Tobias Schwoerer is Senior Lecturer at the University of Lucerne and part-time Lecturer at the University of Fribourg in Switzerland. He has more than three years of fieldwork experience in Papua New Guinea, both in the Eastern Highlands and in Morobe Province. He specializes in political, economic and environmental anthropology, and has published on colonial processes of pacification, the interplay between sorcery and contemporary warfare, conflict settlement procedures, mining and plantation projects, and social inequalities. His latest research project focuses on the engagement of Wampar households in the Markham Valley with large-scale capitalist projects in the form of mining and industrial tree plantations, and how they continuously change and adapt their diversified economic activities in dynamic interactions with local and global markets.

Tobias Schwoerer studied history and social anthropology at the University of Zurich and has a PhD in social anthropology from the University of Lucerne. He is vice-president of the board of ESfO and in charge of organizing the 2025 ESfO Conference in Lucerne.

Conflict, Colonial Discourse, Social Change, State, Sorcery, Regional History, Mining, Land Dispute, Forestry, First Contacts, Economic Anthropology, Natural Resources, Weapons, Violent Conflict

Anthropology
History

European Society for Oceanists (ESfO)
Association for Social Anthropology in Oceania (ASAO)

Papua New Guinea
Eastern Highlands (Papua New Guinea)
Morobe (Papua New Guinea)

Papua New Guinea

First and Early contacts
The Colonial time
20th century
21st century
Anticipatory

Tok Pisin, Wampar