{"title":"Making the Maasai: revisiting the history of Rift Valley Maa-speakers c.1800–c.1930","authors":"Richard Waller","doi":"10.1080/17531055.2023.2280932","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17531055.2023.2280932","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":46968,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Eastern African Studies","volume":"15 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.4,"publicationDate":"2023-11-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139270846","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Western Sudanese marginalization, coups in Khartoum and the structural legacies of colonial military divide and rule, 1924-present","authors":"Willow Berridge","doi":"10.1080/17531055.2023.2280933","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17531055.2023.2280933","url":null,"abstract":"This paper discusses the long-term history underpinning the tension between the “national” army and provincial “militias” that led to the outbreak of conflict in Sudan in April 2023. Sudan’s British colonizers created the distinction between what would later become a professional military in the northern region of the country, and what were deemed as “tribal”, irregular and ethnically defined forces elsewhere. The aspiring revolutionaries of the post-independence era hoped they could use the military as a short-cut to social change and modernization that would sweep away the neo-tribal system of “Native Administration” imposed by the British, but by aligning themselves to an unreformed colonial army and economic system, found that they forced violent reactions in marginalized regions. The reactions included Western Sudanese involvement in attempts to change the regime in Khartoum by force in 1971, 1975, 1976, and 2008, which this paper documents. These crises exposed the broader tensions within Sudanese nationalism, based as it was on the ideal of synergy between military and people. The paper draws on a wide range of Arabic and English sources, including newspapers and archival content.","PeriodicalId":46968,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Eastern African Studies","volume":"54 11","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-11-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"136346404","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Deborah Fahy Bryceson, Jesper Bosse Jønsson, Michael Clarke Shand
{"title":"Wealth and poverty in mining Africa: migration, settlement and occupational change in Tanzania during the global mineral boom, 2002–2012","authors":"Deborah Fahy Bryceson, Jesper Bosse Jønsson, Michael Clarke Shand","doi":"10.1080/17531055.2023.2265726","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17531055.2023.2265726","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This article interrogates place, process and people’s quest for enhanced welfare during the 2002–2012 global mineral price boom in northwest Tanzania. Mass in-migration of miners, traders and service providers generated diversified residential settlements. Processes of occupational change and urbanization, catalyzed by acquisition of employment, land, housing and other possessions at six contrasting mining locations were compared from a geo-social perspective. Our surveyed gold and diamond mining sites represented different manifestations of the mining trajectory namely: (1) artisanal rushes, (2) mature artisanal and (3) industrial mining. The article investigates who benefitted locationally and who lost in residents’ scrambles to gain improved living standards. Survey data on 216 household heads’ occupations, educational backgrounds, consumption and investments were collected, followed by construction of a household welfare index, revealing modest welfare improvements relative to rural consumption norms for the majority of interviewed resident households. However, in line with Picketty’s theoretical insights, extreme material inequality surfaced on the welfare spectrum between the outlier affluent and poor quintile groups. Those with higher educational attainment enjoyed superior welfare and occupational status, coalescing towards middle class formation. At the opposite end, single female-headed households stood out as extremely disadvantaged, handicapped by high child dependency ratios and occupational immobility.","PeriodicalId":46968,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Eastern African Studies","volume":"449 4","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"134908822","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"“Little Dubai” in the crossfire: trade corridor dynamics and ethno-territorial conflict in the Kenyan–Ethiopian border town Moyale","authors":"Katrin Sowa","doi":"10.1080/17531055.2023.2265042","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17531055.2023.2265042","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Against the promise that new trade corridors in Africa lead to political stability and state control, this article presents a contradictory case. In the context of the implementation of the LAPSSET corridor, Moyale at the Kenyan–Ethiopian border has been undergoing a transformation. The formerly marginalized border town is today envisioned as a major trade hub for the region. However, this development has been recurrently disturbed not only by trade barriers and import regulations but also by violent clashes between local communities. Moyale’s history, economic rivalries, and an intra-federal boundary dispute make the new corridor a specifically dangerous setting for the local population, while alternative smuggle routes are perceived as more reliable and secure. The text provides insights into ethnographic research in a particular violent surrounding. Qualitative interviews and participant observations were