Postcolonial geographies, decolonization, and the performance of geopolitics at Commonwealth conferences

Abstract

Research in postcolonial geography has overlooked the period, practices and spaces of political decolonization in favour of studies of high imperialism and ongoing contemporary colonialism.Here, I suggest geographers should look more carefully at the mid-twentieth century era during which people, institutions and states negotiated, performed and experienced becoming postcolonial. I make this case by focusing on the modern Commonwealth which emerged from the end of the British Empire, and specifically, on two Commonwealth Heads of Government Meetings in the 1970s. At this time the Commonwealth was an important site for rehearsing anticolonial, anti-British and postcolonial political identities, for contesting British policies in Southern Africa and intervening in ongoing decolonization. The paper makes three broader contributions. First, it highlights the need to grasp the specificities of institutions arising from decolonization, and to take this period seriously as one that was experienced, at least by political elites, as one of dramatic change, characterized by exciting opportunities as well as uncertainty and frustration. Second, it broadens conceptualizations of geopolitical space and action by drawing attention to international conferences as geopolitical events through which political positions and identities were staged and performed. Third, it contributes to (and complicates) notions of the subaltern within postcolonial geopolitics.

Articulating an Indian diaspora in South Africa: The Consulate General of India, diaspora associations and practices of collaboration

“…Subaltern political actors -and the embodied, more-than representational and material relationalities of their lives -are increasingly the focus of wider scholarship examining the orchestrations of geopolitics (e.g. Craggs, 2014). More nuanced accounts are needed of how governments find ways of including and managing the diversity of diasporic voices and agendas as the role of diasporas within states' extraterritorial political engagements evolves.…”

Mobilizing drug policy activism: conferences, convergence spaces and ephemeral fixtures in social movement mobilization

“…The CND's constant location in Vienna, for example, acts as a guidepost in a policy process of international drug policy. It is both an important event for transnational and national drug policy makers, and the realm of international diplomacy (Craggs, 2014;Kuus, 2011), and it is an important convergence space for drug policy reform activists to meet each other, encounter those in powerful positions, and to engage in contentious social action (Craggs & Mahony, 2014;Wainwright et al, 2000). Policy advocacy happens in many forms, and is always a part of the mobilization of specific policy models.…”

The Geographies of the Conference: Knowledge, Performance and Protest

“…Craggs' () work on the 1971 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Singapore illustrates the value of considering conference location in order to better understand the performance of international relations. This event made history as it was the first time that this biennial conference had been held outside London, this shift reflecting a desire to decentralise Commonwealth politics, necessary given the organisation's imperial history .…”

“…The Singapore conference took place in a striking new modernist building, and lengthy preparations were undertaken to beautify the whole city, including painting, replanting and a politeness campaign (similar efforts were made at Bandung, see Shimazu ). Thus “the conference allowed [Premier] Lee to project a vision of a modern independent Singapore to the rest of the Commonwealth, and of himself as international statesman, a postcolonial performance that cemented Singapore's position in the orbit of the Western economic and geopolitical world” (Craggs , p. 45).…”

“…For example, as Simon Dalby (, p. 593) has shown in relation to the Rio Earth Summit, The New York Times “reinforced northern assumptions about the contemporary geopolitical order of modernity”, all the while lessening the possibility of alternative interpretations, negotiations and conference outcomes. Viewed from this perspective, “Conference performances—and their translation into media narratives—should be seen as crucial, rather than peripheral to, the real business of geopolitics” (Craggs , p. 52; Death ; Shimazu, ).…”