The Invention of Green Colonialism

The story begins with a dream – the dream of Africa. Virgin forests, majestic mountains surrounded by savannas, vast plains punctuated with the rhythms of animal life where lions, elephants, and giraffes reign as lords of nature, far from civilisation – all of us carry such images in our heads, imagining Africa as a timeless Eden untouched by the ravages of modernity.

But this Africa has never existed. The more we destroy nature here, the more we fantasise about it in Africa. Along with UNESCO, the WWF, and other organisations, we convince ourselves that the African national parks are protecting the last vestiges of a world once untouched and wild. In reality, argues Guillaume Blanc, these organisations are responsible for naturalising large tracts of the African continent, turning territories into parks and forcibly evicting thousands of people from the lands where they have lived for centuries.

Making use of archives and oral histories, Blanc investigates this battle for a phantom Africa and the contradictory claims of nations who destroy nature at home while believing that they are protecting the natural world abroad. In so doing, they enact a new type of colonialism: green colonialism.