinks with indigenous philosophies to situate humans in their connections with a living world that has agency and sentience, in contrast, she argues, to (Western) thought that is dominated by dualities like culture/nature and mind/body (Rose 2005; see also Plumwood, cited in Rose ²⁰⁰⁵, 302). Immersed in aboriginal philosophy and aesthetics, Rose’s work calls for noticing the multispecies worlds that have been trashed in the Anthropocene (Rose 2017) and for establishing a decolonised environmental ethics that runs counter to the enduring violent marginalisation of aboriginal people (Rose 1999, 2021). Other scholars have also looked at the power imbalances underlying or even destroying multispecies worlds. Eben Kirksey (2017) shows the overlaps between the destruction of multispecies worlds and the creation and maintenance of (racialised) social injustices, calling for multispecies justice (see also Chao, Bolender and Kirksey ²⁰²²). Maan Barua (2016) points to the non-human labour of lions commodified and exploited in the Indian tourism industry. Ursula Münster (2016) analyses the political ecology of human-elephant collaborations in South India, which has been historically shaped by extraction and conservation and continues to contribute to wildlife management, albeit often invisibly.

Multispecies studies involve contrasting and at times highly innovative methodologies that cross over disciplinary boundaries (see Bubandt, Andersen and Cypher ²⁰²³). Multispecies ethnographers are prompt to immerse in non-human worlds (Van Dooren, Kirksey and Münster ²⁰¹⁶). Some draw on methods from the biological sciences. For example, Heather Swanson collaborates with biologists to explore the lives of individual salmons. With an anthropological eye, she analyses their scales and otoliths, which represent a kind of fish diary, to study the multispecies encounters that make up salmon worlds (Swanson 2017). Andrew Mathews (2018), forester and anthropologist, also uses botanical methods to study the forms of vegetation and landscapes and analyse them as records of the past, combined with ethnographic data, to document the multispecies histories of Italian forest landscapes. John Hartigan (2021) employs ethological methods to learn how wild horses in Galicia interact with humans. He gives a convincing argument that anthropologists can learn much from the observation protocols of zoologists studying the sociability and culture of animals.

Drawing from multispecies studies, this special issue focuses on the ways in which human lives are entangled with other lifeways, in dynamic multispecies assemblages, at different geographical scales and in history. Without dismissing the importance of studying how human lives are practiced, enacted and lived, we look at how they unfold with and are shaped by other living beings — plants, mammals, insects, microbes. The contributions in this special issue are not limited to the description of the socio-economic or institutional impact of conservation projects on human livelihoods and social organisations. They also attempt to document how humans are, to use Haraway’s (2008) term, “becoming with” the other species, especially those whose populations have increased through conservation projects and have come into greater contact with human populations. Therefore, in this special issue, authors pay attention to the intimacies, synergies but also conflicts between humans and other species in the past, the present and the emerging futures, and in the political ecological context of conservation in the region.

Ethnography is particularly well suited to describe the practical and locally embedded ways in which more-than-human coexistence is taking place providing ground for empathetic observation and immersion in local perspectives. Historiography is also helpful to highlight multispecies histories. When archival sources are read against the grain, animals often emerge as the topic of communication: they have been poached, need vaccinations, are photographed by trophy hunters. Their histories, intertwined and part of human histories, can be traced. Beyond archival methods, oral histories can capture rural people’s often intense recollections of encounters, conflicts and cooperation with animals. Coming from the anthropological and historical fields, the contributions to this project draw heavily on ethnographic methods, based on in-depth studies that emphasise local perspectives and on historical methods, especially archival research, that situate multispecies relations in their historical depth. Contributions also draw from different sources of data and materials — for example grey literature or accounts from the natural sciences documenting the ways of life of non-human species. Doing so, they place different knowledges in dialogue with each other, reaching across disciplinary boundaries, whilst remaining firmly rooted in the anthropological and historical fields.

