Sovereignty in Exile: A Saharan Liberation Movement Governs

by Alice Wilson

Overview

Sovereignty in Exile explores sovereignty and state power through the case of a liberation movement that set out to make itself into a state. The Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) was founded by the Polisario Front in the wake of Spain's abandonment of its former colony, the disputed Western Sahara. Morocco laid claim to the same territory, and the conflict has locked Polisario and Morocco in a political stalemate that has lasted forty years. Complicating the situation is the fact that Polisario conducts its day-to-day operations in refugee camps near Tindouf, in Algeria, which house most of the Sahrawi exile community. SADR (a partially recognized state) and Polisario (Western Sahara's liberation movement) together form an unusual governing authority, originally premised on the dismantling of a perceived threat to national (Sahrawi) unity: tribes.

Drawing on unprecedented long-term research gained by living with Sahrawi refugee families, Alice Wilson examines how tribal social relations are undermined, recycled, and have reemerged as the refugee community negotiates governance, resolves disputes, manages social inequalities, and improvises alternatives to taxation. Wilson trains an ethnographic lens on the creation of administrative categories, legal reforms, aid distribution, marriage practices, local markets, and contested elections within the camps. Tracing social, political, and economic changes among Sahrawi refugees, Sovereignty in Exile reveals the dynamics of a postcolonial liberation movement that has endured for decades in the deserts of North Africa while trying to bring about the revolutionary transformation of a society which identifies with a Bedouin past.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780812248494
Publisher:	University of Pennsylvania Press, Inc.
Publication date:	11/07/2016
Series:	The Ethnography of Political Violence
Pages:	312
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.40(d)

About the Author

Alice Wilson is Lecturer in Social Anthropology at the University of Sussex.

Table of Contents

Introduction. The Social Relations of Sovereignty 1

Part I Aspirations

Chapter 1 Hindsight Visions: Tribe and State Power as Projects of Sovereignty 37

Chapter 2 Revolutionary Foundations: Unmaking Tribes and Making State Power 59

Part II Compromises

Chapter 3 Unpopular Law: Tribal, Islamic, and State Law, and the Fall of Popular Justice 89

Chapter 4 Tax Evasion: Appropriation and Redistribution Without Tax or Rent 116

Chapter 5 Managing Inequalities: Organizing Social Stratification, or Marriage Reinvented 147

Part III Dilemmas

Chapter 6 Troubling Markets: Tribes, Gender, and Ambivalent Commodification 183

Chapter 7 Party-less Democrats: Electing the Best Candidate or the Biggest Tribe 204

Conclusion: Revolution as Moral Contract 236

Appendix 1 Notes on Transliteration and Transcription 245

Appendix 2 Tribes in Western Sahara 247

Notes 251

References 259

Index 277

Acknowledgments 293

Editorial Reviews

"This deeply researched ethnography takes the case of Western Sahara and the fusing of a liberation movement (Polisario) and a partially recognized Sahrawi state to make a major contribution to the anthropology of the state. Looking particularly at transformations in the social relations of sovereignty, Wilson offers a fascinating account of control, compromises, and the sometimes uneasy coexistence of revolutionary politics and tribal affinities."

George Washington University Ilana Feldman

"Sovereignty in Exile is a rich and intriguing ethnography that makes a significant contribution not only to refugee studies but also to the anthropology of sovereignty, state power, and tribal identities."

University of Oxford Dawn Chatty

"Based upon a diverse and well-developed social network in a context usually closed to foreign researchers, Sovereignty in Exile is an extraordinary work of ethnographic research. Through detailed empirical analysis and a fresh and informed analytical sensibility, Alice Wilson reopens an important, yet often all too narrow, discussion of what counts as democracy in Africa and other so-called developing regions and states."

University of Florida Brenda Chalfin

"Sovereignty in Exile is a rich and intriguing ethnography that makes a significant contribution not only to refugee studies but also to the anthropology of sovereignty, state power, and tribal identities."

Universityof Oxford Dawn Chatty

"Based upon a diverse and well-developed social network in a context usually closed to foreign researchers, Sovereignty in Exile is an extraordinary work of ethnographic research. Through detailed empirical analysis and a fresh and informed analytical sensibility, Alice Wilson reopens an important, yet often all too narrow, discussion of what counts as democracy in Africa and other so-called developing regions and states."

Universityof Florida Brenda Chalfin

"Based upon a diverse and well-developed social network in a context usually closed to foreign researchers, Sovereignty in Exile is an extraordinary work of ethnographic research. Through detailed empirical analysis and a fresh and informed analytical sensibility, Alice Wilson reopens an important, yet often all too narrow, discussion of what counts as democracy in Africa and other so-called developing regions and states."—Brenda Chalfin, University of Florida

"This deeply researched ethnography takes the case of Western Sahara and the fusing of a liberation movement (Polisario) and a partially recognized Sahrawi state to make a major contribution to the anthropology of the state. Looking particularly at transformations in the social relations of sovereignty, Wilson offers a fascinating account of control, compromises, and the sometimes uneasy coexistence of revolutionary politics and tribal affinities."—Ilana Feldman, George Washington University

"Sovereignty in Exile is a rich and intriguing ethnography that makes a significant contribution not only to refugee studies but also to the anthropology of sovereignty, state power, and tribal identities."—Dawn Chatty, University of Oxford

From the Publisher