Afghanistan - Organizational Groups

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"Tribes are generally thought of as a unit of social organization that share a common ancestry and culture. Over time, groups on different branches of the family tree can grow into different “segments” or clans. There are also several groups in Afghanistan that do not organize around tribal kinship ties, including Uzbeks, Tajiks, and Hazaras. Anthropologists and historians who study Afghanistan don’t use “tribe” as an analytical unit. Instead, they talk about a word that is often translated as “tribe,” but has a lot of other meanings as well - qawm. The best translation for qawm is “solidarity group,” meaning a group of people that acts as a single unit and is organized on the basis of some shared identity.“Tribes” in Afghanistan do not act as unified groups, and for the most part they are not hierarchical, meaning there is no “chief” with whom to negotiate (and from whom to expect results). They are notorious for changing the form of their social organization when they are pressured by internal dissension or external forces. A more traditional Afghan form of social organization is the patronage network. Patronage networks in both the north and the south are dependent on the ability of the patron, or khan, to distribute resources to make a convincing case for his leadership. Local khans do not hold any formal office—they are not elected and people are free to decide whether to support or reject them. Many khans also have some sort of tribal relationship, but their followers are not limited or defined by their tribal identification. The patronage networks they lead, therefore, are temporary and their membership is not a given. Each locality has its own dynamic, and only first-hand investigation can tell whether a locality has a warlord, a khan, or a tribal organization at a given time.

Three decades of war have undermined the centrality of tribe as a source of identity. While it certainly still exists, identities grounded in religion, language, place of origin or residence, socio-economic position, and association with tanzims, the mujahedin parties that fought the Soviets, can (and often do) all trump tribe in different circumstances. For example, the parties involved in a conflict within a community over a disputed resource may be two social networks based in past membership in different tanzims. In another example, the parties involved in a dispute over use of land may be from the same ethnic group, speak the same language, be distant relatives, and yet define themselves in the conflict as farmers and nomads, two socio-economic groups.

The long-standing conflict has, however, strengthened the importance that ethnicity plays in politics and society. By the time of the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1989, the various mujahedin groups were already representative of the various ethnic blocs in the country. Throughout the struggle for control of the government following the collapse of the communist regime in 1992 further solidified ethnic divisions, and the armed factions were all ethnically based, representing the Pashtun, Tajik, Hazara, and Uzbek communities. Ethnically-based violence against civilians, rare in previous periods of conflict in Afghanistan, became increasingly common, and all sides were guilty of atrocities, including massacres and forced expulsions of population. Ethnic considerations still remain important in current political considerations, and although local loyalties and patron-client relationships are the most important locus of identity and social organization, ethnicity continues to be a profoundly powerful tool for political mobilization.[ref 1][ref 2][ref 3]

Although the decades of war have increased the tension between competing groups and have heightened the politicization of ethnicity and tribalism, the concept of an Afghan nation-state has not collapsed. In fact, there is only a minority voice urging the division of Afghanistan into independent ethnic or tribal states, or to connect with ethnic and religious cousins across the country's borders. In any case, despite the differences, conflicts, and violence that has occurred between the various groups that inhabit Afghanistan, a common sense of national belonging has never been erased. As Roy Oliver remarks: "...the concept of Afghanistan as a nation-state has...survived the war and the opening of the country's borders...Although most political parties tend to have a largely mono-ethnic basis, none of them ever advocated partition, secession, annexation, or even federalism on an ethnic basis, no the creation of 'greater' ethnic nations (Pashtunistan, Greater Tajikistan, Greater Uzbekistan). All parties, leaders, and warlords have a national agenda based on the restoration of of a multi-ethnic central state: they differ on the redistribution of power between individuals and groups and on the relation between the centre and periphery, but not on the definition of the nation and of the state. the groups which are competing are not ethnic groups, but could rather more accurately be described as sub-ethnic groups (Panjshiris, Kandaharis, Heratis, people from Kunar or Paktya). No one party seems to represent, or even has pretensions to represent, the interests of a whole ethnic group."[ref 4]

Where tribes exist in Afghanistan, there only very rarely are single leaders of tribes or clans. Instead, within tribes and communities, there are various local elites, some of whom may be extremely influential. Leadership is often situational. In both areas with strong tribal identities and weak ones, Afghan communities generally share local institutions with similar features. Shuras or jirgas typically decide issues of concern to the community and solve conflicts. Mullahs and those who own lots of land or are wealthy are usually influential.A singular focus on “tribe” as the central organizational principle of Afghan society implies a need to identify leaders, institutions, and relationships that may not exist. The assumption that tribes have leaders or behave as a single unit contributes to inadequate engagement strategies. And looking for conflict between tribes distracts us from the more common conflicts that occur within tribes that give the insurgency opportunities to expand. Gathering and mapping tribal, sub-tribal, and clan identities and boundaries only tells a small and potentially misleading part of the story. The more important part of the story involves identifying local conflicts, elites, and institutions, all of which cut across tribal and ethnic identities often in unexpected ways. Local knowledge adds critical context that can be the difference between success and failure."[ref 5]

Contents

See Also

Datasets

  • Minorities at Risk Project - research project that monitors and analyzes the status and conflicts of politically-active minority ethnicities and religious sects in all countries with a current population of at least 500,000

Links

References

  1. ↑ Simonsen, Sven Gunnar. "Ethnicising Afghanistan?: Inclusion and Exclusion in post-Bonn Institution Building." Third World Quarterly, 25(4):710-711
  2. ↑ Riphenburg, Carol J. "Ethnicity and Civil Society in Contemporary Afghanistan." The Middle East Journal 59(1):31-51 Winter, 5005
  3. ↑ International Crisis Group.Afghanistan: The Problem of Pashtun Alienation. ICG Asia Report No. 62, 5 August, 2003
  4. ↑ Oliver, Roy. "Afghanistan: Internal Politics and Socio-Economic Dynamics and Groupings." UNHCR Emergency and Security Services Writenet Paper No. 14/2002, March 2003, 5.
  5. ↑ "My Cousin’s Enemy is My Friend: A Study of Pashtun "Tribes" in Afghanistan," Afghanistan Research Reachback Center White Paper TRADOC G2 Human Terrain System, United States Army, Fort Leavenworth, KS, September 2009, http://easterncampaign.files.wordpress.com/2009/11/my-cousins-enemy-is-my-friend-a-study-of-pashtun-tribes.pdf
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