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'Connections and transformations in Africa': Long version of the Programme Proposal |  |
| A workshop at the African Studies Centre, Leiden, the Netherlands, Tuesday 21 November, 2006 |
return to: Index page 'Connections and transformations in Africa'
Inserting
the word connections in search machines like Google links one
immediately to sites of ICT companies, to Celtel and Vodaphone,
etc. Indeed the new technologies, which these companies and
search machines represent play an important role in literally
connecting people; they add to the increasing possibilities to
communicate, creating a world that comes closer and closer to the
idea of the global village. In
The
Theme Group seeks to explore questions that evolve around the
introduction of technologies in African societies and the ensuing
social transformations. Our point of departure is the way
technologies enable people to create such connections as may lead
to social transformations in their societies. The Theme Group
will therefore link up with debates about the relation between
technology and society, and the discussion on connections and
social transformations. It will explore the socio-historical and
cultural relationships that have developed between people and
technology in
The
central question in this research programme is: how,
and why, do connections and disconnections produce
transformations involving the introduction of new (communication,
social and organizational) technologies.
| Old/
past/continuity |
New;
present; ‘invention’ |
| Technologies |
New
technologies |
| Connections |
Connections |
| Transformations |
Transformations |
In the proposed research, we are not only interested in ‘new’ technologies, ‘new’ connections, and ‘new transformations, but also in continuities and ruptures between old and new; Old technologies may lead to new connections in different circumstances; new connections, may be inspired by old technologies, but they may create on their turn also new social technologies, etc. …...
This
research group contains an interesting group of scholars who come
from different traditions in the social sciences. Social history,
geography, social anthropology are the dominant disciplines of
the researchers in the group. In 2002 the group started with a
research programme around issues concerning ‘Agency in
In
our Theme Group’s agency approach the following topics have
been central: mobility/migration; poverty/marginality;
urbanization; religion; identity construction especially in terms
of ethnicity; conflict and violence, development and policy;
technology; reflection on the role of various groups and
positions in societies including this of the researcher. Our
research has resulted in the publication of a considerable number
of articles and books. The Theme Group also organised two
seminars on its central topic, the results of which are now being
edited into a book to be published in 2007.
One
answer to this question lies in the ways in which research has
provided insights in the ways in which African groups and
societies have been forging answers and responses to
globalization, not only in reaction-to but also as being a
process of co-creation. This relates to research that has been
carried out in the fields of religion, transnational movements,
production of knowledge and studies of coping
behaviour/livelihood. We should realise that there are many forms
of ‘proto’-globalization like mercantilism, the spread
of world religions, of formal organizations, statehood,
technologies and sciences after
One
result of the studies on agency is that we have come to
understand ‘globalization’ as a diverse process, that
can be appropriated in different ways, and that is not
inescapable. Though other changes in the environment may be
inescapable, for instance climate change, or war and conflict.
While globalization in its present or historic forms has meant
the introduction if not implementation of all sorts of Western or
Eastern inventions and appetites on the African continent, we are
developing an open eye for particularly those social formations
that negotiate these forms in terms of an African socio-cultural
understanding. In other words, agency proved to be much more than
only the actions by the individual in response to anything
global, – agency instead means a constant negotiation
between environment and society in changing circumstances, be
they globalization, climate change or otherwise. This agency can
be produced by individual actors but also by organizations.
Hence, in the creative appropriation of globalization, ecological
and political changes the relationship between individual agency
and social agency was brought out.
Insights
from our studies have proved to inform policy and development
related discussions, as our participation and invitation for
these forums have shown. The contribution of this research to the
analysis of the development policies and practices did not stop
at the individual contributions to specific domains of study by
each individual researcher. With the study of the history of the
SNV ‘Volunteers’ Dutch development organization we
entered a new domain of reflexivity on development and analysis
of development as a dynamic process in itself. Here we stepped on
the shoulders of people like Olivier de Sardan, Hobart, Quarles
van Ufford, van Binsbergen and others, who have contributed to
the development of ‘development anthropology’.