Nevertheless, the field of multispecies studies has also been deeply criticised. Alf Hornborg (2017) argues that multispecies studies reflect the gaze of an urban elite and romanticise the relations between humans and non-humans, far removed from local realities and glossing over socio-economic and political inequalities. Scholarship on the “more-than-human” and multispecies relations have also been criticised for reflecting mostly Western voices and lacking in-depth consideration for indigenous perspectives, even when the ideas developed in this field resonate with indigenous ideas and worldviews (TallBear ²⁰¹¹; Todd ²⁰¹⁶; Adams ²⁰¹⁹). For Bram Büscher (2021, 6), studies of the non-human turn have been “selectively ahistorical”: they emphasise entanglements between beings but do not analyse thoroughly enough the historical conditions and political contexts that brought about these multispecies relations. Kopnina (2017) deplores that multispecies ethnography does not adequately consider violence against and exploitation and extinction of animals and exaggerates companionship and conviviality. Lastly, multispecies studies have been criticised for their inability to deal with crises (see Hornborg ²⁰¹⁷). Giraud (2019) points out that, by emphasising complexity and entanglements, these studies might hamper the neat identification of culprits and responsibilities and therefore risk paralysing political action. This special issue offers a counterpoint to these criticisms as it proposes to think with multispecies and political ecology approaches from the Southern African context, situating multispecies relations distinctively in their local histories, socioecological settings and political dynamics.

A Southern African perspective

The opportunities and challenges of conservation in Southern Africa have raised considerable interest amongst social scientists. Their publications have covered a wide range of twentieth and twenty-first century conservation models, from national parks to community-based natural resource management, investigating their impact, prospects and limitations. These conservation initiatives have been studied from the angle of changing human socio-economic conditions of living; shifting local social institutions, politics and power dynamics in colonial and postcolonial contexts; and contestations of knowledge and identities in globalised settings (see, for example, Murombedzi ¹⁹⁹⁹; Magome and Murombedzi ²⁰⁰³; Beinart ²⁰⁰⁸; Matose and Watts ²⁰¹⁰; Mavhunga ²⁰¹⁴; Mosimane and Silva ²⁰¹⁵; Matose ²⁰¹⁶; Carruthers ²⁰¹⁷; Ramutsindela, Miescher and Boehi ²⁰¹⁶; Mosimane and Breen ²⁰²⁰; Ramutsindela, Matose and Mushonga ²⁰²²). Political strife, impoverishment and loss of access to land and natural resources have been constant themes in social science publications dealing with conservation in colonial and postcolonial Southern Africa (Bollig et al. 2023; Bollig and Krause ²⁰²³, 240–260). In these conservation contexts, shifting relations between people and other species have only been scrutinised in limited ways, mostly focusing on human-wildlife conflicts, their impact on human livelihoods and the institutional mechanisms to tackle them (see, for instance, Munang’andu et al. ²⁰¹²; Naidoo et al. ²⁰¹⁸; Schnegg and Kiaka ²⁰¹⁸; Stoldt et al. ²⁰²⁰; Störmer et al. ²⁰¹⁹). In short, most of these valuable publications are centred on the human.

This special issue develops a distinctively Southern African perspective to the field of multispecies studies. There is an emerging scholarship of multispecies research in Southern Africa. Within this scholarship, Marcus Baynes-Rock and Elizabeth Marshall Thomas (2017) investigate the social engagements between Ju/’hoan and lions in the Kalahari in the 1950s. They show that human communities are more-than-human, and they redraw the contours of what constitutes the social. In his study of the conservation of white lions in South Africa, Harry Wels (2018) attempts to understand and take the subjectivities of lions seriously. His approach to multispecies ethnography is immersive, spending time with white lions, and inspired by San tracking techniques (Wels 2020). In the Kalahari Desert, Pierre du Plessis’s (2022) work also engages with San practices of tracking to understand the multispecies relations that make the landscape. This special issue builds on this scholarship by focusing on multispecies relations as they unfold in Southern African contexts. Beyond applying a multispecies approach, the collected contributions think with the specificities of these contexts and from a Southern African point of view.

