The Politics of Custom: Chiefship, Capital, and the State in Contemporary AfricaJohn L. Comaroff, Jean Comaroff How are we to explain the resurgence of customary chiefs in contemporary Africa? Rather than disappearing with the tide of modernity, as many expected, indigenous sovereigns are instead a rising force, often wielding substantial power and legitimacy despite major changes in the workings of the global political economy in the post–Cold War era—changes in which they are themselves deeply implicated. This pathbreaking volume, edited by anthropologists John L. Comaroff and Jean Comaroff, explores the reasons behind the increasingly assertive politics of custom in many corners of Africa. Chiefs come in countless guises—from university professors through cosmopolitan businessmen to subsistence farmers–but, whatever else they do, they are a critical key to understanding the tenacious hold that “traditional” authority enjoys in the late modern world. Together the contributors explore this counterintuitive chapter in Africa’s history and, in so doing, place it within the broader world-making processes of the twenty-first century. |
Contents
An Introduction | 1 |
Millennial Capitalism and the Struggle over Moral Authority | 49 |
Sara Berry Three Chieftaincy Land and the State in Ghana and South Africa | 79 |
Reflections on the Nhlapo Commission | 110 |
Jocelyn Alexander Five The Politics of States and Chiefs in Zimbabwe | 134 |
Mariane Ferme Six Paramount Chiefs Land and LocalNational Politics in Sierra Leone | 162 |
Neotraditionalism Aristocratic Ethos and Authoritarianism in Burkina Faso | 183 |
Susan Cook Eight Corporate Kings and South Africas Traditional Industrial Complex | 211 |
Corporate Branding and the Commodification of Political Authority in Ghana | 231 |
Lauren Coyle Ten Fallen Chiefs and Sacrificial Mining in Ghana | 247 |
Kingship Temporality and Mining of Futures in the Goldfields of South Kivu DRC | 279 |
Invisibility and Recognition of the Customary in Northern Mozambique | 305 |
Acknowledgments | 337 |
Contributors | 339 |
343 | |
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