Cargo cult is a term used to denote various spiritual and political movements that arose among indigenous Melanesians following Western colonisation of the region in the late 19th century. Although the term "cargo cult" has been used by anthropologists to "label almost any sort of organised, village-based social movement with religious and political aspirations", features common to most cargo cult groups include the presence of charismatic prophet figures foretelling an imminent cataclysm and/or a coming utopia for followers—a worldview known as millenarianism. Claims made by these prophets varied greatly from movement to movement, with some predicting the return of the dead or an abundance of food. Some movements sought to appease "ancestral spirits or other powerful beings" by either reviving ancestral traditions or adopting new rituals, such as ecstatic dancing or imitating the actions of colonists and military personnel. Some groups foretold the coming of a bounty of Western goods or money as part of their prophecy,[1] although this was not a universal feature of such movements, with other prophets telling their followers to abandon Western goods. Anthropologists have described cargo cults as rooted in pre-existing aspects of Melanesian society, as a reaction to colonial oppression and inequality disrupting traditional village life, or both.[2]
Groups labeled as cargo cults were subject to a considerable number of anthropological publications throughout the 1960s. After Melanesian countries gained political independence, few new groups matching the term have emerged since the 1970s, with some surviving "cargo cult" groups transitioning into indigenous churches and political movements. The term has largely fallen out of favour and is now seldom used among anthropologists, though its use as a metaphor (often based on ideas of "cargo cults" as engaging in ritual action to obtain material goods) is widespread outside of anthropology in popular commentary and critique,[3] based on stereotypes of cargo cultists as "primitive and confused people who use irrational means to pursue rational ends". Recent scholarship on "cargo cults" has challenged the suitability of the term for the movements associated with it, with recent anthropological sources arguing that the term is born of colonialism and prejudice and does not accurately convey the diversity or nature of the movements within the label, though some anthropologists continue to see the term as having some descriptive value.
The term "cargo cult" first appeared in print in the November 1945 issue of Pacific Islands Monthly, in an entry written by Norris Mervyn Bird, an ‘old Territories resident’, who expressed concern regarding the effects of World War II, the teachings of Christian missionaries and the increasing liberalisation of colonial authorities in Melanesia would have on local islanders.Previous similar phenomena, first documented in the late 19th century, had been labelled with the term "Vailala Madness", to which the term "cargo cult" was then retroactively applied. Bird took the term from derogatory descriptions used by planters and businessmen in the Australian Territory of Papua.[4] From this issue, the term became used in anthropology following the publications of Australian anthropologists Lucy Mair and H. Ian Hogbin in the late 1940s and early 1950s.
Peter Worsley defined cargo cults as follows in his 1957 book The Trumpet Shall Sound:
In 1964, Peter Lawrence described the term as follows: "Cargo ritual was any religious activity designed to produce goods in this way and assumed to have been taught [to] the leader [of the cargo cult] by the deity".[5]
Anthropologist Lamont Lindstrom has witten that the term "bundles together diverse and particular uprisings, disturbances, and movements that may have little in common", with the term used to "label almost any sort of organised, village-based social movement with religious and political aspirations" which "encompass a variety of forms of social unrest that ethnographers elsewhere tagged millenarian, messianic, nativistic, vitalistic, revivalistic, or culture-contact or adjustment movements" Lindstrom writes that many anthropologists suggest that "cargo" does not necessarily signifiy literal material goods, but can also reflect desires for "moral salvation, existential respect, or proto-nationalistic, anti-colonial desire for political autonomy".
Elements that Ton Otto considered characteristic of many cargo cults include the synthesis of indigenous and foreign elements in the belief system, the expectation of help from the ancestors, the presence of charismatic leaders, and lastly, belief in the appearance of an abundance of goods.[6] The indigenous societies of Melanesia were typically characterized by a "big man" political system in which individuals gained prestige through gift exchanges. The more wealth a man could distribute, the more people who were in his debt, and the greater his renown.
Many cargo cults existed in opposition to colonial rule, often linked to burdens placed on villagers by colonial authorities, such as head taxes.
Many cargo cult movements sought to revive ancestral traditions (often in the face of their suppression by missionaries or colonial authorities) such as kava drinking, and/or adopt new rituals such as ecstatic dancing or actions imitative of colonial practices, like flag-raising and marching.
Cargo cults often served to unite previously opposing groups. In some movements, the leaders engaged in authoritarian behaviour in order to uphold the new social order, with a particular focus on the issues of sorcery and sexual activity. In some movements sexual morality was relaxed, ignoring the pre-existing customs regarding exogamy and incest, while in other movements, strict celibacy policies were implemented.
