Alders, Wolfgang. “Clientage, Debt, and the Integrative Orientation of Non-Elites on the East African Swahili Coast.” Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 73 (2024): 101553-. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaa.2023.101553.

Ceramic trends on Unguja Island in Zanzibar, Tanzania provide insights into non-elite political strategies on the East African Swahili Coast. Synthesizing imported ceramic data from two seasons of systematic field survey across rural Unguja with historical, ethnographic, and archaeological evidence from coastal East Africa, this paper argues that an integrative orientation toward power characterized bottom-up action on the Swahili Coast over the second millennium CE. While theories of bottom-up action have emphasized commoner autonomy and resistance to clientage, debt, and social inequality, evidence from the Swahili Coast attests to efforts by non-elites to seek entrance into cycles of reciprocal obligation as a means for recognition and social mobility—a specifically non-egalitarian orientation toward power. In response, elites competed with one another to accumulate wealth-in-people, resulting in a competitive patron-client system that prevented political consolidation. Elucidating these dynamics contributes to an understanding of how non-elite political strategies have shaped sociopolitical systems globally.

Source: Article's abstract

Ali, Merima,Odd‐Helge Fjeldstad and Abdulaziz B. Shifa. "European colonization and the corruption of local elites: The case of chiefs in Africa." Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 179 (2020): 80-100.

The paper focuses on the legacy of British and French colonial rule on the corruption of local elites (chiefs) in Africa through a comparative analysis of levels of corruption among local elites (chiefs) in anglophone and francophone Africa. The study concludes that the level of corruption among local elites in anglophone countries was slightly higher than in francophone countries and chiefs in anglophone countries command a significantly lower level of public trust. The authors point to the British style of colonization(indirect rule) which may have contributed to the corrupt nature of local elite(chiefs) in some African countries. This system offered chiefs more autonomy, weakened the pre-existing local mechanisms of checks and balances and made them less accountable to their local communities rather accountable to their colonial masters. This meant they could abuse their power. In the long run, the formal legal system introduced by the central state had limited relevance to much of the population in anglophone countries. The French style of colonial rule on the other hand, undermined the power and autonomy of chiefs over the local population. Chiefs were stripped of their power to appoint sub-chiefs or handle legal matters. This limitation meant chiefs in francophone countries could not afford local patronage nor abuse power.

Nathaniel Allen

Professor, Africa Center for Strategic Studies

Sector: Cybersecurity, Regional Security, Civil Military Relations,

Contact: Phone: +1  202-433-5939

Alliance Panafricaine des Scénaristes et Réalisateurs (APASER)

Organization

Algiers, Algeria

https://www.apaser.org/

Description:

APASER  is the Alliance Panafricaine des Scénaristes et Réalisateurs. This international collaboration between Writers & Directors  Worldwide, CISAC and the Pan-African Federation of Filmmakers exists to  protect and promote the rights of audiovisual creators in Africa.

Allison Moore

Art Curator (Photography), Museum of Fine Arts, St. Petersburg, FL, USA

Contact and address: 255 Beach Dr NE

St. Petersburg, FL 33701

(727) 896-2667

‍

Jean Allman

Professor, African studies, Washington University in St. Louis

Email: jallman@wustl.edu

Phone: 314-935-9599 (HISTORY); 314-935-5576

https://artsci.wustl.edu/faculty-staff/jean-allman

Allman, Jean. Fashioning Africa: Power and the Politics of Dress. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2004.

Everywhere in the world there is a close connection between the clothes we wear and our political expression. To date, few scholars have explored what clothing means in 20th-century Africa and the diaspora. In Fashioning Africa, an international group of anthropologists, historians, and art historians bring rich and diverse perspectives to this fascinating topic. From clothing as an expression of freedom in early colonial Zanzibar to Somali women’s head-covering in inner-city Minneapolis, these essays explore the power of dress in African and pan-African settings. Nationalist and diasporic identities, as well as their histories and politics, are examined at the level of what is put on the body every day. Readers interested in fashion history, material and expressive cultures, understandings of nation-state styles, and expressions of a distinctive African modernity will be engaged by this interdisciplinary and broadly appealing volume.

[Source: Indiana University Press].

Allman, Jean Marie, Susan Geiger, and Nakanyike Musisi. Women in African Colonial Histories. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2002.

How did African women negotiate the complex political, economic, and social forces of colonialism in their daily lives? How did they make meaningful lives for themselves in a world that challenged fundamental notions of work, sexuality, marriage, motherhood, and family? By considering the lives of ordinary African women? farmers, queen mothers, midwives, urban dwellers, migrants, and political leaders?in the context of particular colonial conditions at specific places and times, Women in African Colonial Histories challenges the notion of a homogeneous "African women's experience." While recognizing the inherent violence and brutality of the colonial encounter, the essays in this lively volume show that African women were not simply the hapless victims of European political rule. Innovative use of primary sources, including life histories, oral narratives, court cases, newspapers, colonial archives, and physical evidence, attests that African women's experiences defy static representation. Readers at all levels will find this an important contribution to ongoing debates in African women's history and African colonial history.

Source: Book Description on Books.google.ca