Terraqueous territorialization and resistance: Unruly sediments, centuries old marshland and the port of Hamburg

Abstract

The port of Hamburg is the third-largest port in Europe and located approximately 120 km from the North Sea in the inner delta of the vast Elbe estuary. The foundation, expansion and maintenance of Hamburg’s port required the reconfiguration of the estuary and its inner delta. Dredging and reclamation have transformed aquatic spaces and entailed significant regulatory changes that have opened up new forms of use (e.g. shipping, port logistics, urban development), terminated old forms (e.g. fishing, agriculture) and provided the framework conditions for new profit opportunities. We take the Elbe estuary in Northern Germany as an example to show how past and present territorialization are inscribed in today’s estuarine landscapes and seascapes. We build our contribution on an analysis of contemporary and historical documents, newspaper articles and qualitative interviews, focusing on the metabolism of terraqueous territorialization and protests against port expansion. Conceptually, we formulate a political ecology of terraqueous territorialization to investigate the socio-ecological renegotiation of land and water spaces and the production of regional centres and peripheries in the estuarine landscapes of the Elbe.