conducted with locals and border officials in Moyale during clashes between the Borana and Garre communities in 2018. The article aims to understand trade and security strategies on the ground, which are far from being controlled by state monopoly.","PeriodicalId":46968,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Eastern African Studies","volume":"47 1","pages":"424 - 444"},"PeriodicalIF":1.4,"publicationDate":"2023-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139363644","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Environmental risk management from below: living with landslides in Bududa, eastern Uganda","authors":"P. Khanakwa","doi":"10.1080/17531055.2023.2268361","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17531055.2023.2268361","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This article explores how the people of Bududa used culturally and spiritually embedded knowledge to tame extreme weather and ably live with the spectre and reality of landslides since the turn of the twentieth century. Drawing on multiple oral and written sources, the article shows how landslides were experienced in the past and chronicles recent government and community responses to living with landslides. The article shows that local approaches to managing risks worked effectively when land for expansion was still readily available. However, increasing population and heavy cultivation of the land over the course of the twentieth century put heavy pressure on the land thereby making it more susceptible to landslides. Consequently, the impact of the landslides became so severe necessitating government intervention to support the affected communities. Focusing on landslides as recurring risks that are socially constructed and managed, the article shows the innovativeness and resilience of the people of Bududa in living with and managing environmental risks.","PeriodicalId":46968,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Eastern African Studies","volume":"127 1","pages":"384 - 403"},"PeriodicalIF":1.4,"publicationDate":"2023-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139364227","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The politics of being Murle in South Sudan: state violence, displacement and the narrativisation of identity","authors":"Diana Felix da Costa","doi":"10.1080/17531055.2023.2259547","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17531055.2023.2259547","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The article offers a nuanced account of how identities are negotiated and contested in South Sudan, by focusing on how Murle and ŋalam identities were deployed in different ways in different places in overlapping periods during a time of armed conflict. As such, it explores the interplay between political violence and the instrumental deployment of ethnicity. Focusing on the 2012–2014 period of war between South Sudan's government and a largely Murle rebellion, it unpacks the longstanding Murle stereotyping as ‘fierce and hostile’ – an image fostered by the interlocution of more powerful neighbours in the colonial encounters and sustained by their dominance in subsequent governance structures. The article specifically discusses how Murle agricultural communities from Boma found protection strategies by activating temporary sub-ethnic identities and navigating the violence of being Murle. This challenges the “naturalised” linkages between modes of subsistence or ecology, and identity, and demonstrates how spatial movements affect the instrumental narrativisation of ethnic identities. The article argues for the continual interplay of ethnicity in relation to the state and its strategies and opportunities. Identity-making and identity-politics are dialctical processes – deployed by the state as much as by those on the receiving end as a source of protection from violence.","PeriodicalId":46968,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Eastern African Studies","volume":"3 1","pages":"404 - 423"},"PeriodicalIF":1.4,"publicationDate":"2023-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139363477","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"A non-event: ratifying the African Women’s Rights framework in Ethiopia","authors":"Karmen Tornius","doi":"10.1080/17531055.2023.2268363","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17531055.2023.2268363","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Ethiopia, the host of the African Union, did not ratify the African Women’s Rights framework (the Maputo Protocol) for fifteen years. While realist, liberal and constructivist scholars have theorised why countries ratify human rights treaties, this article adds to this debate by asking ‘why not?’. Based on interviews, archival material, document analysis and fieldwork in Addis Ababa, the article explores the dominant explanations for adopting human rights treaties, such as donor pressure, legitimacy, openness of a political system and normative alignment. By analysing the Ethiopian government’s decision not to ratify the Maputo Protocol on numerous occasions before finally ratifying it quietly and with a long list of reservations, the article argues that countries may adopt regional human rights treaties for different reasons than the global ones. By tracing this ‘non-event’ from the early attempts to adopt the Maputo Protocol until its ratification in 2018, the article provides an in-depth analysis of the recent history of women’s rights in Ethiopia’s complex national context, including the rise of women’s movements, closing civil space, growing authoritarianism, anti-rights rhetoric, and a government crisis that paved way for reform.","PeriodicalId":46968,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Eastern African Studies","volume":"34 1","pages":"466 - 