Kenya's election will pit ‘princes’ against ‘hustlers’

Significance In June, President Uhuru Kenyatta reportedly told opposition National Super Alliance (NASA) leaders that he would back one of them as his successor. Although there is controversy over exactly what Kenyatta said, it has been interpreted as a snub to ruling Jubilee Party leaders -- in particular, Deputy President William Ruto, whom Kenyatta had previously promised to back in 2022. Impacts The Ruto campaign’s efforts to curb dependence on regional ‘big men’ may reduce defection risks but also weaken its mobilisation capacities. Divisive language will increase the prospect of political instability and violence when the campaigns begin in earnest. Political uncertainty will likely undermine investment and result in an economic slowdown around the election. The efforts of candidates to curry favour with regional powers may strain Kenyan relations within East Africa.

The COVID-19 Pandemic: global perspective and preliminary learnings

<p>This paper examines two key questions to put the COVID-19 pandemic into a broader perspective: What does our past tell us about pandemics? What can it teach us for the future? Moreover, the paper considers three independents but interconnected analytical perspectives. The first one is about advancing our species on the planet and examining the great technological transformations from a historical viewpoint. The second perspective consists of a reflection on food taboos and their relationship to biodiversity issues and zoonotic processes. The third perspective involves a thoughtful exploration of big men, multilateralism, and the society of risk. In addition to overcoming the pandemic’s economic impact, the main challenges of the post-COVID-19 world will be overcome by its ideological implications and the need to strengthen both multilateralism and scientific and technological cooperation solidarity among people.</p>

The COVID-19 Pandemic: global perspective and preliminary learnings

<p>This paper examines two key questions to put the COVID-19 pandemic into a broader perspective: What does our past tell us about pandemics? What can it teach us for the future? Moreover, the paper considers three independents but interconnected analytical perspectives. The first one is about advancing our species on the planet and examining the great technological transformations from a historical viewpoint. The second perspective consists of a reflection on food taboos and their relationship to biodiversity issues and zoonotic processes. The third perspective involves a thoughtful exploration of big men, multilateralism, and the society of risk. In addition to overcoming the pandemic’s economic impact, the main challenges of the post-COVID-19 world will be overcome by its ideological implications and the need to strengthen both multilateralism and scientific and technological cooperation solidarity among people.</p>

The Influence of Clientelism on the Informal Sector in Zimbabwe : A Case Study of Glen View 8 Complex, Harare

This study focuses on the influence of clientelism in the informal sector of Zimbabwe in Glen View 8 (Complex). The study used the case of Glen view 8 (complex) in Harare Province. The study focused on political dynamics in the informal sector; livelihood strategies employed by informal sector operators; manifestation of “Big Men”, social networks in the informal sector; and different strategies employed by operators to overcome the problems of political manipulation, clientelism and patronage. It employs a qualitative research methodology to enable a nuanced comprehension of the clientelistic relationships that take place in the informal sector of Zimbabwe. Through in-depth interviews, focus group discussions, narratives and in-depth interviews with key informants, the study explored the clientelistic nature of the informal sector. The major findings of the study are that the informal sector in Zimbabwe is influenced by political patronage. It was established that patronage influences the informal sector in Zimbabwe in general and at Glen View Complex 8 in particular. Some of the operators revealed that patronage negatively affects their business as they are sometimes forced to attend political party meetings either at the complex or at ZANU-PF star rallies in town. The operators experience a plethora of problems such as lack of security, poor sanitation, stiff competition, poor infrastructure, lack of insurance and fire outbreaks. It has been revealed that most of the problems experienced at the complex are a result of the politicisation of the informal sector particularly by the ZANU-PF party. Operators at the complex have described the politicisation of the informal sector as a major drawback to their efforts of realising maximum benefits from their work. Therefore, the thrust of this thesis is premised on the de-politicisation of the informal sector as the starting point in the transformation of the activities of the operators.

The State of Land Grabs

This chapter investigates the regulatory fictions underpinning foreign investment in “small-scale” gold mining in Ghana. It explores the shifting practices and subjectivities of big men, frontmen, and secretaries who, in relation with others, mediate foreign mining. In Ghana, big men, frontmen, and secretaries are key agents who help Chinese miners procure official paperwork and concession. The chapter contributes to understandings of the state vis-à-vis land grabs by directing attention to the actual conditions under which foreigners control concessions. Detailing the shifting performances and practices facilitating foreign gold mining, the chapter reveals how unremediated mining landscapes and associated environmental impacts are enabled by fictions of mining's developmental benefits and of rational environmental regulation. It also shows how key state and nonstate intermediaries maintain both the appearance of legality as well as the fictional neutrality of the state as public servant, reproducing the historic and problematic narrative that farmers and traditional authorities “giving away land” are ignorant of existing laws.

ROUTES OF KUÇEDRA

The article takes the reader along the multitude of entanglements between the social, political, economic, infrastructural, scientific, and mythological meanings of water in Albania. Waterways, along with the routes of the mythical water figure called Kuçedra, continuously bring to the shore the meaning and the relation to authority. The latter used to be an essential part of the unwritten laws or the so-called Kanuns that were managed by the big men of particular patrilines. The article argues that the relation to authority is deeply rooted in the structural terrains of the Albanian society. The changing nature of the water (in similar ways to Kuçedra) always manages to trickle down, permeate, entangle and transgress these ambiguities and generate space-time in contemporary Albania.

Big Man or Boogey Man? The concept of the Big Man in political science

The Big Man has attracted considerable attention from social scientists, both as an explanatory force as well as a phenomenon to be explained. But the concept has become unmoored from its original meaning. Once used to refer to an apex figure within a patrimonial regime, today Big Men are often described as dictators or thieves. I show this using an original dataset covering discussions of Big Men in leading African Studies journals since 1980. I find that authors, especially political scientists, overemphasise theft and underemphasise accountability of Big Men. Then, drawing on my research with Ghanaian local politicians, I show how Big Men are constantly under pressure from their supporters. The paper concludes with a modest call to put the Big Man back in his place as powerful but also empowered, and thus indebted, to those beneath him.