Dealing with government in South Sudan : histories in the making of chiefship, community & state

Author(s)

    • Leonardi, Cherry
    • British Institute in Eastern Africa

Bibliographic Information

Dealing with government in South Sudan : histories in the making of chiefship, community & state

Cherry Leonardi

(Eastern Africa series)

James Currey, 2015

  • pbk.
  • ebook

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Note

Formerly CIP Uk

Includes bibliographical references (p. 231-246) and index

Also issued online

Description and Table of Contents

Description

Essential reading for scholars of Sudan, of Africa and of local governance, as well as policy-makers and practitioners, this study explores chiefly authority in South Sudan from its historical origins and evolution under colonial,postcolonial and military rule, to its current roles and value in the newly independent country. The creation of Africa's newest state, South Sudan, in 2011, involved national and international recognition of "traditional authorities", or chiefs. Chiefship has often been misunderstood to be a timeless or non-state institution, but this book argues for the mutual constitution of chiefship and the state since the mid-nineteenth century, based on research in the vicinity of three towns. The book also demonstrates that while South Sudanese towns have previously been analysed as centres of alien state power, people came to the urban "frontier" to seek the resources, regulation and justice of the state. Located conceptually - and sometimes spatially - upon this frontier, chiefshipbecame central to local relations with the state, and to state definitions of the local. The book thus addresses broader debates over the role of traditional authorities and the nature of urban-rural and state-society relations inAfrica. Cherry Leonardi is a Senior Lecturer in African History at Durham University, a former course director of the Rift Valley Institute's Sudan course, and a member of the council of the British Institute in Eastern Africa Published in association with the British Institute in Eastern Africa.

Table of Contents

Introduction: the making of chiefship, state and community in South Sudan - PART I: From zariba to merkaz: the creation of the nodal state frontier, c. 1840-1920 Frontier societies and the political economy of knowledge in the nineteenth century Colonial frontiers and the emergence of government chiefs, c. 1900-20 - PART II: From makama to mejlis: the making of chiefship and the local state, 1920s-50s Constituting the urban frontier: chiefship and the colonial labour economy, 1920s-40s Claiming rights and guarantees: chiefs' courts and state justice, c. 1900-56 Containing the frontier: the tensions of territorial chiefdoms, 1930s-50s Uncertainty on the urban frontier: chiefs and the politics of Sudanese independence, 1946-58 - PART III: From malakiya to medina: the fluctuating expansion of the urban frontier, c. 1956-2010 Trading knowledge: chiefship, local elites and the urban frontier, c. 1956-2010 Regulating depredation: chiefs and the military, 1963-2005 Reprising 'tradition': the mutual production of community and state in the twenty-first century Knowing the system: judicial pluralism and discursive legalism in the interim period, 2005-10 Conclusion

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