A
second answer to the question of added value lies in the truism
that agency is only produced in relation with other people; no
agency exists in isolation, whether we speak of individual agency
or group/organizational agency. The crucial insight that agency
is about producing relations with other people
(‘relationality’) came to the fore most strongly in
research of the Theme Group devoted to livelihoods and situations
of extreme poverty combined with questions of social security and
social capital. Increasingly the Theme Group discovered that the
central question here is not whether agency is relational but how
and why and with whom it produces
relationality. Relationality is always in relations to, on, at or
with. Important is to know who want to relate and in what
particular way they want to relate. Agency is manifested in
relationality; we have to understand the how of its production
under the current conditions of plurality and multiplicity. Hence
the issue of connections
comes to the fore.
In the creation of these connections, communication technologies, social technologies and organizational technologies play an important role. The use and the appropriation of these technologies are of course guided by agency and are influenced by inequalities and power relations – such as are always present in societies. In the present new forms of communication and organization technologies are shaping the African landscapes and ‘socio-scapes’, daily life of Africans is increasingly dominated by ‘modern’ technology. Currently an African setting, be it rural or urban, without transistor radios, motor-vehicles, and mobile phones, or without the presence of NGOs and other development organizations is quite literally unthinkable.
Studying
connections and transformations as processes of opportunities and
frictions offers this research programme an innovative framework
in which to articulate the nature, dynamics and consequences of
agency in
By
technology we refer to communication, social and organizational
technologies. These are industrial technology as well as the
introduction of new organization models (management), or new
social forms, such as the organizational forms introduced by
specific religions and ideologies, but also organizational forms
introduced by policy measures and development. These technologies
are as technical as they are social and, as such, they are
interpreted, internalized and used in a social context where they
become part of the context and thus of society. Technological
innovations may lead to reconfigurations of social relations
resulting in people connecting with new relations or introducing
entirely new forms of organization. But they may also lead to
disconnections, to the formation of enclaves and to social
isolation.
STS (Science and Technology studies) have stressed the insight that both technology and society are human constructs. The research in this Theme Group will build upon. Within the theory that has become known as Actor-Network Theory (ANT), both human and non-human actors – or ‘actants’ – have been granted ability to transform society[1]. The Social Constructivism (SCOT) approach stands in stark opposition to technological determinism, and emphasises that technology development is primarily a social process. Within STS there has been a particular interest in the social aspects of design and development processes, and far less in the role of users. Recent work,[2] has indicated users exercise influence throughout the whole trajectory of technology-development, and, as such, they are not end-users but co-producers of innovation processes. The Theme Group will elaborate on these ideas and at the same time try to apply it to organizational and social technology.
The
analysis of society and technology with reference to Actor
Network Theory is in its infancy, and nowhere is this more so
than in
In our study of social transformations as they are linked to societal and historical processes in society we will concentrate on relationality, on connections. The theory of connections is still in its first stage of development.[3] Given the centrality of connections as a concept, the Theme Group envisages exploring the theoretical and ontological dimensions of this concept with a view to developing a general theory of connections. In the light of the group’s commitment to multidisciplinarity and methodological flexibility, such a theory of connections should be informed by insights from different approaches in the social sciences and humanities. The theory must, however, avoid the standard shortcomings of oversimplification and the tendency towards sterile dichotomies that fail to do justice to the interconnections of real life situations. The group plans to overcome such shortcomings by thinking and writing through connections between disciplines, and with researchers based on the African continent.
