New sites of Citizenship: Recognition of Traditional Authority and Group-based Citizenship in Mozambique

Abstract

Since the General Peace Accord of 1992, Mozambique has embarked on a protracted process of democracy decentralisation. The Municipal Law 2 of 1997 made provision for elected local governments in 33 urban municipalities, but not in rural areas. Instead, in the latter a little over 4,000 'community authorities' have been recognised since 2002 followings the passing of Decree 15 of 2000. This article examines the implementation and consequences for rural citizenship of this Decree of official recognition to traditional authorities, "secretarios de bairro' and other leaders. Focusing particularly on traditional authorities, we argue that the Decree's community approzach to representation both establishes new sites for the production of citizens and institutes a kind of grousp-based citzenship. Il does this by incorporating the rural population into the nation state, not on the basis of the individual membership in the polis, but of menbership in a territory-based community. Contrary to...