Wilderness conservation areas were built and maintained by coerced black labor

Evidence

This poacherconservationist dyad helps explain an erratic policy toward human habitation inside the Kruger National Park. After initially barring Africans from the park in the early twentieth century, the white authorities allowed about 3,000 Africans to reside there, but charged them rent (Carruthers, Kruger National Park, 81).This rent provided a revenue stream and ensured that those residents would be forced to sell their labor for menial amounts. Black bodies—of African renters and, later, prison gangs—were dragooned into erecting fences, building roads and camps, and catching poachers. The invention and maintenance of a wild, Edenic purity is, after all, a labor-intensive business. — Rob Nixon, Slow Violence and the Environmentalism…, 1236

Categorization

• XREF: Directly parallels ch38’s already-flagged claim that nature tourism’s tranquility is labor-intensive-made-invisible, and ch86’s double displacement from conservation corridors. — connects to: Wilderness is a cultural construction, not an untouched natural sanctuary — William Cronon, The Trouble with Wilderness; or,…, 5; Wilderness protection has historically been affiliated with wealth and class privilege — William Cronon, The Trouble with Wilderness; or,…, 64; Black labor exploitation continued past emancipation through colonial and wage regimes — Cedric J. Robinson, Black Marxism_ The Making of the Black…, 601 (+2 more)
• CANDY: ‘The invention and maintenance of a wild, Edenic purity is, after all, a labor-intensive business’ is a pithy reversals teachers could quote.

Broader Connections

• Black labor exploitation continued in new forms after slavery’s legal abolition #expands (0.82)
• Black labor exploitation continued past emancipation through colonial and wage regimes #expands (0.80) — Cedric J. Robinson, Black Marxism_ The Making of the Black…, 601
• Louverture preserved emancipation by coercing ex-slaves to keep working plantations #expands (0.75) — Dubois, Laurent, Avengers of the New World_ The Story of…, 28