Connections
are seen in this research programme as simultaneously linking
various geographical, time and social spaces. Connections are
being made between individuals, social groups and institutions at
different moments in varying configurations. In the shaping of
connections we see a central role for technology in the narrower
sense, but at the same time we find it useful to stretch the
notion of technology so as to encompass mobility, law, religion,
and knowledge production, among others. Combining changes at all
these different levels of connections without unduly privileging
any single connection is a challenge for the study of social
realities in contemporary
We understand connections to be analytically distinct from social relations in the sense that relations make use of, and are made possible by, connections, while on their turn connections need certain social technologies to come into existence in a functional and meaningful way. By way of example: a railway line connecting various places allows for a range of (new) social relations to become established. This connection exists irrespective of these social relations, yet may be productive or transformative of them. In order for the railway-line to become established a range of technologies is required These technologies are both technical in the ‘hard’ sense of the word as well as social, i.e. that relate to the management and organization of this connection. It also entails political economic connections as to make possible the massive capital input railway construction always entails.
Connection
thus becomes pivotal. It is them that bring (social) technologies
into play. It is also connections through which social relations
are being shaped or refigured. The nature of the connection
itself is also specifically studied in this programme. In the
course of the 20th century
People have a reason to connect and to disconnect and they do so in meaningful ways. These are always informed by cultural and social repertoires that are available in the specific societies participating in the connections. In order to understand these processes of change we need to analyze, in combination:
· people’s agency on the one hand, which focuses on individual and collective decisions, interpretations and reactions to the changes in their environment, and on the other hand:
· the ways in which outside effects upon their social world have come about.
Individual
and collective agency shows how people and institutions work
together, react towards and impose upon each other through
establishing various types of connections, and in the process
form new social hierarchies, different (labour) relations and
varied forms of cooperation, and new forms of mobility. These are
created by, and based upon, old as well as new repertoires of
(dis-)connection available to people.
Thus
the concept of connections will allow us to observe and describe
changes in connecting and relating as they occur in relation to
the introduction of technologies. However, our research will
especially focus on studying the processes in which these
connections become ‘useful’, that it, at the moment
these connections are being seen as opportunities, or are given
meaning by the people involved or the people who are not involved
(disconnected). That is where connections turn into networks,
social or political relations for instance. Therefore, the Theme
Group will make use of such well-established analytical and
conceptual tools as network analysis, pathways, social relations,
kinship, hierarchies, etc, as far as they continue to be
relevant. In this research programme we will especially address
the nitty-gritty of how, what and why of newly created
connections.[4]
How can we begin to understand what these connections are, why
people, communities and institutions are searching for new
connections and, if so, how they are related to existing forms of
agency and social change?
The
central question in this research programme is: how,
and why, do connections and disconnections produce
transformations involving the introduction of new (communication,
social and organizational) technologies.
We
are looking for promising fields of research in the complex
interrelation between (dis-) connections, technology and social
transformations. We propose to start our discussions by
investigating various technologies and how they relate to the
dynamics of connections and social transformations: technologies
of mobility, materiality, religion, and knowledge production. The
central analytical guidelines will be our thinking about agency
and social hierarchies. From the interrelationship between these
four fields of study and the proposed analytical focus, a set of
questions can be formulated to inspire our proposed research.
Mobility
is a field of study various members of the study group have been
working with: i.e. the study of transnational societies,
religions and ideologies; the study of mobility as it is related
to situations of crisis; urban-rural relations; migration studies
in general. One of the conclusions of these studies is that
spatial mobility is probably the normal condition for societies
in several parts of
In
these transformations, technologies are not neutral entities, on
the contrary they are social and cultural, and are given meaning
in ways that fit a certain cultural space and time
(interpretative flexibility)[7].
Religion and ideology inform the cultural frames of people and
societies and as such help to create technologies, while being a
technology in itself.
In the creation of connections and disconnections, ideologies and religious ideas may inform people about how to perceive changes and situations in societies, and how to reflect upon them. This ‘perception’ and ‘reflection’ is considered an important link in the creation of connections. On the one hand, these may lead to further theoretical questions of what connections are actually made of, how ideologies determine the content of connections or perhaps even use connections as an ideological weapon in the pursuit of certain interests. Here we are dealing with what can be termed an anatomy of connections in the way power structures, ideology and even sensory regimes of the ways in which people connect to the world are involved.[8] On the other hand, we may question how perceptions and reflections are formed and changed through the introduction of technologies. Changes in connecting, since they relate to the introduction of new technologies, create new power structures. Questioning and seeking to understand these structures should be central in all our research.
