Description
Book SynopsisThe book illuminates key aspects of how, historically, the dynamics of power and identity interact in the African context, generating the kind of political structures and collective actions that have often appeared characteristic for the continent. It examines some salient dimensions of the broader frameworks of hegemony and power imposed upon African societies in the context of larger geopolitical and historical processes.
Power and identity are two key concepts which can be applied in describing African realities. The interaction and connections between the two concepts are, moreover, of key importance in the African context, as their studies demonstrate.
In common with other scholars in this area of study, the authors acknowledge that underlying their work is a compelling fascination with the continent’s evolving social and cultural forms. Their insight into African social reality reflects a fragile and fragmented continent capable of bringing forth a great variety of agents and actors in the interplay of social and political power: power vested in a variety of groups, ethnicities, religions or classes, with potential to impose on the identity of others.
Table of Contents
- PART I - INCORPORATION AND POLITICAL PENETRATION
- Part Introduction
- 1. `Big-man’ and his big brother: Some notes on incorporation by Martin Doornbos
- 2. The post-colonial state, `state penetration’ and the Nkoya experience in Western Central Zambia by Wim van Binsbergen
- 3. Recurring penetration strategies in East Africa by Martin Doornbos
- 4. Aspects of modern state penetration in Africa by Wim van Binsbergen
- PART II - ETHNICITY AND IDENTITY: WHAT IS THE PROBLEM?
- Part introduction
- 5. Some conceptual problems concerning ethnicity in integration analysis by Martin Doornbos
- 6. From tribe to ethnicity in Western Zambia: The unit of study as an ideological problem by Wim van Binsbergen
- 7. Kumanyana and Rwenzururu: Two responses to ethnic inequality in Uganda by Martin Doornbos
- 8. The Kazanga festival: Ethnicity as cultural mediation and transformation in Western Central Zambia by Wim van Binsbergen
- 9. Rwenzururu protest songs by Martin Doornbos and Peter Cooke
- 10. Nkoya royal chiefs and the Kazanga cultural association in Western Central Zambia today: Resilience, decline, or folklorisation? by Wim van Binsbergen
- 11. The Ankole kingship question: Stalemate and Implications by Martin Doornbos
- PART III - RELIGION AND STATE: AMBIGUOUS RELATIONSHIPS
- Part introduction
- 12. Fortunes and failures in state formation: Contrasting the jihads of Usman dan Fodio and Mohammed Abdulle Hassan by Martin Doornbos
- 13. Religious innovation and political conflict in Zambia: The Lumpa rising by Wim van Binsbergen
- 14. Church and state in Eastern Africa: Some unresolved questions Martin Doornbos
- 15. African Independent churches and the state in Botswana Wim van Binsbergen
- PART IV CONSTRUCTING NATIONAL POLITICS
- Introduction to Part IV
- 16. Form and ideology in first-generation constitutional preambles: Some francophone African examples Martin Doornbos, Wim van Binsbergen & Gerti Hesseling
- 17. Aspects of democracy and democratisation in Zambia and Botswana: Exploring African political culture at the grassroots Wim van Binsbergen
- 18. Enquiring into African statehood, conflict and legitimacy, with particular reference to Somalia and Uganda Martin Doornbos
- PART V CONCLUSION
- 19. Conclusion Wim van Binsbergen & Martin Doornbos
- Notes
- Cumulative bibliography
- Index
