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The restoration of the Buganda Kingdom Government 1986–2014: culture, contingencies, constraints

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2020

Nelson Kasfir
Nelson Kasfir*
Affiliation:
Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH03755, USA
*
Email: kasfir@dartmouth.edu
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Abstract

The restoration of the Kabaka of Buganda a quarter century after its abolition was the unexpected and contested product of different views of Ganda social structure that had emerged over several centuries. Competing groups, despite acting on contradictory cultural principles, overcame the suspicion of a newly empowered central government. Selective recall of cultural norms and adroit organisational tactics of the individuals who recreated the Buganda Kingdom Government allowed them to surpass their rivals and become the main Ganda interlocutors with the central government. They persuaded the central government to restore the king, though not the kingdom. The compromise they struck permitted the king to be cultural, but not political. Not only did that raise further questions about the meaning of Ganda culture, it constrained the Buganda Kingdom Government's ability to promote Ganda interests with the central government and on occasion reduced its support from the Ganda public in the years following restoration.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Modern African Studies , Volume 57 , Issue 4 , December 2019 , pp. 519 - 540
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Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2020

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Footnotes

I deeply appreciate suggestions on recent drafts from Jonathon Earle, Holly Hanson, John Katende, Apollo Makubya, Daudi Mpanga, Andrew Nalani, Carol Summers and anonymous reviewers. The first version of this paper was part of a presentation to the Workshop on Theorising Social Movements, University of Bayreuth, 2014. It was then further developed as part of the Carl Schlettwein Lecture 11, University of Basel, 2017. I am grateful to the Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study, Wallenberg Research Centre at Stellenbosch University, South Africa for a stimulating milieu for further revision of this article in 2017.

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