Drawing on an engagement with Botswana that dates to the mid-1970s and a theoretical perspective informed by Deleuze and Guattari and Foucault, Ørnulf Gulbrandsen attributes the consolidation of a strong postcolonial state in Botswana to the successful assimilation by indigenous authority power structures of various social forces that had the potential to threaten their hegemony.

According to Gulbrandsen, a broad and coherent elite coalition captured traditional authority structures. The postcolonial state produced this grand coalition by supporting widely shared elite interests in cattle (Chapter 3), and it gained legitimacy with appeals to ‘indigenous symbolism, practices, and institutions' (p. 4 and Chapters 4 and 6). Presenting itself as subsuming rather than replacing traditional authority structures, Botswana's postcolonial state tapped into the symbolic representation of the ruler as motswadintle (a person from whom good things come), a role with considerable discretionary authority. It co-opted the kgotla (traditional assembly) for the presentation of government policies and programmes to the public. Various government policies and programmes, such as drought relief and the provision of anti-retroviral (ARV) medications, put the state in a position of sustaining life (Chapter 7). They also bred dependency on the state, raising the risks of overt opposition. These processes fostered the emergence and consolidation of a powerful postcolonial state and hegemonic ruling elite.

The State and the Social is but the latest in a stream of publications seeking to explain Botswana's relative success. Most agree that a broad governing coalition, elite cohesion, shared interests in livestock and Tswana traditional institutions supported the development of the postcolonial state. Where other explanations emphasize agency, particularly political leadership in response to Botswana's diamond boom, The State and the Social does not. Gulbrandsen devotes little attention to decisions and actions that enabled the construction of a broad coalition or the incorporation of traditional authority structures into the postcolonial state. Instead, following Deleuze and Guattari, the author argues that the strength of the state hinges on whether social forces support or threaten it. Social forces that have been appropriated by the state support it; those that remain exterior to the state pose a potential threat.

Gulbrandsen contends that indigenous authority structures appropriated a variety of potentially threatening social forces. These included Christianity (Chapter 1), the large non-Tswana population (Chapter 5), multi-party elections (Chapter 6), and, most importantly, traditional authority structures. The British ruled the Bechuanaland Protectorate indirectly through the Tswana dikgosi (rulers, singular: kgosi), bolstering their authority. As independence approached, some dikgosi advocated a federal system that would reaffirm their authority. Instead, the postcolonial state stripped dikgosi of authority over substantive matters, and yet traditional authority reinforced the hegemony of the state. The once powerful dikgosi advise the government as members of the Ntlo ya Dikgosi (formerly House of Chiefs), host government officials at the kgotla, and contribute to social peace through the administration of customary law.

Oddly, the analysis makes no effort to explain why the British abandoned their colonial era intermediaries or why most dikgosi opted to back the postcolonial state despite their loss of formal authority. Perhaps it was because Tswana traditional authority is not a unified and unidirectional social force. The Tswana dikgosi do not represent a coordinated group with a common agenda vis-à-vis the state, in part because the structural positions of the merafe (tribes or polities, singular: morafe) differ. Further, within each morafe, the kgosi often faces challenges from other members of the royal family. Gulbrandsen observes that Batswana distinguish between the bogosi (chieftaincy) and the incumbent kgosi and that they hold the bogosi in high esteem even when they are critical of an incumbent. There is also plenty of evidence that Batswana recognize the claims to bogosi of some individuals who are not incumbents, such as heirs apparent and dikgosi who have abdicated or who have been removed from office. Rivalries within royal families create opportunities for state leaders to challenge individual dikgosi without directly challenging traditional authority structures. Likewise, divisions within and between merafe dampen the extent to which challenges by individual dikgosi (whether incumbents or not) pit traditional authority more broadly against the state. Greater exploration of the multi-stranded nature of social forces such as traditional authority would enrich Gulbrandsen's account.

Inconsistent temporal anchoring and attention to social dynamism weaken the analysis. Gulbrandsen repeatedly asserts that he is most concerned with the consolidation of the postcolonial state from 1966 to 1990. Indeed, he describes conditions in the 1970s and 1980s, such as a grand coalition based on elite interests in livestock, as if they were contemporary (Chapter 3 and p. 306). Yet the book also analyses many more recent developments, including an ongoing conflict between the state and Kgosi Kgafela, minority protests in the late 1990s, responses to HIV/AIDS during the presidency of Festus Mogae (1998–2008), and the public sector strike of 2011. The proclaimed temporal focus seems to prevent Gulbrandsen from fully assimilating evidence of mounting social conflict into his thesis. It is otherwise difficult to understand how Gulbrandsen can celebrate ‘the development of a strong, modern state with a sustainable government’ (p. 311) while proclaiming ‘the crisis of a modern state [i.e. Botswana], a crisis that is as much moral as it is material’ (p. 310) and underlining ‘the dubious character of the post-colonial state in Botswana … vested with an immense capacity to capture the population into the process of state formation … [while] tacitly relying on subtle tactics, repressive practices and structures of domination’ (p. 317).