Including chiefs,maintaining peace? Examining the effects of state–traditional governance interaction on civil peace in sub-Saharan Africa

Abstract

The continued influence of traditional governance in sub-Saharan Africa has sparked increasing attention among scholars exploring the role of non-state and quasi-state forms of governance in the modern state. However, little attention has been given to cross-country and over-time variation in the interaction between state and traditional governance structures, particularly in regard to its implications for intrastate peace. This study examines the conditions under which traditional governance contributes to state capacity to maintain peace. The article argues that the type of institutional interaction between the state and traditional authority structures influences a country’s overall governance dynamics and its capacity to maintain peace. By combining new data on state–traditional authorities’ interaction in sub-Saharan Africa from 1989 to 2012 with intrastate armed conflict data, I conduct a systematic comparative analysis of whether concordant state–traditional authorities’ interaction strengthens peace. The empirical results support the argument that integrating traditional authorities into the public administration lowers the risk of armed conflict in comparison to when they remain unrecognized by the state. Moreover, the analysis suggests that the added value of this type of interaction is conditional on the colonial history of a country.

Keywords

intrastate conflict state capacity sub-Saharan Africa traditional governance

Introduction

State capacity is found to be among the key components contributing to the maintenance or collapse of intrastate peace (Fearon & Laitin, 2003; Gleditsch & Ruggeri, 2010; Fjelde & de Soysa, 2009; Hegre et al., 2001). Existing research has focused on examining state governance capacities (e.g. economic, bureaucratic, and administrative) as well as their formal political institutions and ability to coerce order (Fjelde & de Soysa, 2009; Hegre & Nygård, 2015; Hendrix, 2010). Yet besides the modern state structures, other actors and structures often influence a country’s governance realm. Traditional governance – defined as context-specifically constructed and identified authorities, rules, and institutions – continues to influence society amid other non-state and quasi-state governance forms, particularly in post-colonial sub-Saharan Africa. In Malawi, local chiefs contributed to maintaining stability in the country’s transition from a one-party rule to multiparty political order (Eggen, 2011). In South Africa, while the recognition of traditional authorities has faced criticism from the perspective of democratization (Mamdani, 1996; Ntsebeza, 2005), it also played a role in restoring intrastate peace in the post-apartheid political order (Beall & Ngonyama, 2009; Beall, Mkhize & Vawda, 2005). Overall, in many regions there is a growing perception of political reality as a hybrid system of different forms of governance, rather than as an unchallenged prominence of the state.

Despite the increased awareness of the role of traditional governance alongside the state, its impact on the maintenance of intrastate peace has so far received little systematic and comparative academic scrutiny.¹ Therefore, this article investigates traditional governance in sub-Saharan Africa by asking: under what conditions does traditional governance contribute to state capacity to maintain intrastate peace? Specifically, I argue that the type of institutional interaction between the state and traditional governance shapes the overall governance framework of a country and the odds for peace.

Drawing upon research on the contemporary role of traditional governance (Baldwin, 2015; Goodfellow & Lindemann, 2013; Oomen, 2005), I test a theoretical framework proposing that a concordant interaction between the state and traditional governance reduces the risk of intrastate armed conflict. This is argued in relation to discordant types of interactions that are defined by lack of accommodation and clear recognition of traditional governance. Specifically, I advocate the relative advantage of institutional hybridity where traditional authorities are incorporated into the public administration. This theory is tested on new data that cover sub-Saharan African countries between 1989 and 2012. The empirical results provide support for the hypotheses. They also highlight the variation in the effects of concordant interaction subcategories, and the conditioning influence of colonial legacies in particular.

This article contributes to the literatures on intrastate peace, mixed governance, and traditional governance. Recent research on traditional governance has shed light on its resilience but lacked in comparative approaches to examine the effects of mixed governance on particular outcomes. In response, this study draws inferences from systematic, cross-country, and over-time observations investigating one specific outcome. By doing so, the article offers a novel perspective to the study of intrastate peace. Moving the focus beyond pure state capacity, the article introduces a typology on state–traditional governance interaction and investigates the role of non-state actors (specifically traditional authorities) in shaping a country’s civil peace.

State governance capacity and peace

The potential influence of traditional governance in a state’s capacity to maintain peace has attracted little systematic attention. Most studies have focused on the central state and its political, economic, and security capacities to maintain peace (Fearon & Laitin, 2003; Gleditsch & Ruggeri, 2010; Hegre et al., 2001; Hendrix, 2010). This state-centric approach has linked well-governed, bureaucratically and economically efficient states with a lower risk of armed conflicts.² Similarly, past research has identified unconsolidated and unstable political regimes (Gates et al., 2006; Gleditsch & Ruggeri, 2010), past armed conflicts (Thies, 2010), reliance on primary commodities (Collier & Hoeffler, 2004; Humphreys, 2005), and unequal access to state power (Cederman, Weidmann & Gleditsch, 2011; Cederman & Girardin, 2007) as factors that challenge a country’s stability. Even with the emphasis on good governance (i.e. bureaucratic and administrative quality and the state’s capacity to implement policies that benefit the larger society), the scholarly focus has been constrained to the state apparatus (Gleditsch & Ruggeri, 2010; Fjelde & de Soysa, 2009; Hegre & Nygård, 2015; Hendrix, 2010; Thies, 2010).

