Crossing the Zambezi: The Politics of Landscape on a Central African Frontier (review)

In Crossing the Zambezi, JoAnn McGregor embarks on an interesting but undoubtedly very complicated study of the "history of claims to the Zambezi" River (2), specifically the portion that forms the boundary between Zambia and Zimbabwe. Straddling a period of more than one and a half centuries, from the 1850s to the early 2000s, this book explores a wide range of themes that students of Zimbabwean history, and of African studies in general, will find helpful. The book explores how developments such as David Livingstone's "discovery" of the waterfalls (later named Victoria Falls) on the Zambezi in the 1850s, and the construction of the Victoria Falls bridge in 1905 and the Kariba Dam in the late 1950s, altered the Zambezi landscape. In addition to transforming the river's ecology, these developments entailed major changes in the political economy of the region. In examining how these scientific and technological interventions transformed the Zambezi riverscape, the author discusses not only the politics of landscape, but also conflicts between the people who inhabited the Zambezi Valley (the river people), the state, and more powerful others.

Over the course of the one hundred and fifty years studied in this book, the power politics in the Zambezi valley shifted significantly as various players fought for the control of the river and its resources. Before the arrival of Europeans, the Zambezi valley had witnessed intense conflicts among its original inhabitants (or early arrivals), mostly the Tonga and other groups who wanted to exploit the resources of the river. The advent of colonial rule, especially the emergence of the "tourist towns" of Livingstone and Victoria Falls on the northern and southern sides of the river, respectively, introduced more players who made various claims to the Zambezi. Chapters 4, 5, and 6 show how colonial "development" projects in the Zambezi valley further marginalized the inhabitants, who did not benefit from such developments. Many of the "river people" also lost access to the Zambezi when they were displaced to preserve wildlife and forestry resources in this region. These displacements and other grievances fueled ethnic consciousness and local resistance, which leaders of African nationalist movements utilized to mobilize anticolonial struggles on both sides of the river. McGregor argues in chapters 8 and 9 that the displaced people's self-identification as river people has formed the basis for identity (re)formation and mobilization around minority rights in the Zambezi borderlands in postcolonial Zambia and Zimbabwe.

Focusing on an important but relatively neglected part of south-central Africa, Crossing the Zambezi is a major contribution to African studies. Although the author chose to downplay the influence of nonhuman forces on developments in the mid-Zambezi frontier, this book indeed offers a fresh perspective on landscape studies. It also provides refreshing ideas on the politics of belonging, identity formation, and citizenship in Africa's borderlands. Furthermore, McGregor's ability to deploy a wide combination of sources and analytical approaches deserves deep appreciation. In addition to writing very clearly, the author also managed to avoid unnecessary details—which is not always the case in historical accounts of conflicts in Africa.

However, in light of the river people's unending struggles to regain lost access and reopen closed opportunities that the Zambezi provided before colonial rule, I wonder if the book should have been entitled "Closing the Zambezi."