Abstract
We now turn to the manner in which the processes of accumulation and re-investment under the Condominium (as described in Chapters 1 and 2) created and shaped social forces within Sudan. This will lay the basis for describing the political dynamics of the nationalist movement as it developed in Sudan, and the political dynamics of post-independence Sudan. While the pattern of Sudanese politics may, in an immediate sense, have been determined by the struggle between sectarian and ethnic groupings and between adherents and opponents of unity with Egypt, our concern here lies at a more fundamental level. The focus is on the factors which created the whole framework within which Sudanese politics moved. How, for example, did sectarian and ethnic groupings come to be in a position to play a political role?
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Notes
S. al-Mahdi, Jihad fi Sabil al-Istiqlal (Government Printing Press, Khartoum, 1965), p. 13.
M. O. Beshir, Revolution and Nationalism in the Sudan (Rex Collings, London, 1974), p. 141.
Information on the means whereby tribal leaders controlled and managed the economic resources which fell within their tribes’ domains can be found in the anthropological works on Sudan. Particularly recommended (for Northern Sudan) are: T. Asad, The Kababish Arabs: Power, Authority and Consent in a Nomadic Tribe (Hurst, London, 1970);
I. Cunnison, Baggara Arabs: Power and Lineage in a Sudanese Nomadic Tribe (Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1966);
L. Holy, Neighbours and Kinsmen: A Study of the Berti People of Darfur (Hurst, London, 1974);
A. A. Mohamed, White Nile Arabs: Political Leadership and Economic Change (Athlone Press, London, 1980);
A. M. Ahmed, Shaykhs and Followers: Political Struggle in the Rufa’a al-Hoi Nazirate in the Sudan (Khartoum University Press, 1974). 13. A clear account of Condominium government policy towards the role of tribal leaders in the early years after 1898 is to be found in
G. Warburg, The Sudan under Wingate: Administration in the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, 1899–1916 (Frank Cass, London, 1971), pp. 142–7.
A. A. Bishai, Export Performance and Economic Development in Sudan 1900–1967 (Ithaca Press, London, 1976), p. 119.
C. H. Harvie and J. G. Kleve, The National Income of Sudan 1955/56 (Department of Statistics, Khartoum, 1959), p. 31.
M. Abd al-Rahim, Imperialism and Nationalism in the Sudan (Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1969), p. 158.
H. Macmichael, The Sudan (Ernest Benn, London, 1954), p. 226.
P. Woodward, Condominium and Sudanese Nationalism (Rex Collings, London, 1979), p. 145.
A major part of the land used for peasant production was under communal management, formally owned by the state. ‘Communal management’, however, refers to the process whereby individuals obtained permission to use the land, not to the means whereby the land was cultivated. In most cases the village or tribal leaders would grant permission to individual members of the community to cultivate particular stretches of land (without rent). The right to cultivate such land would usually remain with the individual to whom it had been granted for as long as he or she continued to cultivate the land. While communal labour was often used to complete the most rigorous parts of agricultural work, the usufruct of the land was appropriated by the individual. In the Fur area of western Sudan, the labour of fellow-villagers was drawn in to help gather an individual farmer’s harvest by the holding of beer parties for those who gave assistance; in the central Sudan, the practice of nafir (mutual assistance, or communal self-help) involved the members of a community working collectively to clear the fields or bring in the harvests of individual farmers, with the farmer subsequently obligated to make his own labour available to clear the fields or bring in the harvests of others. See F. Barth, Economic Spheres in Darfur (University of Bergen Press, 1967). Land cultivated by peasants in the valley of the Nile north of Khartoum was mostly privately-owned and not under communal management.
See Republic of Sudan, First Population Census of Sudan 1955/56 (Department of Statistics, Khartoum, 1962), vol. 2, p. 124. The table from which this figure is taken is reproduced as Table A.6 in the Appendix.
Republic of Sudan, First Population Census of Sudan 1955/56 (Department of Statistics, Khartoum, 1962), vol. 3, p. 372.
See R. Henin, ‘Economic development and internal migration in the Sudan’, Sudan Notes and Records, vol. XLIV, 1963, pp. 100–19.
The Taxation of Animals Act, 1925, laid down that province governors had the right to levy taxes on ownership of camels, cattle, donkeys, goats, horses, mules and sheep. The level of taxation on each animal was made subject to certain stipulated maxima; these maxima were changed from time to time. See Democratic Republic of Sudan, Laws of the Sudan (Khartoum University Press, 1975), pp. 398–402.
See M. W. Wilmington, ‘Aspects of moneylending in northern Sudan’, Middle East Journal vol. 9, 1955, p. 141.
Republic of Sudan, The Sudan Gezira Board: What It Is and How It Works, (Ministry of Information, Khartoum, 1967), p. 31.
Republic of Sudan, A Report on the Census of Pump Schemes, June–August 1963: A Coordinated Picture of Area Irrigated by Pump Schemes in the Republic of Sudan (Department of Statistics, Khartoum, 1967), p. 39.
The tenants themselves seemed to experience some psychological unease over their status and role. They generally insisted on being called ‘farmers’ rather than ‘tenants’. See A. Barnet, The Gezira Scheme: An Illusion of Development (Frank Cass, London, 1977), p. 168.
Although no change occurred until 1956 in the ‘main account’ percentage of rewards going to tenants, changes occurred in the organisation of costs — i.e. some costs which were initially the responsibility of the tenants subsequently became the responsibility of the Board. See A. Gaitskell, Gezira: A Story of Development in the Sudan (Faber, London, 1959), Chap. 19.
Y. Abd al-Majid, ‘Ujara al-Rif (Khartoum, 1954), p. 32.
All information given here on individual Sufi orders is in Sudan taken from J. S. Trimingham, Islam in the Sudan (Frank Cass, London, 1965), pp. 187–241.
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© 1987 Tim Niblock
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Niblock, T. (1987). Social Forces under the Condominium. In: Class and Power in Sudan. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-08836-2_3
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