However, recent literature on governance emphasizes the presence of multiple forms of governance that coexist with the state without constituting the modern state itself (Levi-Faur, 2012). The lack of scrutiny of the role of these (e.g. traditional governance) in shaping intrastate peace is problematic in contexts such as sub-Saharan Africa, where the formal state capacity is often relatively low and other forms of organization have remained resilient alongside the state (Englebert, 2000; Herbst, 2000). Despite the challenges related to state capacity, many of these countries with ‘limited statehood’ also remain peaceful.³ The state capacity and conflict onset literature explains convincingly why bureaucratically strong and democratically governed states should remain peaceful. Yet, the challenge is to explain why many states with limited economic and political institutions also maintain their civil peace.

Nevertheless, one should not equate the continued salience of traditional governance solely with the notion of weak states. Evidence from different parts of developing countries suggests that traditional governance remains resilient across contexts (Baldwin, 2015; Englebert, 2002; Eggen, 2011; Klick, 2016). Generally governance is performed by a hybridity of state and non-state actors whose relationships vary from competition to collaboration and integration (Boege, Brown & Clements, 2009; Levi-Faur, 2012).⁴ While the impact of state strength on intrastate peace is not questioned here, the article expands the focus to the interaction between the state and traditional governance and contributes to a broader understanding of a country’s capacity to maintain intrastate peace.

Traditional governance in sub-Saharan Africa

Holzinger, Kern & Kromrey (2016: 2) define traditional governance as ‘a form of governance understood and validated through narratives or procedures deemed “traditional” by constituents’. Accordingly, while traditional forms of governance have roots in the pre-colonial period, the concept does not rely on an untransformed or linear historical evolution of governance. Instead it focuses on people’s perceptions of certain rules, institutions, and authorities as traditional (Ubink, 2008). The concept refers to a wide variety of public authority figures (e.g. chiefs, kings, and headmen) and procedures and institutions (e.g. conflict resolution mechanisms and land management practices). This article restricts its empirical focus to the role of traditional authorities.

Traditional governance remains relevant in the majority of contemporary nation-states.⁵ Yet in sub-Saharan Africa the colonial and post-colonial periods have shaped societies in ways that make the study of state–traditional governance interaction particularly urgent. The colonial period both marginalized and re-authorized traditional institutions, triggering tensions between the different governance systems while also assigning powers to traditional authorities (Mamdani, 1996). Traditional governance continues to play a de facto role across sub-Saharan Africa today (Baldwin, 2015; Englebert, 2002). Chiefs, kings, and headmen wield significant influence, particularly in rural areas and on issues regarding the allocation of land, resolving local conflicts, running customary courts, enforcing contracts, and maintaining cultural values and practices (Baldwin, 2015; ECA, 2007; Herbst, 2000). Crucially, what varies is how the state interacts with traditional governance and defines its institutional role (Muriaas, 2011; Ubink, 2008). For example, in Kenya and Côte d’Ivoire traditional authority structures largely exist in parallel to the state without clear recognition or accommodation by the state. However, in countries such as Malawi, Ghana, and Mozambique, chiefs have constitutionally recognized roles within the state-steered governance system.⁶

There is considerable scholarly debate surrounding the sources and implications of the resilience of traditional governance. Proposed explanations on the former range from the continuation of colonial indirect rule (Mamdani, 1996; Ntsebeza, 2005) and state weakness (Herbst, 2000; Koelble & Siddle, 2013) to democratization (Baldwin, 2015), decentralization (Koelble & Li Puma, 2011), and the recognition of group rights (Oomen, 2005). While Logan (2013, 2009) and Williams (2010) emphasize the continued trust towards traditional governance, Mamdani (1996) and Ntsebeza (2005) contend that, similar to the colonial period, traditional governance structures are used to spread undemocratic state control. Oomen (2005) posits that both its continued practical relevance and political incentives have influenced the resilience of traditional governance.

The research field is equally divided over the societal implications of maintaining a role for traditional governance alongside the state. For some, the recognition of traditional governance structures contributes to jeopardizing democratic accountability at the local level (Lund, 2003; Mamdani, 1996). Scholars emphasize the threat of unaccountable chiefs that abuse their authority at the expense of the constituents (Buur & Kyed, 2007; Ntsebeza, 2005). The seminal work of Boone (2014) suggests that traditional authorities’ rule can contribute to decentralizing political tensions and inducing local-level grievances.

Others align with Sklar (1999), who maintains that cooperative, mixed governance between state and traditional governance structures can contribute to stability. Baldwin (2015: 5) suggests that self-interested traditional authorities can act as intermediaries between the state and its constituents in their capacity to ‘organise responses to rural problems that elected politicians and state institutions lack in weak states’. Comparing the implications of coordination versus competition between state and traditional governance structures, Pula (2015) and Klick (2016) suggest that cooperation is beneficial for development and peace.

The majority of past research stresses the empirical relevance of traditional governance while acknowledging the challenge of its democratic accountability (Herbst, 2000; Menkhaus, 2000; Osaghae, 2000). The relevance of traditional governance can make its neglect backfire on the state itself (Pula, 2015). Notably, Englebert (2000) and Wig (2016) show that the type of traditional governance structure can influence its relevance and strength. Englebert (2000) finds that consolidating state power has been a challenge for countries with more heterogeneous and centralized traditional authority structures. Wig’s (2016) results suggest that centralized pre-colonial institutions give groups better capacity to negotiate with the state.

Existing literature recognizes the continuing influence of traditional governance in sub-Saharan Africa but differs in its implications. I suggest that this can be partially explained by the differences in the outcome variable (democratic ideals or intrastate peace) and limited scrutiny towards the variation in the institutional conditions under which traditional governance operates vis-à-vis the state. Disentangling the implications of the different types of state–traditional governance interactions for intrastate peace can help to understand the competing findings in previous literature.

