Tribal Allegiance and the Overstated Role of the Colonial State

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Chapter 7 evaluates the second major claim of the proponents of the concept of ethnicity in SSA. Similarly to the evaluation of the first major claim of these proponents (see Chapters 5 and 6), using the conceptual, historical, empirical, and comparative evidence, this chapter argues against assigning the paternity of tribal allegiance in SSA to the colonial and postcolonial states. It examines many of the cases often exhibited as “ethnic” outcomes of colonial rule and shows that the role of colonial rule in such cases was minimal. Rather, tribes in SSA evolved on their own. Their tribal allegiances predated colonial rule. In many instances, it was actually the profusion of tribes that dictated tribal policies to the colonial state, and not the other way around. This chapter shows that the role of the postcolonial state in fostering tribal allegiance has also been overstated.