Faced, through colonialism, with foreigners with a seemingly unending supply of goods for exchange, indigenous Melanesians experienced "value dominance". That is, they were dominated by others in terms of their own (not the foreign) value system.[7] Many Melanesians found the concept of money incomprehensible, and many cargo cult movements ordered followers to abandon colonial money by either dumping it into the sea or spending it rapidly, with the prophets promising that it would be replaced by new money and they would be freed from their debts.
Since the modern manufacturing process was largely unknown to them, members, leaders, and prophets of the cults often maintained that the manufactured goods of the non-native culture had been created by spiritual means, such as through their deities and ancestors, or that an ancestor had learned how to manufacture the goods. These leaders claimed that the goods were intended for the local indigenous people, but the foreigners had unfairly gained control of these objects through malice or mistake.[8] Thus, a characteristic feature of cargo cults was the belief that spiritual agents would, at some future time, give much valuable cargo and desirable manufactured products to the cult members.
Discussions of cargo cults usually begin with a series of movements that occurred in the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century.[9] The earliest recorded movement that has been described as a "cargo cult" was the Tuka Movement that began in Fiji in 1885 at the height of the colonial era's plantation-style economy. The movement began with a promised return to a golden age of ancestral potency. Minor alterations to priestly practices were undertaken to update them and attempt to recover some kind of ancestral efficacy. Colonial authorities saw the leader of the movement, Tuka, as a troublemaker, and he was exiled, although their attempts to stop him returning proved fruitless.[10]
Cargo cults occurred periodically in many parts of the island of New Guinea, including the Taro Cult in northern Papua New Guinea and the Vailala Madness that arose from 1919 to 1922.[9] The last was documented by Francis Edgar Williams, one of the first anthropologists to conduct fieldwork in Papua New Guinea. Less dramatic cargo cults have appeared in western New Guinea as well, including the Asmat and Dani areas.
The most widely known period of cargo cult activity occurred among the Melanesian islanders in the years during and after World War II. A small population of indigenous peoples observed, often directly in front of their dwellings, the largest war ever fought by technologically advanced nations. The Japanese distributed goods and used the beliefs of the Melanesians to attempt to gain their compliance.[9] Later the Allied forces arrived in the islands and did this as well.
The vast amounts of military equipment and supplies that both sides airdropped (or airlifted to airstrips) to troops on these islands meant drastic changes to the lifestyle of the islanders, many of whom had never seen outsiders before. Manufactured clothing, medicine, canned food, tents, weapons and other goods arrived in vast quantities for the soldiers, who often shared some of it with the islanders who were their guides and hosts. This was true of the Japanese Army as well, at least initially before relations deteriorated in most regions.
In the late 1930s, the John Frum movement emerged on Tanna in Vanuatu. This tradition urged islanders to resume dancing and kava drinking (which had been suppressed by missionaries) and to maintain historic traditions. The movement predicted American assistance, which as foretold arrived in 1942. The movements rituals were influenced by Christianity, and also included similar elements to other cargo cults like "marching and drilling, flags and poles, and flowers". The John Frum movement has become to be described as the "archetypal" cargo cult.[11]
With the end of the war, the military abandoned the airbases and stopped dropping cargo. In response, charismatic individuals developed cults among remote Melanesian populations that promised to bestow on their followers deliveries of food, arms, Jeeps, etc. The cult leaders explained that the cargo would be gifts from their own ancestors, or other sources, as had occurred with the outsider armies.[12]
In attempts to get cargo to fall by parachute or land in planes or ships again, islanders imitated the same practices they had seen the military personnel use. Cult behaviors usually involved mimicking the day-to-day activities and dress styles of US soldiers, such as performing parade ground drills with wooden or salvaged rifles.[12] The islanders carved headphones from wood and wore them while sitting in fabricated control towers. They waved the landing signals while standing on the runways. They lit signal fires and torches to light up runways and lighthouses.[13]
In a form of sympathetic magic, many built life-size replicas of airplanes out of straw and cut new military-style landing strips out of the jungle, hoping to attract more airplanes.[14] The cult members thought that the foreigners had some special connection to the deities and ancestors of the natives, who were the only beings powerful enough to produce such riches.