State–traditional governance interaction and intrastate peace

Building on the assumption that traditional governance matters de facto in the countries of interest, I argue that the type of state approach vis-à-vis traditional governance influences the risk of intrastate conflict onset. The argument rests on a notion that even in the context of limited statehood the state has a profound influence on other forms of governance. The state’s institutional design influences the manner in which traditional institutions can operate (i.e. entrench customs), justify authority, and provide order. Simultaneously, the relevance of traditional governance means that the state’s approach to traditional governance structures influences its own capacities to govern and maintain peace.

The theory views a country’s formal institutional design as an important element in defining state–traditional governance interaction. The act of allocating roles and functions to certain actors in the institutional design is regarded as a process of ‘recognition and enforcement [that] strengthen the institutions that play these roles’ (Claassens, 2011: 178). While this does not imply that the institutional design would run uninterrupted from the constitution to the grassroots of governance, it nevertheless shapes the public space in which different actors and institutions make claims for power and participation (see Horowitz, 2002).

Post-apartheid South Africa is a case in point. When analyzing the democratization process, scholars have noted that the institutional status of traditional authorities has had tangible consequences on the stability of the governance realm (Beall, Mkhize & Vawda, 2005; Oomen, 2005). Negative consequences (e.g. interruptions of local elections) have occurred at times when the status of traditional authorities has been unclear (Oomen, 2005). In reverse, the recognition and incorporation of traditional authorities into the state administration has contributed to gaining minimal support of traditional authorities for the post-apartheid state and restoring peace in volatile regions (e.g. Kwazulu-Natal) (Beall & Ngonyama, 2009).

Mozambique’s pre-civil war period represents a different type of institutional design. The Frelimo-led government that came to power in 1975 formally abolished the institution of traditional authority (Seibert, 2003). The alienation of traditional authorities is suggested to have contributed to the emergence of the rebel movement Renamo as some of the alienated chiefs turned to support it (Ntsebeza, 2005). Post-war Mozambique has instead re-integrated traditional authorities into the state-recognized governance realm.

Post-apartheid South Africa and prewar Mozambique represent different types of state–traditional governance interactions. The interaction in the former is characterized by recognition and integration, whereas the latter represents a system of exclusion. Adapting Goodfellow & Lindemann’s (2013) conceptual framework, the two examples can be categorized into concordant and discordant interactions. Figure 1 displays four types of state-induced interactions that are expected to shape a country’s intrastate peace differently: exclusion and symbolic recognition under discordant interaction and institutional multiplicity and institutional hybridity under concordant interaction.

Four types of state–traditional governance interactions

Concordant interaction refers to institutional designs in which either traditional governance is synthesized into the state-steered system or its authority is recognized and demarcated as a parallel structure in certain functional areas. The core of concordant interaction is that the relationship is cooperative and demarcated (Goodfellow & Lindemann, 2013), whereas discordant

Figure 1.

State–traditional governance interaction types

interaction is defined as interactions without integration or state recognition regarding the functions of traditional governance.

Under concordant interaction, institutional hybridity refers to the incorporation of traditional governance into the state realm by integrating traditional authorities into the local and/or national public administration (e.g. by allocating seats in local councils or permitting representation in the national administration). Besides South Africa, examples of countries that have been characterized by institutional hybridity include Angola, Botswana, and Cameroon. Institutional multiplicity refers to the recognition of traditional governance as a separate governance realm with legitimacy in certain areas of governance (Goodfellow & Lindemann, 2013: 6–8). Namibia, Uganda, and Burkina Faso are examples of institutional multiplicity. Under discordant interaction, exclusion of traditional governance refers to a situation such as Mozambique during the 1970s with a total absence of recognition for traditional governance.⁷ Symbolic recognition refers to the recognition of the presence of traditional forms of governance without defining their relationship to the state (e.g. Burundi and Sudan).

The drawback of discordant interaction is that it fails to deal with parallel and competitive claims over authority (Goodfellow & Lindemann, 2013). Discordant interaction does little to guarantee coordination between different realms of governance. The influence of traditional authorities is left outside the state-recognized realm. As a consequence, discordant interactions can increase the risk of conflict through two mechanisms. First, the lack of coordination with traditional governance implies a failure to take advantage of the intermediary role of traditional authorities in the provision of public goods and services (see Baldwin, 2015). This makes the country more vulnerable to grievances caused by ineffective governance. Second, leaving traditional governance outside the state realm leaves the country more vulnerable to tensions between the two competing forms of governance (see Englebert, 2000). This can encourage traditional authorities to turn against the state (e.g. Mozambique).

Concordant interaction alleviates both of these problems. First, as implied by previous studies (Baldwin, 2015; Klick, 2016), coordinating with traditional governance can add to a state’s concrete governance capacities and enhance its efficacy in providing public goods and services. This decreases grievances and motivations to mobilize against the state. Second, concordant interaction can reduce the risk of conflict by decreasing the opportunities for traditional authorities to compete with the state or potentially even support a rebellion against it. This proposition underlines the power-seeking nature of traditional authorities that become less threatening towards the state when recognized by it rather than left unchecked (Mamdani, 1996; Ntsebeza, 2005). Concordant interaction is argued to stimulate a system that can ‘increase the intervention capacity of the state by bringing non-state actors into the making and implementation of public policy, thus making the latter more efficient and less fallible’ (Offe, 2009: 555). A first hypothesis follows:

Hypothesis 1: Concordant state–traditional governance interaction leads to lower risk of intrastate armed conflicts than discordant state–traditional governance interaction.

