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Conflict and Resolution in a Pastoral Nomadic Society in the Sudan
Abstract
This paper investigates conflict and resolution in a pastoral nomadic society. Conflicts and resolutions range from inter-lineage or inter-ethnic disputes, to disputes emerging from a civil war to changing national borders that compromise traditional territories and migration routes. In my study of the Hawazma Baggara, encompassing fieldwork data collected over a period of twenty-five years (1982-2010), several conflict types have emerged. I consider how the context of conflict changes as a result of (A) shifting population pressures that affect access to resources from competing subsistence activities; and (B) from a shift in primarily local level resolution to inclusively local, national and international level resolution. Intra-lineage disputes involve negotiation, but can also take a physical form as disputants demonstrate conflict by forming satellite house circles adjacent to the primary camp circle. Resolution of this dispute level (lineage segment) may involve rejoining the primary camp circle or physical separation by breaking away entirely. Inter-lineage disputes might be resolved by both traditional negotiations and government intervention. This paper considers two case studies. One describes inter-lineage conflict and the various traditional and legal mechanisms employed to find resolution, including government-forced physical separation of the feuding lineages. A second case study examines a dispute over land rights between Hawazma pastoralists and Nuba farmers in South Kordofan. Both groups make claims based on customary law, although the Nuba also claim the British allocated them the disputed territory. Both groups attempt to resolve the issue at the local level; both are willing to use traditional mechanisms of conflict resolution. Additionally, both groups activate national mechanisms by seeking the assistance of international conflict resolution organizations. This case reveals a number of salient problems: (1) Issues that arise from overlapping, incongruent national land tenure policies and law; and (2) Conflicting customary law and usufruct rights of multiple ethnic groups due to increasing population pressures put on scarce resources, exacerbated by massive population shifts in response to war. It reveals how, in a changing political context, local conflicts are taking on national and international implications, especially with new national political boundaries that ignore traditional migration routes. The paper concludes with a consideration of how traditional mechanisms of conflict resolution are employed to inform policy development in an emerging context of Sudan, now split into two national polities.
Discipline
Anthropology
Geographic Area
Sudan
Sub Area
Conflict Resolution