Chibale Zambia: independence and interdependence

Chibale Zambia: the theme independence and interdependence. Everyone strives for independence, but no one is invulnerable. The networks must be maintained in case of problems.

Independence

People foster an ideology of independence. During the last century, rather than residing in relatively large villages, people began to live on separate farms – either as a married couple or as a single extended family of three generations. People in Chibale often say that they are striving for independence. This refers to freedom with regards to the demands of matrikin (members of one’s mother’s lineage) and other local factors. But also to independence from the government and other exogenous factors. The striving for independence may be related to the money economy people became involved in. However, people often imply that the striving is ‘inborn’. For instance by arguing that villages only had become large to defend against the frequent raids at the end of the 19th century.
Be that as it may, “becoming and/or remaining independent can be considered an important value shared by large sections of the population”¹Seur (1992: 187).. Not only do the people live each on their own farm, within a farm wife and husband often also have their own fields and personal income. Of course, individuals still work together and help each other when necessary but this does not work ‘automatically’, that is through some form of shared focus of authority. Co-operation and help are the result of negotiations and agreements between individuals or are characteristic of the grouping one belongs to.

Chibale Zambia: independence and interdependence. The following quotation sheds light on the ideas that exist among certain people about the relation between independence and change.

The most important change in this area has been that people moved from the villages to farms. Most farmers are independent these days. In the villages there was no development, people had only one idea. In the villages there was no competition, so everybody stayed on the same level. Now there is a lot of competition, everybody wants to undertake new things and people are working hard for themselves, and they compare their results with the results of other farmers. Since everyone is living on his own farm today new ideas arise, and because of this you can see that people end up thinking differently about a lot of things.
∵ Benson Mwape in Seur (1992: 100).

Dealing with both the need for maximum independence and the need to be able to fall back on others in times of distress defines a significant part of strategic behaviour in Chibale.

Continue to the article about the theme modernity and traditionality.