Furthermore, institutional hybridity can be theoretically expected to better guarantee the added value of recognizing traditional governance.⁸ Institutional multiplicity has equal theoretical potential to add to a country’s governance capacities by institutionalizing coordination between the two parallel governance structures. Yet it leaves more room for competition and confrontation between the state and traditional authorities (as traditional authorities remain outside the state realm). Institutional hybridity binds traditional authorities more closely to the state and gives them stakes in the maintenance of state stability. Thus, an addendum to the first hypothesis concerns the two concordant interaction types in relation to the discordant relationships:

Hypothesis 2: Institutional hybridity decreases the likelihood of conflict onset more than institutional multiplicity relative to the discordant interaction types.

Research design

Dependent variable

In order to measure the continuance or collapse of intrastate peace I turn to the UCDP/PRIO Armed Conflict Dataset, version 4-2015 (Gleditsch et al., 2002; Petterson & Wallensteen, 2015). The dataset covers all onsets of intrastate armed conflicts, defined as armed conflicts that take place between a government and at least one armed group and result in a minimum of 25 battle-related deaths in one calendar year (Petterson & Wallensteen, 2015).⁹ The dichotomous variable receives the value 1 if there is an onset of intrastate armed conflict during a specific year and 0 otherwise. As the focus is on a country’s overall capacity to maintain peace (and avoid conflict onsets), the ongoing conflict years after the onset are dropped from the models. A new conflict outbreak is coded if the same conflict has fallen below the threshold of 25 battle-related deaths for the period of two years before a new onset. There are 53 conflict outbreaks in the data used in the main analyses.¹⁰

Independent variable

Regarding the state–traditional governance interaction types, new cross-sectional time-series data have been compiled that code the formal constitutional role of traditional authority in 44 sub-Saharan African countries in the period 1989–2012.¹¹ Traditional authorities are the general focal points of traditional governance (Logan, 2013; Ubink, 2008). As a tangible institution, traditional authority can be similarly identified across the studied region even when different countries and communities use different names and have different types of authorities. As discussed in the theoretical section, the formal institutional design is argued to set the basis upon which traditional authorities build their claims regarding their role vis-à-vis the state. The constitutional and legal status of traditional authorities is assumed to have similar systematic implications on the relationship across the country even when local realities would influence the concrete roles of individual authorities.

The data for the independent variable have been systematically collected and coded through reviewing the constitutions and other relevant legal instruments that were in place and/or became adopted during the time period in the countries under analysis. Other relevant legal instruments refer to local government acts and chieftaincy acts that specify the principles of the constitution. Secondary sources such as the UN Food and Agriculture Organization’s (2016) database on gender and land rights and case-specific studies have been triangulated for background knowledge and case-specific understanding.¹² The coding is based on calendar years, meaning that a constitution adopted in December 1996 is coded as having taken place in 1996. In order to take into account the time lag between changing the institutional design and its effects on the governance framework, the independent variable is lagged one year.

The coding process proceeds in two stages. First, a binary variable of concordant interaction takes the value 1 if there is a constitutionally explicit recognition of traditional authorities as a parallel structure of governance or part of the public administration, and 0 otherwise. The term ‘constitutionally explicit’ refers to an emphasis on the constitution in a situation where a new constitution raises ambiguities in relation to older legal

Table I.

Definitions and number of observations of different state–traditional authorities interactions

Discordant vs. concordant	Subcategory	Definition of the type of interaction	N = 835*
Discordant	Exclusion	No constitutionally explicit formal recognition of traditional authorities	402
Discordant	Symbolic recognition	Constitutionally explicit recognition of the institution of traditional authorities. No definition of the functions or role within public administration present	84
Concordant	Institutional multiplicity	Constitutionally explicit recognition of traditional authorities as responsible for certain governance functions, separate from the public administration organs	42
Concordant	Institutional hybridity	Constitutionally explicit recognition of traditional authorities, including role/representation in the public administration	307

* The number of observations is the number of country-years after the ongoing conflict years have been dropped from the data.

documents: if a new constitution lacks all explicit reference to the role of traditional authorities (or to the legal instruments guaranteeing their role), the interaction is coded as discordant even if it has been concordant in the past.¹³

Second, in order to grasp the specific subcategories within concordant and discordant interactions, all country-year observations have been coded according to the four groups of exclusion, symbolic recognition, institutional multiplicity, and institutional hybridity. Following the theoretical framework, the subcategories constitute a series of mutually exclusive binary variables taking the value 1 according to the definitions in Table I. The difference between the two concordant categories derives from the presence versus absence of integration into the public administration. Therefore, a case of institutional hybridity can include traits of institutional multiplicity (but not vice versa). For example, in South Africa traditional authorities have both their own formally recognized bodies and allocated roles to participate in the public administration. Post-apartheid South Africa is coded as institutional hybridity. In Uganda prior to 2005, the institution of chieftaincy was recognized and chiefs were treated as cultural leaders with functions defined outside the state administration, making this a case of institutional multiplicity.¹⁴ Figures 2 –4 illustrate the categorization of the examined countries into the specific state–traditional authority categories in three time points.

