IsisCB Explore

Article ID: CBB327867560

A World Laboratory: Framing the Albert National Park (July 2017)

Bont, Raf de (Author)

Environmental History
Volume: 22
Issue: 3
Pages: 404-432

DOI: 10.1093/envhis/emx020

URI: https://academic.oup.com/envhis/article-lookup/doi/10.1093/envhis/emx020

Outside Links

WorldCat

Google Scholar

JSTOR

Academia.edu

Research institutes; research stations Biology Environmental sciences International cooperation Wildlife conservation National parks and reserves Belgium, colonies 20th century Democratic Republic of the Congo

The Albert National Park in Belgian Congo was founded in 1925 on the initiative of a small but well-connected transnational network of naturalists, diplomats, and royals. Throughout the park’s existence, this network discursively framed it as a place of scientific research and international collaboration, thus linking it with values of universalism and inclusiveness. The rhetoric of the park as a “world laboratory” facilitated the access of a global network of biologists and legitimized scientific management schemes to protect its so-called primitive character. While opened up to international scholars, the park was also closed off from unwanted human and nonhuman actors including the local population, tourists, and invasive species. After Congo’s independence in 1960, the founding network lost its direct control over the country’s national parks. But in the new geopolitical situation, the old rhetoric of universalism and internationalism was also useful to preserve its continued influence on the management of Congolese nature.

...More

Citation URI

http://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB327867560/

Citations Indexes

Similar Citations

Article Raf De Bont; (2022)
Moving across the Zoo–Field Border: Heini Hediger in Congo (/isis/citation/CBB512006477/)

Article Wilko Graf von Hardenberg; (2019)
Climate, Fascism, and Ibex: Experiments in Using Population Dynamics Modeling as a Historiographical Tool (/isis/citation/CBB551967420/)

Book Jacob S. T. Dlamini; (2020)
Safari Nation: A Social History of the Kruger National Park (/isis/citation/CBB286513124/)

Book Lary M. Dilsaver; (2017)
Preserving the Desert: A History of Joshua Tree National Park (/isis/citation/CBB540717050/)

Book Rothman, Hal K.; (2007)
Blazing Heritage: A History of Wildland Fire in the National Parks (/isis/citation/CBB000950079/)

Article Saari, Paula Johanna; (2015)
Marketing Nature: The Canadian National Parks Branch and Constructing the Portrayal of National Parks in Promotional Brochures, 1936--1970 (/isis/citation/CBB001552982/)

Article Beudel, Saskia; Daly, Margo; (2014)
Gallant Desert Flora: Olive Pink's Australian Arid Regions Flora Reserve (/isis/citation/CBB001451690/)

Article Fan, Shih-fang; (2011)
The History of Qingdao Laboratory of Marine Animal Physiology (/isis/citation/CBB001221321/)

Book Laura Alice Watt; David Lowenthal; (2016)
The Paradox of Preservation: Wilderness and Working Landscapes at Point Reyes National Seashore (/isis/citation/CBB843463060/)

Book IEEE, ; (2009)
Proceedings of 2009 IEEE Conference on the History of Technical Societies: 5--7 August 2009, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (/isis/citation/CBB001034069/)

Article Roland Wittje; (2020)
The Establishment of IIT Madras: German Cold War Development Assistance and Engineering Education in India (/isis/citation/CBB601483752/)

Book Perrin Selcer; (2018)
The Postwar Origins of the Global Environment: How the United Nations Built Spaceship Earth (/isis/citation/CBB775195612/)

Book Jennifer Hubbard; David Wildish; Robert Stephenson; (2016)
A Century of Maritime Science: The St. Andrews Biological Station (/isis/citation/CBB276028581/)

Article Samuël Coghe; (2021)
Between colonial medicine and global health: protein malnutrition and UNICEF milk in the Belgian Congo (/isis/citation/CBB611553003/)

Article Santos Casado; (2014)
La geología en los orígenes históricos del conservacionismo español. (/isis/citation/CBB051826949/)

Article Santos Casado; (2017)
Patrias primitivas. Discursos e imágenes de la naturaleza en el primer conservacionismo español (/isis/citation/CBB737764329/)

Article Selcer, Perrin; (2013)
Beyond the Cephalic Index: Negotiating Politics to Produce UNESCO's Scientific Statements on Race (/isis/citation/CBB001212635/)

Article Hoppe, Brigitte; Robin, Nicolas; Štrbáňová, Soňa; (2006)
Introduction (/isis/citation/CBB000771783/)

Book Vetter, Jeremy; (2010)
Knowing Global Environments: New Historical Perspectives in the Field Sciences (/isis/citation/CBB001021712/)

Book John Woinarski; (2018)
A Bat's End: The Christmas Island Pipistrelle and Extinction in Australia (/isis/citation/CBB553610990/)