Book Review: Human Porterage and Colonial State Formation in German East Africa, 1880s–1914 by Andreas Greiner GreinerAndreas, Human Porterage and Colonial State Formation in German East Africa, 1880s–1914. Tensions of Transport (Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2022), xviii + 271 pp., €145.59, ISBN 978-3-030-89459-6.

Andreas Greiner's book, based on his PhD dissertation, explores the tensions of porterage and caravan transport in German East Africa during the three decades of German colonial occupation.The author creatively uses caravan transport as the observation point to analyse the complexities of state formation in German East Africa, as well as the impact of colonial presence on local dynamics.By "[l]ocating colonial rule in everyday interactions" (p.5), Greiner takes an enticing approach to colonialism, and a very much welcome one.A local and daily analysis allows for a more complex and rich understanding of the processes of colonial occupation, which were disputed, negotiated and adapted on the ground by different actors.In this case, those included colonial officials, European and non-European traders, and porters themselves.These kinds of studies are still necessary to better understand colonialism beyond imperial and national approaches.Looking into daily colonial rule allows for a more complex analysis of the history of colonial occupation in Africa; in this instance, the less studied German Empire.Therefore, by resorting to concepts and examining dynamics that other literature on colonialism has tackled (Greiner notably quotes Frederick Cooper and Ann Laura Stoler), the author does join a considerable body of research which "point [s] to the fragility and vulnerability of colonial infrastructure systems" (p.10), which is also a pretext to delve into labour and mobility.The analysis fully demonstrates the tensions within the colonial state itself: German officials had to conciliate the need to maintain trade (since it was the colony's main source of income) with typical colonial projects of control, capitalist economy, and civilisation.Furthermore, Greiner considers African mobilities and contributions to the porterage system, going beyond "the still-vibrant conceptual focus on infrastructure as a European invention" (p.12).African agency is therefore an important part of the analysis.The book straddles different literatures, and one less positive aspect is that the mobilisation of so many references sometimes erodes the place of the impressive number of