For several years now I have been reflecting on why so many governments, political parties, religious movements or individuals have a grimace that borders on hatred of nomadic peoples.
As my consultants and I began to work on the issue of conflicts over natural resources (land and water first and foremost), it became clear that a new and different effort was needed to understand how to deal with these realities. More and more often we were faced with disputes and conflicts in which peasants and shepherds were confronted in an increasingly violent way.
Without exaggerating, we can say that the essence of the ongoing conflicts in the Saharan and sub-Saharan belt, from Mauritania to Somalia, see these parts as main actors.
Our technical and professional origins came from the world of land tenure, some with a more legal background, some agronomic, some economic and others more anthropological, or a mixture of these specialties. The focus of our work for years had been the land, the rules of access, the forms of administration and then the forms of use and management.
With this in mind, we started a series of projects, in Africa and elsewhere, that served us not only to "do" but also to "reflect" on how we were working and on the need to put doubts within the epistemology that guided us. The problem of the relationship between shepherds and farmers was more difficult than expected, which made us look for alliances with other FAO technical units that, in theory, worked on the issue of nomadic shepherds. In fact, as we soon discovered, the interest was always on the technical aspects, that is, the state of health of the animals and the state of the available plant resources, without ever going into studying the rest of the problem.
Little by little we began to understand that we had to shift the focus of our attention from the physical resource (land or water) to the human resource. Placing human beings at the centre of the approach meant searching for the reasons for conflicts starting from their logic, not only productive but also social and ecological. This led us to develop an approach that we called territorial negotiation, where a series of new variables entered, in particular the analysis of power dynamics and its asymmetries, the search for basic conditions to start a dialogue that would lead to a real negotiation and, if possible, a final concertation on the things to do.
The best known case in recent years is that of Abiey, a disputed area between the two Sudan. One of our consultants of the new generation was able to put these principles into practice and start a dialogue, negotiation and final consultation between communities in dispute for a long time. The article can be found here: http://www.fao.org/3/a-i7422e.pdf
Based on this work, as well as on the first reflections elaborated from some technical missions in the northeast of Nigeria, an ongoing conflict zone with Boko-Haram, and where once again the underlying issue was (and remains) the one between shepherds and farmers, we proposed to the FAO Emergency Division, as well as to FAO Representatives in those countries, to make a further effort to obtain funds and political support (both from governments and other UN agencies), to move upstairs and gradually approach the main political spheres.
We have never been able to get a positive response. On the contrary, the initial efforts we had made were diluted in such a way that practically nothing remained of what we had done and what we had proposed.
For my part I have insisted a lot with the leaders of the Emergency Division, especially because I thought I had friends there, and not just colleagues. Two or three years have passed and I am still waiting. My young advisors were also cut off, and FAO Emergency dropped the issue of conflicts, particularly those with pastors, across Africa, preferring to just write articles, bargain with universities and nothing else. In short, the usual adage of Nanni Moretti: I do things, I see people.
In these days I picked up a book by Eric Hobsbawm, “Bandits”, and I found a phrase that confirmed my basic suspicions. A phrase that, said by a specialist like him, is worth more than a confirmation:
If farmers are the victims of authority and coercion, they are not so much because of their economic vulnerability - in general they are able to meet their needs - as because of the lack of mobility.
Here's the real deal. Social control by the political elites is much better exercised on the resident populations, which can be reduced to slavery, extreme poverty and, above all, persuaded to do only what the commanders order. Those who escape this control, because they are nomads, become a danger.
And so it is that we understand better than ever FAO, in particular the division of Emergencies, wants to avoid at all costs to intervene in these conflicts. Because if it did, it would have to enter into power dynamics that are not appreciated by those who govern countries and even less by those who govern FAO or those who want to pursue a career within it. Better, much better, to limit oneself to bringing some aid, filling pages with rhetorical statements, looking for funds for anything other than the center of the conflict and that is the land (and other resources), the rules of access, use and management, with all the ecological, social, institutional and political dimensions that this entails.
The result is there before our eyes: conflicts are increasing, pastors are abandoned and no one tries to make a serious effort to attack the roots of the problems.
In our naivety we had believed colleagues who, in the corridors and in the coffee breaks, told us that they absolutely agreed with us and that soon the necessary funds and support would arrive. It took years, but in the end we realised that what was missing was the will, because what interested us was a career.
As I once wished in one of my last messages to the emergency management, you too must look in the mirror in the morning when you wash. I, and whoever worked with me, can do it; you, I'm not sure.
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