Control variables

I control for a number of covariates that can influence the likelihood of intrastate conflict outbreak and can be argued to influence the conditions under which specific state–traditional governance interaction takes place.¹⁵

First, the legacies of different colonial powers with their distinct approaches to the pre-colonial (e.g. traditional) governance hierarchies can intervene in the relationship between state–traditional governance interaction and intrastate peace. Research suggests that British indirect rule left traditional authority structures and existing governance structures more resilient than elsewhere in colonial Africa (Englebert, 2002; Ubink, 2008). In the indirect rule, traditional authorities were relied upon in maintaining order and implementing colonial policies. This differed from, for example, the more direct French rule, which paid less attention to the correspondence between the colonial administrative boundaries and the boundaries of the pre-colonial communities (Ubink, 2008). Consequently, traditional authority structures in the former British colonies may have remained more intact and accustomed to

Figure 2.

State–traditional authority interaction in sub-Saharan Africa, 1991

Figure 3.

State–traditional authority interaction in sub-Saharan Africa, 2001

collaborate with state actors than elsewhere in colonial Africa. In order to control for the colonial legacies, I include a binary variable that captures whether a country is a former British colony. The additional analysis further examines the conditioning influence of colonial legacies.

Moreover, the regime type can influence the effect of concordant state–traditional governance interaction for intrastate peace, while also affecting the likelihood of intrastate conflict. The hypothesized added value of traditional authorities builds upon their concrete governance capacities and support to the state that complement the states’ own governance capacities. However, there

Figure 4.

State–traditional authority interaction in sub-Saharan Africa, 2011

might be less need to utilize these capacities of traditional institutions in more consolidated democratic countries as these states are better able to govern the entire sovereign territory. Subsequently, the effect of concordant interaction might be conditional on the type of political institutions, and the absence of consolidated democracy in particular.

In order to control for the influence of political institutions, I use the Polity IV project’s polity2 score that ranges from –10 (strongly autocratic) to +10 (strongly democratic) (Marshall, Gurr & Jaggers, 2016).¹⁶ I include a squared polity2 score to capture the difference between consolidated and unconsolidated regimes in consideration of the risks facing unconsolidated regimes that lack both the capacity to enforce order and the capacity to appease potential challengers (Fearon & Laitin, 2003; Hegre et al., 2001). In the additional analysis I use a binary measure of democratic regimes in order to examine whether the influence of the independent variable changes in this regime type. I also use the polity index to construct a decay function of time since a major institutional change to grasp the influence of past political instability (Hegre & Sambanis, 2006: 521).¹⁷

I include the log of per capita gross domestic product which is taken from the Expanded Trade and GDP Data by Gleditsch (2002b). Per capita GDP is systematically reported across countries and its negative correlation with conflict onset is found fairly robust in large-N studies.¹⁸ As with stable political institutions, per capita GDP can be argued to influence the context in which the state formulates its approach towards traditional authorities. In order to control for the potentially destabilizing effects of state dependence on primary commodities (see Humphreys, 2005), I use a dichotomous variable that receives the value 1 if more than one-third of a country’s export earnings come from oil, and 0 otherwise.

Furthermore, I control for the (log) population size. Previous research has found more populous countries to be at higher risk of armed conflict (Bruckner, 2010; Hegre & Sambanis, 2006). Populous countries might also rely more on the presence of traditional authorities in rural areas. I also include a measure of the share of people belonging to ethnic groups excluded from power. Interethnic tensions over political power increase the risk of conflicts (Cederman & Girardin, 2007) and they can influence the way the state interacts with traditional authorities. The variable comes from the Ethnic Power Relations (EPR) country-year data (Cederman, Wimmer & Min, 2010). For similar reasons and following Fearon & Laitin (2003), I include a measure of ethnic fractionalization as well as its squared term. I also control for the log share of mountainous terrain of a country since rough terrain is argued to be conflict prone as it offers potential rebels cover (Fearon & Laitin, 2003).

With regard to the capacities of traditional governance structures, I follow Wig (2016) and control for the level of centralization of the pre-colonial governance structures. The variable receives the value 1 if the average pre-colonial centralization score, which ranges from 0 (stateless society) to 4 (centralized society), for the ethnic groups in a country is above the overall mean, and 0 otherwise.¹⁹

Finally, following Carter & Signorino (2010) I control for a country’s conflict history by including the

Table II.

Discordant versus concordant state–traditional authorities interactions and conflict onsets in sub-Saharan Africa in 1989–2012

Interaction type	No onset	Conflict onset	Total
Discordant	441	45	486
Concordant	341	8	349
Total	782	53	835

The number of observations here is the number of country-years after the ongoing conflict years have been dropped from the data. Chi-square test p-value < 0.001.

duration and polynomials of years since the last conflict onset. Moreover, considering the findings on conflict diffusion (Gleditsch, 2002a) I include a measure of conflict incidents in neighboring countries. I also control for the time since independence.

Results

Table II presents a simple tabular relationship of intrastate conflict onset and discordant versus concordant state–traditional authorities (hereafter state–TA) interactions. Approximately 9.2% of the discordant interaction years have escalated into armed conflict. Only 2.3% of the concordant interaction observations have experienced conflict onset. This variance is different from null at the 99% confidence level. Disaggregating the independent variable into the four subcategories reveals a more nuanced picture: 8.5% of the exclusion observations have escalated into conflict compared to only 2.0% of the institutional hybridity observations. On the other hand, 4.8% of the institutional multiplicity cases and 13% of the symbolic recognition years have experienced conflict outbreak. First, this suggests that conflict onsets are rare in every interaction type. Second, while there is a negative correlation between concordant interaction and conflict onset, examining the subcategories suggests interesting variation among the concordant and discordant groups.

