Regenwaldkolonisation als Frontier-Prozess: Der Ituri-Wald in Nordost-Kongo (Zaire) 1985-1995

This paper analyses the concept of the frontier in terms of its usefulness in representing migration processes on the periphery of settled regions in tropical rain forests. Empirical field methods developed to study such dynamic settlement expansion areas are discussed and applied to two typical forms of frontier narrative: the migration epic ("to-the-region approach"), and the frontier as an arena of intercultural contacts ("within-the-region approach"). Combined with the cultural-ecological notion of pre-adaptation, three characteristics which were originally defined to describe frontier processes in the Amazon can help to analyse the frontier processes in the Ituri forest of former north-eastern Zaire: competing groups, perceptions of land, and power structures. It is argued that all actors on the frontier act within an institutional vacuum which is primarily a function of the declining Zairian State. The economic interests and ambitions of the frontier actors appear to be relatively heterogeneous due to their different regional and cultural backgrounds. They tend to converge however in a common desire to achieve secure economic subsistence. The only global player on the scene, a conservation reserve, even finds itself forced to adapt to local circumstances, particularly as it becomes the involuntary target of informal economic activities.