Cargo cults were typically created by individual leaders, or big men in the Melanesian culture. The leaders typically held cult rituals well away from established towns and colonial authorities, thus making reliable information about these practices very difficult to acquire.[15]
Classification of groups as cargo cults was sometimes controversial. For example, the separatist Hahalis Welfare Society on Buka Island was classed by Australian authorities as a cargo cult, but this was denied by its leaders Francis Hagai and John Teosin.[16]
Some cargo cults are still active. These include:
However, as of 1993, Lamont Lindstrom reports that "many" Melanesian political movements "must take care" to "explicitly" deny any connection with the cults.[19]
Anthropologist Anthony F. C. Wallace conceptualized the "Tuka movement" as a revitalization movement. Peter Worsley's analysis of cargo cults placed the emphasis on the economic and political causes of these popular movements. He viewed them as "proto-national" movements by indigenous peoples seeking to resist colonial interventions. He observed a general trend away from millenarianism towards secular political organization through political parties and cooperatives.[20]
Theodore Schwartz was the first to emphasize that both Melanesians and Europeans place great value on the demonstration of wealth. "The two cultures met on the common ground of materialistic competitive striving for prestige through entrepreneurial achievement of wealth." Melanesians felt "relative deprivation" in their standard of living, and thus came to focus on cargo as an essential expression of their personhood and agency.
Peter Lawrence was able to add greater historical depth to the study of cargo cults, and observed the striking continuity in the indigenous value systems from pre-cult times to the time of his study. Kenelm Burridge, in contrast, placed more emphasis on cultural change, and on the use of memories of myths to comprehend new realities, including the "secret" of European material possessions. His emphasis on cultural change follows from Worsley's argument on the effects of capitalism; Burridge points out these movements were more common in coastal areas which faced greater intrusions from European colonizers.[21]
Cargo cults often develop during a combination of crises. Under conditions of social stress, such a movement may form under the leadership of a charismatic figure. This leader may have a "vision" (or "myth-dream") of the future, often linked to an ancestral efficacy ("mana") thought to be recoverable by a return to traditional morality.[22] [23] This leader may characterize the present state as a dismantling of the old social order, meaning that social hierarchy and ego boundaries have been broken down.[24]
Contact with colonizing groups brought about a considerable transformation in the way indigenous peoples of Melanesia have thought about other societies. Early theories of cargo cults began from the assumption that practitioners simply failed to understand technology, colonization, or capitalist reform; in this model, cargo cults are a misunderstanding of the systems involved in resource distribution, and an attempt to acquire such goods in the wake of interrupted trade. However, many of these practitioners actually focus on the importance of sustaining and creating new social relationships, with material relations being secondary.[25]
Since the late twentieth century, alternative theories have arisen. For example, some scholars, such as Kaplan and Lindstrom, focus on Europeans' characterization of these movements as a fascination with manufactured goods and what such a focus says about consumerism.[26] Others point to the need to see each movement as reflecting a particularized historical context, even eschewing the term "cargo cult" for them unless there is an attempt to elicit an exchange relationship from Europeans.[27]
In recent decades, anthropology has distanced itself from the term "cargo cult", which is now seen as having been reductively applied to many different complicated and disparate social and religious movements that arose from the stress and trauma of colonialism, and sought to attain much more varied and amorphous goals—things like self-determination—than material cargo.[28]
More recent work has debated the suitability of the term cargo cult arguing that it does not refer to an identifiable empirical reality, and that the emphasis on "cargo" says more about Western ideological bias than it does about the movements concerned.[29] Nancy McDowell argues that the focus on cargo cult isolates the phenomenon from the wider social and cultural field (such as politics and economics) that gives it meaning. She states that people experience change as dramatic and complete, rather than as gradual and evolutionary. This sense of a dramatic break is expressed through cargo cult ideology.
Lamont Lindstrom takes this analysis one step further through his examination of "cargoism", the discourse of the West about cargo cults. His analysis is concerned with Western fascination with the phenomenon in both academic and popular writing. In his opinion, the name "cargo cult" is deeply problematic because of its pejorative connotation of backwardness, since it imputes a goal (cargo) obtained through the wrong means (cult); the actual goal is not so much obtaining material goods as creating and renewing social relationships under threat. Martha Kaplan thus argues in favor of erasing the term altogether, though other writers like Ton Otto have argued the term remains useful.[30]
The term "cargo cult" is widely used negatively as a metaphor outside anthropology. Usage often relates to the ideas of desire (particularly for wealth and material goods) and relatedly consumerism and capitalism, ritual action and the expectation of rational results from irrational means,[31] though the term has been used as a general pejorative for "almost anything that some critic depreciates".