Tribalism, Traditionalism, and Modernism in Chagga Local Government
| Published date | 01 April 1958 |
| Author | J. Gus Liebenow |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1002/j.1099-162X.1958.tb01159.x |
| Date | 01 April 1958 |
Tribalism) Traditionalism) and
Modernism
in
Chagga
Local
Government
by J. Gus
LIEBENOW
Assistant
Professor
of
Government,
University
of
Texas
THE task of creating institutions of self-government in Tangan.yika is being
approached
at
two levels. At
the
territorial level British administrators
are
attempting to fashion
de
novo
representative
and
responsible political institutions
for a plural society having a fairly extreme fragmentation ofloyalties based
upon
diversity of race, religion, national-origin,
and
tribal affiliation. At this level
the
main
problems of self-government centre
upon
communal versus national
representation, qualifications for
the
suffrage, accessability of all to employment
in the civil service, the development of political associations,
and
the
growth of
parliamentary institutions.I
At
the
second, or local, level
the
efforts of administrators
are
primarily
directed towards
the
transformation of a series of tribally organised units into
modern
and
efficient units of local government.
In
the
post-war period there
has been adecided turning
away
from
the
policy of
Indirect
Rule. This was
the policy of utilizing for local administration a series of traditional political
systems in which leadership was usually based
upon
hereditary descent
and
nepotism
and
in which the sanctions for political authority were often mystical
rather
than
merelylegal
and
moral. Today, traditional systems
are
being gradu-
ally 'secularized',
and
the
modern political leaders must face the
dual
tests of
popular acceptance
and
of technical competence for dealing with the
modern
ｾｹｳｴ･ｲｩ･ｳ
of finance
and
with the expanding local programmes in health, educa-
tion
and
natural
resources development.
Although
the
particular case examined in this article will accentuate
the
problems of self-government encountered at the local level, it must be recognized
that there is a close relationship between developments
and
politics
at
both
ｾ･ｶ･ｬｳＮ
Two
of
the
main
problems considered
below-'tribalism'
and
the
conflict
In values
and
interests between the traditional
and
the emergentAfrican
elites-
are
of
concern equally to those who are fashioning territorial institutions
and
those who
are
modifying indigenous political systems. At
the
territorial level,
for example, the emphasis on tribal loyalties has complicated the process of
nominating or electing African members to the Tanganyika Legislative Council.
The
limitation on
the
size of this territorial body makes it impossible to provide
representation to each
of
the one hundred-odd tribal groups enumerated in
the
ｾＱｾ
census. Another problem at this level concerns the competition for a mass
fIcan following.
The
Tanganyika African National
Union
and
the
United
ranganyika
Party
find themselves out-manoeuvred in the
rural
areas by
the
ｄ｡ｾ･ｲｳ
of such tribal-based political associations as the Chagga or
Haya
. nlons. 'Tribalism' is also clearly manifest
at
the local level in a
number
of
ｾｮｳｴ｡ｮ｣･ｳ
where the
dominant
(or
at
least the original) tribal
group
in an
area
ISheluctant to accord representation on local councils to 'alien' Africans, even
ｾｨ･
latter
constitute amajority.
ｰｯｾ
ｬｾｩｳ
article is the product of two field studies in Tanganyika during 1954-1956,
made
ｆｏｾｬ
de
ｾｨｲｯｵｧｨ
grants provided by the Social Science Research Council (U.S.A.)., the Ford
nation,
and
the Program of African Studies, Northwestern University.
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