Introduction: remobilisation within Porous polities: ex-combatants’ claims-making in post-colonial Indonesia, Vietnam and Mozambique

Abstract

This special issue addresses the challenges that former freedom fighters faced in post-colonial Indonesia, Vietnam and Mozambique under porous political and difficult economic conditions within the new societies they helped to create. Drawing on the concept of contentious politics, the contributions in this special issue critically engage with notions of ‘reintegration’, demonstrating the political obstacles, economic uncertainties, and the reoccurrence of violence. The articles concern themselves with how ex-combatants attempted to secure a livelihood in post-colonial polities and adapt to new socio-political realities within newly created states and societies in flux. Ex-combatants’ claims stemmed from having risked their lives for independence but also from a marked feeling of being left out as new, independent states formed around them. The contributions seek out the limits of the contested nature of ex-combatants’ claims-making via its social, economic, political but also its psychosocial dimensions. Taken together, the contributions put in perspective disillusion, political contention by violent and non-violent means, and the limits of state support.