First of all, specificities of the Southern African context include the long history of state-led conservation in the region, rooted in colonial visions and practices and embedded in enduring power imbalances at local, national, regional and global levels (Murombedzi 2003; Mavhunga ²⁰¹⁴; Koot, Büscher and Thakholi ²⁰²²; Ramutsindela, Matose and Mushonga ²⁰²²; Thakholi, Koot and Büscher ²⁰²⁴). Thinking multispecies relations from a Southern African perspective therefore cannot leave aside this politically laden historical context. Thus, many contributions draw not only on multispecies approaches but also on political ecology. Moreover, Southern Africa is particular for standing at the forefront of conservationist initiatives, where conservation holds promises of both human development and the preservation of ecosystems. In this context, conservation is also laden with hope and aspirations for the future, not only for national governments but for international organisations, practitioners operating at the local level and local communities who see new opportunities and challenges emerging with conservation projects implemented in their backyards. With this collection of articles, therefore, we scrutinise the concrete changes at local level in the multispecies relations that make up human lives in these conservation areas and situate them in this highly political context.

Historicising multispecies relations in Southern Africa

Animals, insects, parasites and plants have histories too, histories that are not reducible to evolutionary changes and adaptation to changing environmental conditions, as demonstrated by the emerging scholarship on African multispecies histories (see Swart ²⁰¹⁰; Gibson ²⁰¹⁸; Glover ²⁰²¹; Jacobs ²⁰²¹; Aderinto ²⁰²²). Several contributions to this special issue propose a historical analysis of multispecies relations in Southern Africa. Sandra Swart reconsiders human-baboon relations within a historical longue durée. Doing so, she prompts us to look at history as more-thanhuman and highlights the necessity of thinking at the interface of two changing cultures, of humans and baboons, to develop conservation approaches that consider baboons (and more widely animals) as “creatures of history.” Léa Lacan focuses on the historical emergence of a more-than-tsetse assemblage in the gaze of colonial experts in Zambia from the late nineteenth century until 1959. She explores the complexity of multispecies relations underlying the tsetse and trypanosomiasis “problem” mediated by colonial stakeholders to trace the intertwined history of wildlife conservation and tsetse control. Hauke-Peter Vehrs focuses on the history of local and trophy hunting of the hippopotamus in north-eastern Namibia. He combines a historical perspective on hunting as mediated by colonial actors with empirical material on local hunting to scrutinise current conservation policies and the colonial continuities that continue to shape the lives of the residents. Luregn Lenggenhager and colleagues focus on the intertwined histories of humans and donkeys in and around Etosha in central Namibia. They investigate the ambiguous position of the domestic donkey, a neglected species yet one that followed humans in their travels and influenced their relations with other livestock and wildlife species. All four contributions trace the genealogies of multispecies relations, and examine how humans become with animals, whether wildlife or livestock, or insects and parasites. They situate current multispecies relations in the context of colonial and postcolonial visions, knowledge, practices and policies that have shaped them.

Situating multispecies relations in their local socioecological contexts

Thinking from and with local and indigenous knowledge and philosophies is crucial for decentring Western views on the environment (Rose 2005; Mavhunga ²⁰¹⁸; Adams ²⁰¹⁹; Ferdinand ²⁰²¹) and for reframing conservation and environmental governance in ways that support local multispecies communities (Mabele, Krauss and Kiwango ²⁰²²). In conservation landscapes of Southern Africa, this requires understanding and immersion in the local realities of multispecies relations. Against the criticism that asserts that multispecies studies are often too far removed from practical realities on the ground, the contribution by Romie Nghitevelekwa and colleagues focuses on the interactions between a Khwe community and antelopes in the Bwabwata National Park in north-eastern Namibia. It explores the sociocultural significance of antelopes in the Khwe lifeworld and their call for community-based conservation that considers wildlife beyond its ecological and economic importance. The contribution by Sthembile Ndwandwe and colleagues investigates the case of honeybush cultivation in Haarlem, South Africa. The authors adopt an interdisciplinary perspective that combines anthropology with plant ecology. They engage with the multispecies relations that make local honeybush ecologies and the socio-economic relations between Haarlem honeybush harvesters and the plant, to examine the impact of honeybush domestication and commodification on these relations. The authors delve into perspectives of Haarlemers to analyse how their ways of relating to honeybush have changed along with these transformations.

