VDM Stacey, p: Traditional Uncertainties; Chieftaincyin Northern

The study traces ethnic conflict to contingent state society constellations usage of customary power. Periodic violence has historically erupted due to contradictory customary interpretations contending for legitimacy. Much of the history of state statute is characterised by volte-face, which is both a cause and symptom of how political power is structured between the traditional and the modern political realms. Volte-face is recognised as stemming from adversaries refuting the customary as a product of historical practice. Consequently, through renewed state codification, the customary beomes reproduced, whilst uncertainty remains, due to the legitimacy of its present practice demanding the denial of itself being a product of the very structures, that had previously imposed their own, contrary will and position. As a political history, the central role of tradition in state formation is demonstrated, which is characterised by a strong interdependence between the traditional and modern domains, whose fundament also rests on the reproduction of the two realms artificial separation.