Authors:Peter Hakim Justin, Han van Dik Abstract: Following South Sudanese independence in 2011, land reform became a major aspect of state building, partly to address historical injustices and partly to avoid future conflicts around land. In the process, land became a trigger for conflicts, sometimes between communities with no histories of “ethnic conflict.” Drawing on cases in two rural areas in Yei River County in South Sudan, this paper shows that contradictions in the existing legal frameworks on land are mainly to blame for those conflicts. These contradictions are influenced, in turn, by the largely top-down approach to state building, which has tended to neglect changes in society and regarding land resulting from colonialism and civil wars. PubDate: 2017-08-04 Issue No:Vol. 52 (2017)
Authors:Ato Kwamena Onoma Abstract: Epidemics of contagious diseases often motivate the social constitution of “dangerous communities.” These communities are defined as having a high potential to further spread the diseases involved to a wider public. Migrant communities’ links with sick people in places of origin that are badly affected by such diseases ostensibly justify the construction of these communities as epidemic dangers to their places of residence. But this depiction of certain groups as health threats is always grounded in other long-standing narratives about the populations targeted. Such narratives often portray those targeted as radically different from the wider body politic and stigmatise them in multiple ways. The situation of the Peul of Guinean origin in Senegal at the height of the Ebola virus disease outbreak in the Mano River Basin sheds light on these processes of sociogenesis and their implications for epidemic control and prevention. PubDate: 2017-08-04 Issue No:Vol. 52 (2017)
Authors:Ndidzulafhi Innocent Sinthumule Abstract: The need to increase the amount of land under nature conservation at the national and global levels has gained attention over the past three decades. However, there are mixed reactions among stakeholders in South Africa regarding the establishment and expansion of cross-border nature conservation projects. Whereas conservationists and other white private landowners are in support of nature conservation projects, some white farmers are resistant to releasing land for conservation. The purpose of this paper is to investigate historical and contemporary reasons for farmers’ resistance to conservation and to analyse the consequences arising from that resistance for the consolidation of the core area of South Africa’s contribution to the Greater Mapungubwe Transfrontier Conservation Area. The paper argues that consolidation of land to create such special areas is a social process shaped through local contestation over land, power, and belonging. The study draws on fieldwork material from the South African section of the Greater Mapungubwe Transfrontier Conservation Area. PubDate: 2017-08-04 Issue No:Vol. 52 (2017)
Authors:Denis M. Tull, Claudia Simons Abstract: In Africa, a seemingly growing number of attempts by presidents to overcome or abrogate term limits, or make them otherwise ineffective, has ignited a debate about the significance of constitutional engineering, and its implications for the rule of law, democracy, and the nature of politics in general. In light of recent instances of “third-term bids,” we revisit the hypothesis about the institutionalisation of power in Africa and challenge the assumption that, over the past two decades, African politics have experienced a fundamental change away from “big man” rule towards the rule of law. Based on a comprehensive stocktaking of the state of play of term limits and third-term bids, we analyse broader trends and outcomes of legal and constitutional engineering. We argue that an analysis focusing exclusively on formal institutions and procedures misrepresents the extent of political change by ignoring power and authority in many African countries. While the growing salience of formal institutions is undeniable, we suggest that they matter more as a legitimisation of the power of political leaders than as a constraint to it. PubDate: 2017-08-04 Issue No:Vol. 52 (2017)
Authors:Rebecca Schiel, Christopher Faulkner, Jonathan Powell Abstract: Since 1990, Côte d’Ivoire has experienced over a dozen army mutinies, with three major events occurring in the first half of 2017. This paper explores the underlying causes of these events, considering both this year’s mutinies and the state’s prior experiences with military insubordination. A review of the events of Côte d’Ivoire’s tumultuous 2017 indicates a number of parallels with some of its earlier mutinies, though these more recent events are perhaps unique due to the presence of a larger range of dynamics and the scale of the mutineers’ demands. Beyond requests for better pay, which are nearly ubiquitous, these events also illustrate the general hazards of post-conflict civil–military relations, including challenges related to demobilisation, integration of rebel forces, the consequences of soldiers having contributed to a leader’s ascendance, and the perils of soldier loyalties lying with personalities instead of the state. PubDate: 2017-08-04 Issue No:Vol. 52 (2017)
Authors:Raymond Adibe, Cyril Chinedu Ike, Celestine Uchechukwu Udeogu Abstract: This study assesses the Cybercrime Act 2015 and its implications for online press freedom in the liberal authoritarian state of Nigeria. Specifically, the study examines how the character of political leadership in Nigeria leads to wrongful application of the act to undermine the independence of the press. The study shows that Nigeria’s online press freedom index has consistently worsened since the introduction of the Cybercrime Act in 2015, and it recommends the promotion of a holistic democratic project that recognises economic and political freedom as being inextricably linked. PubDate: 2017-08-04 Issue No:Vol. 52 (2017)
Authors:Roman Loimeier Abstract: Review of the edited volume: Insa Nolte, Olukoya Ogen, and Rebecca Jones (eds), Beyond Religious Tolerance: Muslim, Christian and Traditionalist Encounters in an African Town , Woodbridge: James Currey, 2017, ISBN 9781847011534, 318 pp. PubDate: 2017-08-04 Issue No:Vol. 52 (2017)
Authors:Kristine Höglund Abstract: Review of the monograph: Anika Becher, Explaining Ethnic and Election Violence: Kenya and Malawi in Comparison , Baden-Baden: Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft, 2016, ISBN 9783848733903, 557 pp. PubDate: 2017-08-04 Issue No:Vol. 52 (2017)
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