An
important field to explore in relation to connections and
technologies is the field of knowledge production, both as a self
critique and as a technology of knowledge production. This field
of inquiry allows us to explore again another level of
connections in geographical sense and in time depth. Here we will
address, in the first place, the current South-North
collaboration in the production of Africanist knowledge as an
intercontinental project of connectedness, both in the use of
social and technical technologies (disciplinary organisation,
technologies of research, data processing and publication). The
hierarchical dimension to be considered in this connection is
that of (real and imagined) North Atlantic hegemony –
increasingly challenged not only by Islamism but also by
Afrocentrism, but also subjected to detached and critical
epistemological enquiry e.g. in the wake of Sandra Harding’s
work. New, electronic and digital technologies of connectedness,
only exist in continuity with older technologies of connectedness
through knowledge. In this connection, ethnic and religious myths
of identity, difference, and fundamental meaning (in other words,
everything that is constitutive of society) have always played a
major role. With these questions we seek to explore the boundary
conditions under which new technologies of connectedness are both
reshaping and preserving
The
focus on connections, flows and flexibility will inform our
research techniques and methodologies. However, the flexibility
of communications and connections may lead us to reconsider these
techniques. Do the established ethnographic methods suffice for
the study of emerging social realities and their complexities?
Research techniques have been affected by the very communication
technologies we are studying, i.e. the use of the Internet, the
phone, motor transport. But also in historical research, access
to the new media is leading to an increase in the accessibility
of archives and the speed at which we can gather information. The
physical field of research has certainly extended to multiple
connected sites, and to longer time frames. The multi-sited,
longitudinal and comparative methods that have been on the
research agenda for more than a decade now will be further
developed in this research programme. We, as researchers, are
involved in connections and therefore need to situate ourselves
explicitly, as researchers, in the field.
To
develop our research techniques, we propose engaging in some team
research. This is meant as a methodological experiment that would
help to formulate methodologies, to develop interdisciplinarity
and to provide quick insights into one specific research topic
showing the relationship between transformation, technologies and
connections.
(to
be developed: linkage between the constituent projects during our
workshop of 21 November)
In
our concrete research projects we have chosen to concentrate on
certain forms of connecting that appear to be ‘new’ in
a certain period of societal existence and the way this is
related to the introduction of technologies and how it produces
social transformations. We have also chosen to built upon our
experiences so far by concentrating on areas and trying to
incorporate our former research.
The
Theme Group will devote considerable time to develop a theory or
approach of connections and (social) technology; and we will put
energy in the development of methodology, i.e. the proposal to do
team research.
This
project is to comprise 5 sub projects:
Southern
Africa (
[1]
See for instance Bijker, Wiebe E. (1995) Of
Bicycles, Bakelites, and Bulbs: Toward a Theory of Sociotechnical
Change, Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press; Bijker,
W.E. (2001) “Technology, Social Construction of”, in International
Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences,
Elsevier Science Ltd. pp. 15522 – 7. Callon, Michael (2004)
Actor-Network Theory, What is actor-network
theory?, University of Colorado at Denver, School of Education,
Internet document: http://carbon.cudenver.edu/~mryder/itc_data/ant_dff.htmlAccessed
23 November 2004; Latour, Bruno (1991) “Technology is
society made durable”, in John Law (ed) A
Sociology of Monsters: Essays on Power, Technology and Domination,
London: Routledge, pp. 103 – 31. Law, John ed. (1991)
A Sociology of Monsters: Essays on Power, Technology and
Domination, London: Routledge. Woolgar,
Steve and Keith Grint (1997) The Machine at
Work: Technology, Work and Organization,
Cambridge: Polity Press.