Table III reports the main logit-regression models of intrastate conflict onset with the coefficients and clustered standard errors of the explanatory variables. Models 1 and 2 treat the key independent variable as a binary variable of concordant versus discordant interaction, while Models 3 and 4 examine the effects of the different state–TA interaction subcategories with exclusion as the baseline category.

Models 1 and 2 give cautious support for the first hypothesis. Concordant interaction is associated with a

Table III.

Logit-regressions of intrastate conflict onset in sub-Saharan Africa, 1989–2012

	Model 1	Model 2	Model 3	Model 4
Concordant interaction	–1.296*	–1.192*
	(0.538)	(0.502)
Institutional hybridity			–1.379*	–1.145*
			(0.687)	(0.552)
Institutional multiplicity			–0.498	–1.190
			(0.796)	(1.010)
Symbolic recognition			0.360	0.0976
			(0.554)	(0.537)
Polity2 score _t _–1		0.0221		0.0213
		(0.0353)		(0.0341)
Polity2 squared _t _–1		0.00705		0.00689
		(0.00801)		(0.00805)
Regime past instability		1.077*		1.075*
		(0.494)		(0.495)
(log) GDP/capita _t _–1		–0.231		–0.223
		(0.270)		(0.282)
Oil		1.011*		0.998*
		(0.490)		(0.500)
(log) Population _t _–1		0.297^†		0.304^†
		(0.153)		(0.161)
Ethnic exclusion		–0.0440		–0.0483
		(0.610)		(0.596)
Ethnic fractionalization		7.252^†		7.308^†
		(4.408)		(4.330)
Ethnic fractionalization sq.		–7.034^†		–7.110^†
		(4.218)		(4.117)
(log) Mountainous		0.349^†		0.341^†
		(0.195)		(0.194)
Neighbor conflict incidents		1.442**		1.460**
		(0.485)		(0.467)
Time since independence		0.00681		0.00645
		(0.00435)		(0.00460)
British colony		–1.225*		–1.214*
		(0.577)		(0.558)
Pre-colonial centralization		0.649^†		0.632^†
		(0.356)		(0.371)
Constant	–1.336***	–6.939*	–1.409***	–7.071*
	(0.346)	(2.974)	(0.338)	(3.087)
AIC	374.0	349.4	376.2	353.4
Log pseudolikelihood	–182.0	–155.7	–181.1	–155.7
Wald chi²	30.86 (4)	50.84 (18)	31.20 (6)	52.46 (20)
Pseudo-R²	0.0780	0.178	0.0826	0.178
Countries	43	42	43	42
Observations	835	795	835	795

Standard errors, clustered by country, in parentheses; ^† p < 0.10, *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001; peace-years, peace-years2, peace-years3 excluded from the table.

decrease in the likelihood of conflict onset, with its coefficient statistically significant at the 95% confidence level. In terms of the substantive effects, estimates based on the full Model 2 imply that concordant state–TA interaction – ceteris paribus – decreases the likelihood of conflict onset from 11% to 4%, in relation to discordant interaction.²⁰

Figure 5.

First difference estimates of main explanatory variables

However, when we move to the subcategory models, notable variation emerges. Supporting both hypotheses, the coefficient of institutional hybridity is negative and statistically significant.²¹ Based on the estimates of Model 4, institutional hybridity decreases the probability of onset by more than 60%, from 0.113 (11.3%) to 0.042 (4.2%), holding everything else constant. However, contrary to expectations, Models 3 and 4 demonstrate that institutional multiplicity does not have a significant influence on conflict onset likelihood. A model specification that includes the two concordant interactions against a baseline of discordant interaction further demonstrates that institutional multiplicity is no different from discordant interaction in its relation to conflict onset likelihood. The different model specifications imply that the distinct effect of specific state–TA interactions derives from the conflict-reducing effect of institutional hybridity in relation to the discordant types.²²

Figure 5 portrays the estimated effects of a number of key explanatory variables, holding other variables at their median values. The figure exemplifies the variation in the effects of the different state–TA interaction types. While institutional hybridity is significant and negative, both institutional multiplicity and symbolic recognition are insignificant. As expected, recognizing traditional authorities symbolically without defining their role is found to have no effect in relation to the baseline of exclusion. Moreover, countries seem to gain the added value of traditional authorities only by incorporating them into the state administration rather than recognizing their authority alongside the state administration (e.g.

Figure 6.

Conditional marginal effects of institutional hybridity

institutional multiplicity). While surprising in terms of the first hypothesis, this supports the theoretical consideration of institutional multiplicity’s vulnerability towards competition between the different governance realms. The results corroborate Goodfellow & Lindemann’s (2013) account of the problems associated with institutional multiplicity in the context of Uganda. There ambiguities concerning the frontiers of traditional authorities’ powers and their grievances against the state for not having access to public power have induced disputes and confrontation rather than better coordinated and cooperated governance (Goodfellow & Lindemann, 2013).

With regard to the control variables, the only directly governance-related, statistically robust variable is the decay function measuring proximity to past regime instability. The results support earlier findings implying that proximity to a major institutional change increases the likelihood of conflict onset (Hegre & Sambanis, 2006). The probability of conflict in the wake of a major change – ceteris paribus – is 0.27 (27%), more than 15 percentage points higher than the median onset risk. In a country with institutional hybridity the estimated conflict risk decreases. Figure 6 presents the conditional effects of institutional hybridity as the proximity of regime instability grows. The closer the institutional change the larger the estimated effect of institutional hybridity.

