Logging, Sustainable Development and Power Strategies in a Cameroon Tropical Forest
In the Congo basin, logging has always been at the heart of the most violent forms of the colonial relationship. The example of the Dja forest region in south-eastern Cameroon suggests that the installation of colonial power was based on the establishment of a “territory-population-resources” system that was similar to the one that began in the West at the end of the 17th century. We believe that this “governmentalization of the population,” to borrow an idea from Michel Foucault, is essential to understanding the forest harvesting methods in use from decolonization up to the present. It then becomes possible to consider the power strategies adopted by loggers and sustainable development supporters as being part of the same system for managing both nature and society. The new forestry law adopted by the Cameroon government in 1994 would appear to be at the crossroads between the interests of the industrial forestry sector and the scientific discourse about the population and the tropical forest. It is in this context that the Badjoués living on the edge of the Dja Biosphere Reserve are targeted by both conservationists and logging companies.