These contributions focus on multispecies relations as they unfold in practice on the ground, from the perspective of those who are living with the antelopes or the honeybush. They analyse how these multispecies relations transform in dynamic socio-economic contexts, whether it be community-based conservation in north-eastern Namibia or the establishment of honeybush plantations to support the plant’s commodification in Haarlem, South Africa.

Politicising multispecies relations in Southern Africa

In reaction to Hornborg’s and Büscher’s criticisms, this special issue demonstrates that a focus on multispecies relations does not preclude an analysis of their political dimensions. It builds on a scholarship that has shown the overlaps between the domination over local and indigenous groups and the domination of nature following both colonial and capitalist logics (Plumwood [1993] 2003; Rose ²⁰⁰⁴; Ferdinand ²⁰²¹). All contributions highlight the politics of conservation that underlie multispecies relations in Southern Africa. A Southern African perspective on multispecies studies necessarily considers the political legacies of the colonial history and its enduring effects in the region (see especially the contributions by Lacan, Vehrs, and Lavelle). It also considers the current negotiation of policies, knowledge and practices in conservation landscapes and questions of environmental justice (see the contribution by Ndwandwe and colleagues on the impact of honeybush cultivation on the historical and ongoing socio-economic marginalisation of Haarlemers). Michael Bollig focuses on wildlife corridors, key instruments to support wildlife mobility, ecosystem connectivity and tourism in the Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area. By combining multispecies studies and political ecology, he explores the contested nature of wildlife corridors that engage complex multispecies relations. The contribution by Jessica-Jane Lavelle investigates human-river entanglements amongst the Mayeyi people in the Kwando-Linyanti wetlands in northern Namibia. Her case study traces the formation of multispecies entanglements of the Mayeyi in a riverine environment in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and analyses their violent disruption as a consequence of colonialism. Finally, the contribution by Paula Alexiou and colleagues discusses the ethics of conducting multispecies ethnography in conservation landscapes in Southern Africa. The authors reflect on three ethical issues that emerged from their research in the Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area (specifically Namibia, Zambia and Botswana). These include how to deal with the historical legacies of conservation, their positionalities as researchers and the marginalisation of subjects, human and non-human, who are involved in their studies. This contribution raises key questions about multispecies justice in the practice of research.

Multispecies encounters in conservation landscapes: thinking from Southern Africa

Overall, by historicising multispecies relations in the conservation landscapes of Southern Africa, situating them in their local socioecological contexts and highlighting their political significance, this special issue provides two main perspectives. First, it explores new possibilities for the field of multispecies studies that consider its main criticism, namely an ahistorical and apolitical romanticising of multispecies entanglements. It departs from the acknowledgement that multispecies approaches from a Southern African perspective, one which remains rarely represented, necessarily means conducting politicised multispecies enquiries. Second, this special issue contributes to the movement towards decolonial approaches to environmental, conservation and multispecies studies. It does so through contributions that are committed to unveiling the colonial contexts within which conservation and realities of multispecies coexistence in conservation landscapes have emerged and developed and that are intent on highlighting enduring colonial legacies. It does so as well by making local realities of conservation and multispecies interactions visible. Ultimately, the special issue calls for thinking further from and with Southern African perspectives to enhance scholarly understandings of multispecies worlds.