The case of institutional hybridity in Malawi and the country’s peaceful transition from one-party rule to multiparty democracy in the mid-1990s supports these findings. Chiefs whose recognition had already supported the stability of one-party rule were instrumental in maintaining order during the transition as the dissolution of the old state structures and the malfunctioning of the new local government structures created a governance vacuum at the local level (Chiweza, 2007; Eggen, 2011). Interviewing Malawians on the country’s stability, Eggen (2011) found that many named traditional authorities as a primary reason behind the maintenance of peace. Institutional hybridity in Malawi portrays both of the mechanisms expected to strengthen intrastate peace. While it has helped the state to co-opt and gain the support of traditional authorities, chiefs seem to have also added to the country’s concrete governance capacities as the intermediaries between the state and the constituents in policy implementation (Chiweza, 2007).

Concerning the other control variables, the results are mostly in line with earlier findings. Conflict incidents in neighboring countries increase the risk of conflict outbreak. However, a country’s own conflict history (peace-years) is not significant in the full model. Countries appear to be more vulnerable to instability in their surroundings than trapped in their own conflict history. Time since independence does not significantly influence the risk of conflict outbreak.

There is evidence for a conflict-inducing effect of oil dependency. The risk of conflict increases from around 11% to 26% in oil-dependent countries, keeping everything else constant. Also in line with earlier research, mountainous terrain and ethnic fractionalization correlate positively with the risk of conflict outbreak, yet both of the measures are significant only at the 90% confidence level. Moreover, the latter shows a curvilinear effect on conflict onset implying a greater risk of conflict in ethnically polarized societies. The coefficients of logs of per capita GDP and population size have theoretically anticipated signs; yet they do not have statistically significant explanatory power.

Pre-colonial centralization has a positive and weakly significant coefficient (p < 0.1). This can reflect the capabilities of highly centralized (e.g. hierarchically structured) traditional authorities to confront the state or even mobilize against it (see Englebert, 2000), increasing the odds of (armed) challenges against the state. However, the low confidence in this finding renders it speculative at best. Moreover, while pre-colonial centralization has been used to capture the bargaining strength of traditional leaderships vis-à-vis the state (Wig, 2016), the informal aspect of traditional authority strength (e.g. the relevance of and trust towards traditional leaders within their communities) should also be considered.²³ Accordingly, I compile a measure of informal strength of traditional authority using the Afrobarometer data (2008) (round 4). Similar to pre-colonial centralization, traditional authorities’ informal strength has a positive and significant coefficient, which nevertheless becomes weaker when the state–TA interaction types are excluded from the model. While this might imply that states with strong traditional authorities that are not given public recognition are more conflict-prone, the lack of data on this variable for many conflict-ridden countries introduces systematic bias that renders the results ambiguous.²⁴

Finally, the coefficient for British colonies is negative and significant across the models. Former British colonies appear to have a lower risk of intrastate conflict than countries with other colonial histories. In light of this and the theoretical consideration on the potential interference of colonial histories in the relationship between the independent variable and conflict onset likelihood, the article now turns to additional analyses that further test the theoretical propositions.

Additional analyses and further discussion

Table IV presents two models interacting the different state–TA categories with the former British colony variable. Model 5, which interacts the colonial history variable with the concordant binary variable, shows a weakened negative effect for concordant state–TA relationships. The interaction term itself is not significant. However, Model 6 changes the results considerably. Interacting the former British colony variable with institutional hybridity renders both variables insignificant in their coefficients, while the interaction term is negative but insignificant. Moreover, the interactions between institutional multiplicity and symbolic recognition with former British colonies are omitted as these have not experienced any conflict onsets. A pairwise comparison shows that while institutional hybridity correlates positively with former British colonies, there are relatively few observations of institutional multiplicity and symbolic recognition in former British colonies. This selection bias, while interesting with regard to the continuities between colonial and post-colonial periods, blurs the relationship between state–TA interaction and intrastate peace and calls for closer examination.

Table IV.

Colonial history interaction terms and conflict onset

	Model 5	Model 6
Concordant TA interaction	–0.945^†
	(0.516)
Symbolic recognition (SR)		0.405
		(0.611)
Institutional multiplicity (IM)		–0.288
		(0.843)
Institutional hybridity (IH)		–1.019
		(0.659)
Former British colony	–0.938	–0.682
	(0.656)	(0.762)
Concordant TA*British colony	–0.906
	(1.062)
SR*Former British colony		0
		(.)
IM*Former British colony		0
		(.)
IH*Former British colony		–0.490
		(1.253)
Pre-colonial centralization	0.692^†	0.594
	(0.357)	(0.399)
Regime past instability	1.088*	1.096*
	(0.489)	(0.499)
Oil	1.010*	1.189*
	(0.511)	(0.534)
Ethnic fractionalization	6.954	8.711^†
	(4.297)	(4.669)
Ethnic fractionalization sq.	–6.812	–8.708^†
	(4.161)	(4.657)
(log) Mountainous	0.308	0.296
	(0.204)	(0.195)
Neighbour conflict incidents	1.380**	1.501**
	(0.475)	(0.468)
Constant	–6.637*	–6.506*
	(3.013)	(3.070)
AIC	350.6	350.0
Log pseudolikelihood	–155.3	–153.0
Wald Chi² (df)	44.44 (19)	46.36 (21)
Pseudo-R²	0.180	0.186
Countries	42	42
Observations	795	773

Standard errors, clustered by country, in parentheses; ^† p < 0.10, *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001; in an effort to save space, the remaining control variables also included in Model 4 are not shown in the table.

