With Les pouvoirs locaux au Niger, the Benin-Niger-based research institute LASDEL gives us a view of what African social science can look like, and what we see is both admirable and enviable. The book is the result of a truly collective and internally coherent research effort and it therefore surpasses by far the average edited volume of individual papers held together by an introduction. It also strikes a careful balance between applied social science and practical knowledge, which is in line with the institute's main goals. It is therefore a highly recommended read for Africanists interested in the workings of micropolitics and local governance, but a must-read for Nigerien fonctionnaires and probably most instructive to the administrations of other decentralizing states.
The book is divided into three sections. After an introductory theoretical outline by Olivier de Sardan, the first section deals with the most striking feature of Nigerien local politics: the position of the traditional chiefs (Olivier de Sardan and Tidjani Alou). Created by the French colonial administration, this hereditary office still plays a major, formally institutionalized role in Niger and the chiefs are therefore under scrutiny in every chapter, from the intricacies of chiefly succession to their involvement in waste disposal.
The second section offers a topical analysis of the workings of local administration and politics. These chapters form a coherent whole. Although they are set in different localities and deal with different subjects, they all address questions discussed in the other contributions and make use of the same framework of presentation. Hahonou considers the ethnic dimensions of party politics (in Bankilaré) and local associations (in Filingué), as well as the collective voting patterns in a local setting with which most Africanists will be familiar. But he also examines an interesting experiment in nomadic administration from which many other African countries could learn: the creation of a commune (municipality) without territory, the ‘inhabitants’ of which can vote in different places, depending on their nomadic residence.
Lund's analysis of local politics in the Zinder region shows the intractability of politics and civil society that is valid for many African settings. Lund points out that it is exactly the twilight zone between political power brokers and civil society that should be at the heart of studying local politics. His case studies on fada, local youth clubs centred on a local radio station, and m'banga, private security and vigilante brigades in the service of local politicians and chiefs – but ultimately in the service of themselves – are most convincing.
The intermingling of public and private is also the focus of Blundo's study on local waste management and public hygiene in the small town of Dogondoutchi. Some of the outcomes of his study are not new. Blundo shows the intractability of the cycle of poor service delivery by authorities. Unpaid taxes and a failure to distinguish state and private resources lead to a shortfall of funds for the tasks in hand; these are relegated to the private sector at higher expense; this in turn undermines public funds and authority. But the local scale and focus of his study – public waste management in a small African town – is highly original; to date it has drawn the attention of only a small circle of researchers.
All contributions in this section deal with the position of the traditional chiefs, but this becomes the main focus in Bako-Arifari's chapter on the intricacies of chefferie among the Fulani in Gaya. He shows how the various controversies around the position of traditional power within local politics are fed by historical discourses, which rest on ambiguities in the meanings of local and administrative titles and functions. These, in turn, were shaped by muddled and careless administrative practices in colonial times, and gradually became standardized in the administrative framework of the post-colonial period. Ultimately, however, they rest on the authority of ‘tradition’.
The third section of the book gives a summary of the state of local government in Niger through a series of descriptive cases set in a number of villages and smaller towns across the country (Dessa, Balleyara, Birnin Lallé, N'gourti, Shadakori and Bana). These case studies are less analytical. They are intended to provide further cases to illustrate the processes described in the second section. The additional merit of this section, however, is that it pays more attention to religious authorities as local political actors – a theme that has received less attention in the second section than it deserves.
The highly empirical approach to local politics in all the contributions, based on extensive fieldwork by local (or highly localized) researchers, is admirable. It is perhaps only possible because it is written from within Africa, and without much care for buffing up citation indices or impact factors, but with greater concern for the communities under study.
