“…Discontent mounted among urban citizens, while coercion and unpopular measures such as 'Operation Production' eroded the ability of the party to control the urban population and contributed to widespread disengagement from the state (Grest, 1995;Jenkins, 2006).…”
Section: The Context: Changing Confi Gurations Of Urban Governancementioning
Contemporary modes of urban governance involve a wide variety of actors. The present paper combines insights from several debates into a framework that considers the multiple sites where practices of governance are exercised and contested, various and entangled layers of relations and a broad range of practices of governance that may involve various modes of power, as well as different scales. The paper illustrates some of these complexities with an empirical study of the governance of marketplaces in Maputo, Mozambique. It shows how urban governance in a context of extensive informalisation and `democratic transition' can be highly fragmented and fluid, contesting some of the assumptions underlying Western debates on urban governance. It also questions notions of the hollowed-out state and an excessive focus on public policy.
“…Discontent mounted among urban citizens, while coercion and unpopular measures such as 'Operation Production' eroded the ability of the party to control the urban population and contributed to widespread disengagement from the state (Grest, 1995;Jenkins, 2006).…”
Section: The Context: Changing Confi Gurations Of Urban Governancementioning
Contemporary modes of urban governance involve a wide variety of actors. The present paper combines insights from several debates into a framework that considers the multiple sites where practices of governance are exercised and contested, various and entangled layers of relations and a broad range of practices of governance that may involve various modes of power, as well as different scales. The paper illustrates some of these complexities with an empirical study of the governance of marketplaces in Maputo, Mozambique. It shows how urban governance in a context of extensive informalisation and `democratic transition' can be highly fragmented and fluid, contesting some of the assumptions underlying Western debates on urban governance. It also questions notions of the hollowed-out state and an excessive focus on public policy.
“…The position of the chefes within the neighbourhoods — whether he or she represents the state or the community or even the party — is complicated by their roots in the grupos dinamizadores (GDs, or ‘dynamising groups’). These were established by FRELIMO in the mid‐1970s with the aim of encouraging collective organization among city dwellers (Araújo, ) and to deal with ‘rapid rural‐urban migration, rising unemployment, the uncontrolled occupation of abandoned properties, critical food shortages and escalating crime’ (Grest, : 6). Serving as the link between the party and the state, the GDs were committees of eight to 12 people who helped to mobilize local populations for participation in party activities and were also given a number of tasks relating to national security and education (Araújo, ).…”
Section: Neighbourhood Authoritiesmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…They were also charged with promoting ‘good relations amongst neighbours and finding solutions to small‐scale disputes’. By the 1980s, the GDs had morphed into a ‘local administrative structure at the level of the bairro , being charged with a wide range of social, economic and cultural tasks (Grest, : 13). Jenkins (: 39) also notes that by the 1980s the GDs were no longer really functioning as channels for community participation and had developed a primarily administrative role.As the dynamising groups went defunct or transformed, the lowest level of the FRELIMO state administration became their own party secretaries (usually known as secretários de bairro or simply secretários ) who today enjoy immense influence in rural and peri‐urban areas (Orre, : 226).…”
This article engages with the discussions on the benefits and drawbacks of land titling programmes that seek to regularize informal urban settlements in developing countries. It is based on fieldwork in two neighbourhoods of Maputo, Mozambique, that are currently part of a municipal government regularization programme supported by the World Bank. The fieldwork explored an informal titling system administrated by the neighbourhood authorities upon which local residents rely to prevent land conflicts and to provide proof of residence. The findings add to the literature that demonstrates growing unease with a strictly dyadic formal/informal analysis of land occupation, and further queries the assumption that the state and the informal settler are diametrically opposed, with the former granting formal rights to the latter. In the process of these discussions, the article highlights the limited scholarly attention that has been granted to the governance implications of land titling programmes.
“…While analysing local development reforms in Mozambique, several scholars have pointed out how the convergence of interests between state institutions and officials interested in firmly controlling the reforms and donors inclined to impart technocratic solutions, in a situation in which resources are scarce, inevitably leaving immense power to the few holding state and administrative institutions (Grest 1995;Harrison 1996;Alexander 1997;Santos 2006). The Angocheans, with no pedagogies of appropriation of democratic citizenship, where left at the mercy of the parties.…”
Section: Resultsmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Therefore, the most remote and less urbanised municipalities are seen as symbols of backwardness in areas where other 'unspoiled' authentic forms of the 'tradition' have been in practice for centuries. The assumption is that the efficacy of the 'tradition' rests upon the moral legitimacy of the codes shared by the ethnic group; the same researchers tend also to assume that people resort to these forms of administration in the absence of modern Western systems of governance (Grest 1995;West and Kloeck-Jenson 1998).…”
The decade from 1990 to 2000 was a period of sustained political activity in Africa, leading towards democratisation. Under this scope, Mozambique is widely seen as one paradigmatic success story. Yet, the country's multiparty democratic system remains challenged by a strong authoritarianism that hampers open deliberation in political public discourse. This paper discusses some reasons for this democratic hold-up in Mozambique's political and social transition within the broad and ongoing democratisation process in Sub-Saharan Africa. With an emphasis on the analysis of the political situation in the northern town of Angoche, this article argues that the persistence of central government authoritarianism is a reminder of a political liberalisation without democratising the political systems. Indeed, local municipal officials are now elected and receive revenue transfers, but remain limited by other measures.2 The central state successfully resists attempts to devolve broader decision-making authority to municipalities. Far from the ideal Weberian type of state bureaucracy, public administration is highly politicised in the sense that the building up of the administrative capacities of the state are seen as a way of consolidating the political leverage of the ruling party -Frelimo. The paper defends, however, that indeed, a detailed analysis of the public political actions at local level, between distinct political structures, shows that successive authoritarian regimes have not totally erased the freedom of speech and thought, even if they have relegated opposition to ever more marginal spaces.
RésuméLa décennie 1990/2000 a été caractérisée en Afrique par une activité politique soutenue orientée vers la démocratisation. Dans ce cadre, le Mozambique est plutôt vu comme une réussite paradigmatique. Or, ce système démocratique de multipartisme continue à afficher des velléités d'un fort autoritarisme peu propice au relèvement du niveau de la réflexion dans le discours politique public. Cette étude s'interesse aux raisons de ce blocage démocratique du processus de transition politique et social au Mozambique dans le cadre plus général du processus de démocratisation en cours en Afrique au sud du Sahara. En s'appuyant en particulier sur l'analyse de la situation politique de la ville d'Angoche, située au nord du pays, l'étude estime que le fait que le gouvernement central persiste dans l'autoritarisme est assez révélateur d'une libéralisation politique non suivie de la démocratisation des systèmes politiques. En effet, si les fonctionnaires municipaux locaux sont maintenant élus et reçoivent des fonds de transfert, ils restent, en revanche, limités par d'autres mesures.2 Le gouvernement central résiste avec succès à toute tentative d'élargir le mandat des municipalités en matière de prise de décision. Loin du modèle idéal wébérien de bureaucratie d'Etat, l'administration publique est fortement politicisée, en ce sens que le renforcement des capacités administratives de l'Etat est perçue comme un moyen de ren...
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