Witchcraft, War and Rationality: the strategic functions of traditional religion in contemporary African conflict.

This paper examines the nature of contemporary African conflict with respect to the use of traditional religious beliefs and practices for strategic purposes. The failure of the states in sub-Saharan Africa to Westernise, and throw aside traditional political, religious and cultural characteristics from pre-colonial days, has been a source of confusion and ongoing debate. Whereas most analysts in the 1960s and 70s predicted such ‘modernisation’ through independence and secular nationalist movements, current analysis is pondering the extent and exact nature of the ‘re-traditionlisation’ of African society. Elements of this confusion has surfaced in discussions on the changing way of warfare in the post-Cold War world, where African civil wars are often used to illustrate wider arguments about the ‘new’ types of war and where displays of ritual violence and ceremony is equated with chaos and anarchy. This paper argues that traditional religion has played, and continues to play, a central role in most recent and contemporary African wars, and that in view of this any consideration of war on the continent must take it into consideration. It is further argued that this use of traditional religion is not a display of irrational activity that would fall into a ‘new barbarism’ analysis, but rather that they serve instrumentally rational purposes clearly identifiable also with reference to Western approaches to strategy: traditional religious beliefs and practices serve to provide legitimacy to insurgent groups amongst the wider population where the ‘cause’ is expressed with reference to religious beliefs and traditions; as such it helps to mobilise support; it can help maintain discipline within the armed group by reinforcing hierarchy; and it can serve as a tool for intimidation. The extent of all of these, however, can only be fully understood with reference to the beliefs attached to the practices, and consequently a culturally sensitive analysis is necessary. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]