[2]
Kline, R., & T.J. Pinch (1993) “Taking the black box off
its wheels: The social construction of the American rural
car”, in Knut Holtan Sørensen (Ed.), The
car and its environments : the past, present and future of the
motorcar in Europe, Luxembourg [etc.] :
[3]Amselle,
Jean-Loup, 2001, Branchements. Anthropologie de
l’universalité des cultures. Paris, Flammarion. Reyna,
Stephen, 2002, ‘Connections: Brains, Mind and Culture in
Social Anthropology, London, Routledge
[4]
Green, Sarah, Culture in a Network: dykes, webs and women in
London and Manchester
www.innerasiaresearch.org/Green.Culture.pdf
In British Subjects: An Anthropology of Britain. Nigel
Rapport, ed.. Oxford: Berg Publishers, 2002;
Strathern, M. 1987, ‘Producing difference: connections and
disconnections in two New Guinea Highland kinship systems’,
in J. F. Collier & S. J. Yanagisako (eds) Gender and kinship.
Essays towards a unified analysis, 271--300, Stanford: University
of Stanford Press.; Strathern, M. 2004, Partial
connections. Savage, Maryland: Rowman and
Littlefield (1991). Re-issued by AltaMira Press, Walnut Creek, CA
[5]
De Bruijn, M. D. Foeken, R. van Dijk (eds) 2001, Mobile Africa,
ASC series, Brill, Leiden; Nyamnjoh, Francis B. 2005,
“Images of Nyongo amongst Bamenda
Grassfielders in Whiteman Kontri”, Citizenship
Studies Vol.9(3):241-269, 2005; van
Binsbergen, W.M.J., 1998, ‘Globalization and virtuality:
Analytical problems posed by the contemporary transformation of
African societies’, in: Meyer, B., & Geschiere, P.,
eds., Globalization and idenity: Dialectics
of flow and closure, Oxford: Blackwell, pp.
273-303.
[6]
One this point, two members of the proposed Theme Group have
already done considerable work in relation to the computer,
Internet, and ICT in general: Nyamnjoh, F.B., 1997, ‘Africa
and the Information superhighway: The need for mitigated
euphoria’, paper read at the WAC C-UNESCO Workshop on
Communication and the Globalisation of Poverty: Media Ownership
in West and Central Africa, Yaounde (Cameroon), September 8-10,
1997; earlier version by Nyamnjoh, F.B., Wete, F., &
Fonchingong, T., 1996, entitled ‘Media and Civil Society in
Cameroon’, in: Africa Media Review, 10, 2: 37-66. van
Binsbergen, W.M.J., 2002a, ‘ICT vanuit intercultureel
perspectief: Een Afrikaanse verkenning’, in: de Mul, J.,
2002, ed., Filosofie in cyberspace:
Reflecties op de informatie- en communicatietechnologie,
Kampen: Klement, pp. 88-115; van Binsbergen, W.M.J., 2004,
‘Can ICT belong in Africa, or is ICT owned by the North
Atlantic region?’, in: van Binsbergen, W.M.J., van Dijk, R.,
eds., Situating globality: African agency in
the appropriation of global culture, Leiden:
Brill, African Studies Centre Yearbook 2003, pp. 107-146; and as
far as more traditional technologies in Africa are concerned: van
Binsbergen, W.M.J., 1995, ‘Four-tablet divination as
trans-regional medical technology in Southern Africa’,
Journal of Religion in Africa, 25, 2:
114-140.
[7]
See Kline & Pinch 1993, 1996
[8]
Feldman, Allen “From Desert Storm to Rodney King via
Ex-Yugoslavia: on Cultural Anaesthesia”, in: C. Nadia
Seremetakis (ed.) The Senses Still. Perception and Memory as
Material Culture in Modernity. Chicago, Univ. of Chicago Press,
1994.
return to: Index page 'Connections and transformations in Africa'
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