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AEGIS European Conference on African Studies

11 - 14 July 2007
African Studies Centre, Leiden, The Netherlands


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Witchcraft containment in Cameroon: the dynamics of changing legal strategies

Panel 36. Between customs and state law: The dynamics of local law in sub-Saharan Africa
Paper ID217
Author(s) Pelican, Michaela
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AbstractOver the past fifteen years, Cameroon - as many African countries - underwent significant political and legal changes which have affected local strategies of conflict management. While in the 1990s there was a tendency towards confrontational strategies, in the early 2000s actors tended to resort to procedural methods. In my presentation I will examine the dynamics of changing legal strategies by focusing on matters arising from witchcraft accusations. As we will see, local actors explored a variety of strategies, including customary and state legal methods as well as violent encounters and mediation via local voluntary associations. Northwest Cameroon is an area characterised by centralised chiefdoms in which the containment of witchcraft is considered the responsibility of so-called traditional authorities. In the 1990s, however, in the context of Cameroon’s political liberalisation and growing social insecurity, ‘traditional’ methods of witchcraft containment weakened in their efficacy. Conversely, the local population engaged in violent witch-hunts which triggered state intervention and responses from human rights and church activists. In my presentation I will focus on an anti-witchcraft conference held in 1999 in Northwest Cameroon. The event was organised by local human rights and church activists who demanded the fair treatment of individuals suspected of occult aggression. Moreover, they encouraged customary and state legal institutions not to compete but collaborate in the containment of witchcraft. The intervention of human rights and church organisations could be seen as the precursor of new forms of law or civil society – informed by global rights discourses and customary ways of mediation. In my reading, the recent trend towards procedural methods, involving alternative institutions in the process of conflict management, is as much motivated by external influences, namely international development discourses, as it is a reaction to the malfunction of customary and state legal institutions.