Labor Demands
The growth of plantations and other enterprises in Kinyaga led to a progressive augmentation in the wage labor force. Labor demands from Europeans in Kinyaga had to compete with demands from European establishments west of the lake. The development of…
Kinyagans And Wage Labor
Work for Europeans within Kinyaga offered only minimal economic advantages; salaries were on the whole low, particularly when compared to benefits to be gained through the sale of livestock and food. With the growth of Bukavu and the expansionof mining…
Power Struggles at the Court: Kabare and Ruhinankiko
Since the arrival of the Europeans, the Court, aware of its own limitations, had dealt skillfully with the problems and advantages created by the presence of the powerful strangers. Unable to ban the Fathers, it had restricted their impact by…
The Arrival of the White Fathers
Unlike the notables of the central kingdom, other subjects of the mwami overcame their repugnance to the ibisimba and sought protection from them. When the German explorer von Gôtzen had visited Rwanda, he had traveled through the eastern part of…
XIII. Epilogue
If Ruanda was a State at all, it was a State before the Europeans occupied it. It had been an isolated area, with only a trickle of trade goods entering it and these were used largely by the ruling class.…
XII. Recent Political Developments
THE SOCIAL STATUS QUO It is practically impossible to describe the status quo as it was when the writer arrived in Kibungu Territory in May 1960, unless one takes a look at the immediate past history of Remera and its…
The Process Of Infeudation
The Tutsi seem to commend themselves to the chieftains as a matter of course, or else he can force them to it. There is one instance of a Tutsi on Remera who seems to have refused to pay allegiance to…
The Cow As Token
Tostand alone is a tragedy. For sheer survival, the weaker individuals or lineages are driven to beg for a cow from someone more powerful than themselves. Asking for a cow is the equivalent of asking for material acknowledgment on the…
Ubuhake And Uruharo
Ubuhake is the institution through which an individual - be he head of a family or of a lineage - commends himself to a patron. The patron grants protection (most often from himself, as well as from other rapacious notables),…
The Nuclear Feudal Cluster
It has been seen in the preceding chapter on social organization that the chieftain is the head of a group which is called the "nuclear feudal cluster." By the author's definition, this is the smallest socio-political group of the hierarchy.…