Contested Imperial Infrastructure: A User’s History of the Cape to Cairo Railway in Southern Africa, 1889–1967

This study opens up a new and critical view of the Cape to Cairo Railway during British colonialism in Southern Africa. It does so by contrasting the romanticized vision of the Cape to Cairo Railway with the complex reality of railway use that emerged. The Cape to Cairo Railway was a grand British project to conquer, capitalize and ‘civilize’ Africa and soon became a symbol of the lofty British ambitions during ‘high imperialism’. Despite never being completed, Cecil Rhodes’ companies constructed railways into the British colonies of Bechuanaland, Northern and Southern Rhodesia, which remained in use throughout the colonial period. This book uncovers how and for what different groups – administrators, mining companies, settlers, African workers and farmers, African, European and Indian travellers – used and shaped these extant rail tracks from the beginning to the end of British imperialism in the region. By investigating the themes control, money & maintenance, racialization & gender and borders & polities, the book explores the role of the railways in the colonization of Southern Africa. The investigation demonstrates that the railway was predominantly shaped by the imperial owners, but the process was ambivalent and contingent. Other users constantly negotiated and contested the railways in idiosyncratic ways, conforming, evading or sometimes challenging the planned purposes of the owners. Overall, this book shows that the effects of imperial infrastructure are determined by its users on the ground.