488"},"PeriodicalIF":1.4,"publicationDate":"2023-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139363872","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Ascendant recentralisation: the politics of urban governance and institutional configurations in Nairobi","authors":"Smith Ouma","doi":"10.1080/17531055.2023.2268364","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17531055.2023.2268364","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This paper draws from two experiences with decentralisation in Kenya to illustrate the different ways through which the central government has sought to bolster its power at the expense of the local government in the country’s capital, Nairobi during periods of vertically-unified authority. In the first instance, it examines the years between 1983 and 1992 during which the central government appointed a Commission to replace the elected Nairobi City Council. The second period that is examined is between 2017 and 2022 when certain devolved functions were transferred from the elected Nairobi City County Government to a newly established institution appointed by the President, the Nairobi Metropolitan Service. During both periods authority was vertically unified with the ruling parties also being in control of the city. Drawing on a series of interviews with various stakeholders and inhabitants of informal settlements, the paper argues that contrary to what much literature suggests, recentralisation of urban governance not only occurs in situations of vertically-divided authority but can also occur where authority is unified. Some of the conditions that enabled these power consolidation moves together with the outcomes that these generated are also examined.","PeriodicalId":46968,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Eastern African Studies","volume":"11 1","pages":"363 - 383"},"PeriodicalIF":1.4,"publicationDate":"2023-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139364050","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Military decolonisation and Africanisation: the first African officers in the Kenyan army, 1957–1964","authors":"Poppy Cullen","doi":"10.1080/17531055.2023.2257897","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17531055.2023.2257897","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT On 15 July 1961, the first eight African officers were commissioned into the King’s African Rifles in Kenya. This was very late to begin Africanising the colonial military force. The colonial army, even more than other institutions, was neither anticipating nor preparing for independence until it was imminent. Then, Africanisation was dramatically sped up to try and match political progress. This article explores how the first African officer corps was created in Kenya. Using lists of commissions published in The Kenya Gazette, it shows what types of people were commissioned, focusing on ethnicity, age, experience, training, education, and promotion. Three types of servicemen were commissioned: effendis, with years of colonial experience; non-commissioned officers, who were briefly trained in Britain and rapidly promoted; and direct-entry officers, better educated, younger, and trained in Britain. The article argues that the opportunities that military decolonisation and Africanisation offered to these varied groups of men had an impact which lasted for decades, as these first commissioned officers became and remained the leaders of Kenya’s military. Understanding the process of Africanisation therefore helps to explain the trajectory of Kenya’s military after independence.","PeriodicalId":46968,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Eastern African Studies","volume":"52 1","pages":"515 - 533"},"PeriodicalIF":1.4,"publicationDate":"2023-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139364328","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Mother Earth is for us all: the discontent of Oromo pottery-making women at land dispossession in Southwest Oromia, Ethiopia","authors":"B. Wayessa","doi":"10.1080/17531055.2023.2262116","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17531055.2023.2262116","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This paper examines the effects of changes in land tenure on female potters in the southern highlands of Ethiopia. Communal land has historically played an important role in the livelihoods of pottery-making women, who rely on the non-agricultural use of this land. Data was gathered through interviews and observations, and the resulting evidence was organized and analyzed to address the research objectives and contextualize the findings within a broader empirical framework. Recent changes to Ethiopia’s communal land tenure system have disproportionally affected the socio-economy of the pottery-making women in comparison to their non-pottery-making counterparts by constraining their access to clay mining sites. Meanwhile, globalization and the free-market economy have facilitated the unrestricted import and distribution of plastic and metal objects, significantly reducing the need for pottery objects, and further impacting the potters’ livelihoods and social status. The fact that globalization and government changes to the communal land tenure system have disproportionally affected artisan women in Ethiopia resonates with the need for academia to pay more attention to intersectionality when studying gender bias, given that the situation has created an additional level of discrimination for socially marginalized women.","PeriodicalId":46968,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Eastern African Studies","volume":"105 1","pages":"445 - 465"},"PeriodicalIF":1.4,"publicationDate":"2023-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139363852","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}