Colonialism, governance, and fisheries : perspectives from Lake Malawi

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Gough, Milo and Nkhoma, Bryson and Chirwa, Elias and Wilson, David and Knapp, Charles and Morse, Tracy and Mulwafu, Wapulumuka (2025) Colonialism, governance, and fisheries : perspectives from Lake Malawi. The Journal of African History, 66. e1. (https://doi.org/10.1017/S002185372500012X)

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Abstract

This piece explores the parallel development of two fisheries management regimes in mid-twentieth-century Lake Malawi: one imposed by the British colonial government over the lake and the other by Senior Chief Makanjira focused on Mbenji Island. The parallel development of these regimes provides opportunity for close analysis of how fisheries management centred on different knowledge and practices led to distinctive legacies of governance legitimacy and efficacy. Given the increasing recognition that Indigenous knowledge is crucial to the future sustainability of fisheries globally, we contend that it is imperative to recognise the ways in which colonial pasts have embedded knowledge hierarchies and exclusionary decision-making processes within national fisheries governance regimes that continue to obstruct capacities to bring different knowledges, practices, and management approaches together effectively and appropriately.

ORCID iDs

Gough, Milo, Nkhoma, Bryson, Chirwa, Elias, Wilson, David ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7992-901X, Knapp, Charles ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7997-8543, Morse, Tracy ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4185-9471 and Mulwafu, Wapulumuka;
CORE (COnnecting REpositories)