Margaret Levyns and the Decline of Ecological Liberalism in the Southwest Cape, 1890–1975

Abstract

This article analyses the life and ideas of Margaret Rutherford Levyns (née Michell), a South African botanist who worked from 1918 to 1946 as a lecturer in botany at the University of Cape Town and continued to write about the Cape flora (known today as the Cape Floristic Region) until her death in 1975. Until the early 1960s, Levyns maintained a neutral scientific and moral understanding of invasive species, defined here as ‘ecological liberalism’, that reflected her gendered experiences as a botanist, her prevailing ideas of ecology, the lingering ideals of Cape liberalism, and her extensive research into the phytogeography and taxonomy of the Cape flora. Levyns began to shift her views on non-native invasive species only after retirement. By using Levyns as a lens onto the period, this article distinguishes between a prevailing Cape ecological liberalism from the 1890s to the 1950s that shifted towards a more critical stance on invasive alien species in the 1950s and 1960s.