Accordingly, I investigate subsets of former British colonies and other colonies.²⁵ A subset of former British colonies indicates a conflict-decreasing effect of institutional hybridity. Thus, while former British colonies seem to present a preferable context for institutional hybridity to evolve in the first place, this has a decreasing effect on conflict onset when it does take place. Excluding traditional authorities has a significant conflict-inducing effect in former British colonies. However, as anticipated the robustness of the effect of institutional hybridity diminishes in countries with other than British colonial history.²⁶ Examples such as Niger, a former French colony with a history of both conflict and institutional hybridity, exemplify this ambiguity in the relationship between recognition of traditional authorities and civil peace. In Niger, the institutional recognition of traditional authorities (from symbolic to institutional hybridity) introduced considerable discontinuity from the French colonial rule that had stripped traditional leaders of their authority and later explicitly politicized them (Miles, 1993). This considerable discontinuity in the institutional role of traditional governance structures in many countries outside Anglophone Africa may have altered the necessity and potential of institutional hybridity in the post-colonial era.

Besides the colonial context, we have considered democratic regimes as potential interveners in the relationship between state–TA interactions and intrastate peace. The effect of concordant interaction may differ in consolidated democracies and the recognition of traditional authorities can be part of a democratization process. In order to better control for the relationship between concordant interactions and democratic regimes, I interact the state–TA interactions with a binary measure of democratic regime type.²⁷ Crucially, the pacifying effect of institutional hybridity grows stronger in this model specification, while the interaction term does not have a significant effect on conflict onset. Institutional hybridity appears to have a significant conflict-reducing effect in non-democratic states. Yet, validating the theoretical concerns, its effect ceases to be separable from the null hypothesis in democratic regimes. Figure 7 illustrates this.

Finally, I test the strength of the results with further robustness checks.²⁸ First, in order to examine the possibility that the effect of institutional hybridity is explained by a generally more inclusive society, the state–TA interaction types have been interacted with the ethnic exclusion variable. Institutional hybridity remains

Figure 7.

Marginal effect of institutional hybridity in non-democratic versus democratic regime types

significant and negative in this model specification. Notably, the interaction terms of institutional multiplicity and symbolic recognition with ethnic exclusion are positive and significant. Recognizing traditional authorities symbolically or defining their role outside the state administration might be an (often unsuccessful) effort to accommodate the elites of politically discriminated groups in states with higher levels of ethnic exclusion. Considering the relatively low share of ethnic exclusion in institutional hybrids, I have also excluded all observations with a value higher than the 75th percentile in ethnic exclusion. Institutional hybridity remains negatively correlated with conflict onset (p < 0.01).

In order to scrutinize potential biases brought by outlier cases, I have dropped every country in the data one by one from the analysis and the results remain fairly robust. The results remain unaltered when using a skewed-y logit model and when relaxing the operationalization of conflict onset to include all onsets after one year of ceased conflict. A measure of the heterogeneity of the pre-colonial communities has also been added to the models without significant changes to the interpretation of the main results.

Conclusions

This study has examined the role of traditional governance in maintaining intrastate peace alongside, within, or parallel to the state in sub-Saharan Africa. The results indicate that recognizing and incorporating traditional authorities into the public administration can be beneficial for peace, particularly in the midst of politically unconsolidated periods. I find support for the claim that institutional hybridity decreases the likelihood of intrastate conflict onset. However, this pacifying effect is not seen with the second concordant interaction, institutional multiplicity. Recognizing the legitimacy of traditional governance structures as parallel institutions does not bring about more value than when they are disregarded.

The results contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of a country’s governance capacities and intrastate peace. Deploying the capacities of traditional governance structures can strengthen the state’s capacity to prevent violent conflict, particularly when traditional authorities are given incentives to support the state. The results suggest that governments interested in preventing armed conflict may want to consider incorporating traditional governance more explicitly to the state. Future studies should examine the influence of this at a local level, as well as the role of traditional authorities more broadly in shaping conflict dynamics.

The empirical findings also suggest that colonial legacies influence the context in which different types of state–TA interactions emerge and operate. This highlights the importance of understanding the continuities between colonial and post-colonial governance institutions. Institutional hybridity is more frequent in former British colonies and its decreasing effect on conflict onset is only robust in Anglophone Africa. To what extent this variation is explained by the relative strength of traditional governance structures in former British colonies, and their relative weakness and corruption in other environments, should be examined. Furthermore, the impact of the informal strength of traditional governance structures should be given more focus in future studies. The results here suggest that the grassroots-level strength of traditional authorities matters for intrastate peace. However, more systematic data across countries is needed to investigate this.

Finally, research should examine the over-time development of the benefits of institutional hybridity. The findings suggest that giving traditional authorities a say in public administration pacifies non-democracies. Yet the added value becomes unclear with democratic countries. How the benefits and risks of institutional hybridity and other concordant and discordant interactions evolve when a state becomes more consolidated is a crucial question in democratizing countries where traditional authorities continue to claim their right to govern.

Footnotes

Replication data

The dataset and do-files for the empirical analysis in this article, along with the Online appendix and coding rules, can be found at .

Acknowledgments

I am grateful to Ismene Gizelis, Han Dorussen, Florian Kern, Rebecca Cordell, and my supervision group at the Department of Government for their excellent feedback. I also thank the editors and the two anonymous reviewers for their invaluable comments.

ORCID iD

Katariina Mustasilta

Notes

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