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Summary

This presentation focuses on the political economy of health in the diamond mines of South-West Africa, Namibia, under South Africa’s mandate for the League of Nations, with an emphasis on the early years of the mandate. Archival correspondence between the South-West African administration and the League of Nations held in the UN archives will be explored in relation to the health and treatment of African workers in the mines of South-West Africa, and more generally in the colony. The often-ambiguous discourses and practices of colonial officials and mining company officials will be addressed in relation to the health of the African workforce and how these responded to emerging global health discourses. Furthermore, the seminar will begin to address hitherto unexplored avenues of research on the early emergence of health discourses and practices on a global stage. In so doing, the speaker aims to reveal the complex interweaving of different actors and institutions operating at local and global level whose practices and discourses began to shape the political economy of health on the mines of South-West Africa under South African rule and for the emergence of complex notions of care, health, and morality in Africa and on a global stage.

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