Legal Geographies of Catastrophe: Forests, Fires, and Property in Colonial Algeria

Forest fires in Algeria in the 1850s and 1860s suggest a link between environmentally induced catastrophes and the geographies of property and territory in the colony. In eastern Algeria, these fires helped fuel a discussion over the security and reliability of European settlers’ property rights and of the colonial state's ability to guarantee them. Following a brief analysis of forestry policy in France and Algeria, this paper analyzes some of the correspondence and official reports that emerged in the wake of major conflagrations. By the early 1860s, settlers and private forestry companies were calling the colonial state's credibility into question and demanding far-reaching changes to the property law and land-use regimes in place in the colony. Eventually, colonial authorities moved to help cement settlers’ property claims, eliminating enclaves and imposing new rules on “native” Algerians’ rights to use the forest. This essay concludes by suggesting that the process of making property private, in Algeria and elsewhere, is informed by perceptions of risk and by the modes of awareness inspired by environmentally induced catastrophic events.