Introduction: Traditional Authority and Democratization in Africa

Abstract

The ambiguous nature of the relationship between traditional leaders and postcolonial states has been a recurring theme in sub-Saharan Africa since the achievement of independence.1 This is due in part to colonial systems of governance, which, through a combination of direct and indirect forms of rule, incorporated traditional leaders as an extension of colonial regimes in order to extract human and natural resources and curb organized resistance (Mamdani 1996; van Nieuwaal and van Dijk 1999; Ray and van Nieuwaal 1996; Mbembe 2001). Although some traditional leaders had assisted liberation struggles across the continent, postcolonial governments mainly saw them as repressive collaborators of the colonial masters and as impediments to the modernization and nation-building projects of the 1960s and 1970s. While not all postcolonial governments officially banned traditional leaders altogether, as Tanzania and Mozambique did, for example, the overwhelming majority comprehensively curtailed their legal powers in local governance, often limiting their role to cultural and spiritual activities (von Trotha 1996: 81).2