PhD thesis Title Page Final _Richard Juma - Victoria University ...

people overtime. It is argued here that an ‘actor’ 94 portfolio of activities
depends not only on the assets and the opportunities available as per the
discussion in Chapter 4, but also embedded in the historical socio-cultural
repertoire of the actor. Recent studies shed light on the concepts of
livelihood ‘trajectories’, ‘styles’, 95 and ‘pathways’ which emphasize the
consideration of the historical socio-cultural repertoire of the actor(s) in
the framework of a livelihood approach (De Haan and Zoomers 2005).
The chapter is divided into two main sections. The first section documents
and summarises the literature on factors which assert pressure on the
Turkana livelihood system. As pointed out in Chapter 2, this section
specifically focuses on the drought impacts, and the historical factors. 96
The historical analysis deals mainly with two distinct phases: the colonial,
and the post-independence phases. The argument advanced to consider
the colonial period is that the stage for food shortages within the Turkana
region was set many decades ago. Oba (1992) contends that the root cause
of the food insecurity problems among the Turkana people of today can be
traced to the disruptive and inimical policies of both the colonial and post-
independent governments. He argues that where policies have been
applied, they have tended to be against the interest of the Turkana people.
Lamphear (1992) emphasizes that the negative policies towards the
Turkana people started with the colonial regime. A Turkana diviner called
Lokorijam had a prophetic dream in 1875 about colonial infiltration. He is
quoted: “I have seen a great vulture, coming from the sky, and scooping up
the land of the Turkana in its talons” (Lamphear 1992: 48). Lamphear
(1992: 48) further points out that “it is evident that a colonizing power who
94 Actor is a concept devised by Norman Long. See Long’s book Development Sociology:
Actor Perspectives (2001). According to de Haan and Zoomers (2005), actors of a
particular style have similar dispositions and face similar life opportunities, expectations
of others, resulting in a livelihood typical of their group.
95 Nooteboom (2003) emphasises that style represents behaviour that reflects both ‘longterm
practices and institutions on one hand and individual strategic choices on the other
hand.
96 There are many other factors which impact negatively on the livelihoods of Turkana
people. Gulliver (1951) reported animal diseases and raids from neighbouring tribes but
in this study limits itself to drought and history of negative policy environment.
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