required for development’. In such unstable states, ‘political acts are played out on the market place of the various patrimonial networks concerned’ (1999: 157, emphasis added) generating a notoriously destabilising force. They argue that ‘in the absence of any other viable means needed to sustain neo-patrimonialism, there is inevitably a tendency to link politics to realms of increased disorder, be it war or crime’ (1998: 162, emphasis added). Berman (1998: 305), equally concerned with the destructive impacts of ‘patrimonialism’, argues that ‘[p]atron-client networks remain the fundamental state-society linkage in circumstances of social crisis and uncertainty and have extended to the very center of the state’. The ill fate of African postcolonial states has in other words often been conceived in a Weberian, central-government-focused conception of ‘patrimonialism’, and, by extension, ‘neo-patrimonialism’6 or even ‘pathological patrimonialism.’7 (I shall question the utility of the notion of ‘patrimonialism’ at the end of the following section.)
Many of Africa's political disasters have thus been attributed to a contradiction between, on the one hand, ideals of the autonomous state premised on Western, bureaucratic rationality and, on the other, all the African realities of particularism and clientelism. It is often assumed that such realities give rise to monstrous leaderships and terrorist movements and stir up tribalism. The perception of such threats amongst postcolonial political leaders committed to projects of nation-state building are clearly reflected in how they in many instances tried to get rid of or reduce substantially the significance of indigenous authorities during the first era of independence. President Samora Machel of Mozambique, for example, asserted that ‘[t]o unite all Mozambicans, transcending traditions and different languages, requires that the tribe must die on our consciousness so that the nation may be born’ (Machel 1974: 39, quoted after Bertelsen 2009: 125). Only in some very few countries ‘tribes’ and their leaders were officially recognized, and this includes Botswana. In this country, the status of the royal Tswana chiefs (dikgosi, singl. kgosi) had been consolidated, but by no means created, by the British and was further enshrined in the postindependence Constitution.8 African postcolonial state leaders were – with obvious reason – deeply worried about the dangers of ‘tribalism'. Subscribing to Western ideals of political modernisation, many made considerable efforts to curtail or eliminate traditional authority figures.
Finally, the West has, in postcolonial times, acted much as protagonists for the establishment of the modern state on African soils, yet also – in other disguises – represented major forces working contrary to their strength and sustainability. While much attention has been given to the deteriorating impacts of globalisation on nation-states all over the world during recent decades, such impacts have a long history on this continent all through the eras of imperialism and colonialism. During the latter half of the twentieth century – the postcolonial era – the rulers of many African states have maintained internal control with the support of one of the superpowers, at least until the end of the Cold War. And they did so, argues Reno (1999: 22f.), by using this support to coerce domestic ‘strongmen’ into structures of clientelism rather than to develop a state apparatus on the basis of bureaucratic principles. This strategy has generally created extremely shaky states, especially because as soon as the Cold War terminated, the conditions for clientelism evaporated and the strongmen turned against their previous patrons at the centre of government. In this vein of analysis of the formation of the postcolonial state, all the ostensibly destructive practices of patrimonialism reviewed above are directly related to global forces.
The consequence has, in many instances, been notoriously unstable states, often characterized by violence. It has been maintained that this trend has generally given rise to an unattractive image of ‘Africa’, militating effectively against foreign investment, effecting consequent economic stasis and excessive poverty (e.g., Bhinda et al. 1999). And when transnational capital interests have spotted a profitable opportunity on the African continent, they have operated in highly selective ways within specific areas without concern for a positive economic impact upon larger regions and without working constructively to support the state political economy of the relevant country. Also, the massive penetration of nongovernmental organisations on the continent has ostensibly at best played an ambiguous role in relation to the sustainability of the nationstate in Africa (e.g., Ferguson 2006: 13–14).
From Abandonment to Resurgence of ‘Traditional Authorities'
The case of Botswana is important because it illuminates so well ways to avoid such calamities. A case study of this country might thus contribute to remedy what Englebert (2002: 51ff.) has identified as a major problem of theories that purport to offer continent-wide explanations: they ‘fail to account for intra-African differences'. Most apparently, while diamond economies have substantially amplified violent conflicts and civil wars in countries such as Angola and Sierra Leone, Botswana's diamonds – like its cattle industry – have been successfully integrated into the state-centred political economy in ways that have, as I shall explain in this volume, contributed decisively to bringing the major elites of the country together in a persistent and strong interest in political stability and societal peace and order.9 The state has been able to counter external forces from a position of considerable strength, which for example has enabled it to bring the various NGOs under Botswana's umbrella of government programmes and projects. In view of the often uneasy relations between capitalist corporations and nation-states (e.g., Hardt and Negri 2000: 325ff.), it is quite remarkable how the state in Botswana has managed to establish an advantageous, sustainable agreement with such a powerful corporation as the De Beers mining company. Their joint agreement has ensured that the state receives a substantial share from mining proceeds as well as direct representation on the board of the mining company, which has further strengthened the state's bargaining position (Sentsho 2005: 138; cf. Harvey and Lewis 1990: 123ff.; Leith 2005: 61ff., Chapter 3 below).
However, in order to come to terms with how international relations could possibly have such a constructive impact upon postcolonial state formation in Botswana, we need to address carefully another field of difference that has become ever more apparent since the late 1980s. While many postcolonial state leaders in Africa attempted at the inception of the independent state to eliminate ‘traditional authorities’, their force, vitality and persistence proved in due course to be considerable. For example, in such a turbulent state as Zaire (Congo), ‘many chiefs de facto consolidated their . authority in the institutional and administrative chaos that followed independence. In an attempt to depoliticize the country after the 1965 coup, Mobutu returned to office all the chiefs that had been deposed’ (De Boeck 1996: 82). Unsuccessful attempts were made to terminate this policy in the 1970s. In spite of the fact that ‘the regime continues to view the traditional authorities as potentially threatening’, the chiefdoms had to be restored to their full status, which ‘led to a situation in which the state apparatus co-exists in various degrees of interdependence with traditional socio-political structures of varying degrees of coherence, power and autonomy’ (De Boeck 1996: 82–83). The Zaire case exemplifies the kind of contradictions of, on the one hand, conflicting interests and, on the other, mutual dependency between ‘state’ and ‘chiefdoms’ that has become increasingly evident throughout most of the continent since decolonisation. Such contradictions have sponsored transformations and instabilities in many different state contexts, with, for each case, particular configurations of ambiguities and ambivalence.10
This trend has apparently triggered a major shift of state strategies – from abandonment to resurgence of ‘traditional leaders’ (e.g., see Ray and van Rouveroy van Nieuwaal 1996; von Trotha 1996). There are, to be sure, different scholarly views about what this trend actually involves.11 While Skalnik (2004) argues that the resurgence of traditional leaders reflects ‘failed’ states’ efforts to regain their strength, others place emphasis on the ability of the stronger postcolonial states to make indigenous authorities instrumental to expand their governmental controls and interventions in the population. Englebert (2002: 190), for example, claims that the legitimacy of the state in Africa would be enhanced by its incorporation of traditional institutions.
