Ambergris, Livestock, and Oil: Port-making as Chokepoint Making in the Red Sea

ABSTRACT Either imagined as spaces of cosmopolitan circulation and exchange or mechanised logistics hubs, ports are central sites to theorise the historical origins of capitalism and its contemporary manifestations and futures. We know little, however, of the processes through which ports come into being and the varied ways in which they sustain their centrality. Locating itself in three port-cities along the maritime chokepoint of the Bab-el-Mandeb and focusing on the circulation and capture of objects as disparate as ambergris, goats, and oil, this article emphasises how port making (and unmaking), through the channelling of circulation, entails the transformation of littoral spaces into chokepoints – nodes of circulation, but equally importantly of capture and constriction. A focus on port-making as chokepoint making renders in active voice the confluence of forces, from ecological to geopolitical, that give rise to ports as specific loci of regulatory powers as well the contingency and fragility of place-making.