Rights statement: This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Journal of East African Studies on 06/09/2018, available online: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17531055.2018.1518366
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Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - ‘National resources’?
T2 - The fragmented citizenship of gas extraction in Tanzania
AU - Ahearne, Robert
AU - Childs, John Robert
N1 - This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Journal of East African Studies on 06/09/2018, available online: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17531055.2018.1518366
PY - 2018
Y1 - 2018
N2 - Recent discoveries of oil and natural gas across East Africa have provoked a wave of political optimism fuelled by imaginaries of future development. Tanzania is a paragon of this trend; its government having asserted its potential to become a globally significant natural gas producer within a decade. Yet, this rhetorical promise has been countered by a series of violent confrontations that have taken place between state forces and residents of southern Tanzania. Although these struggles are about various articulations of resource sovereignty, this paper argues that they should be located less in questions of resource control, than in a historical marginalization of the south, or what has been called a ‘hidden agenda’, that privileges urban centres to the north. Drawing on original qualitative data generated over three years in Mtwara and Lindi regions, it shows how gas discoveries reveal the fault lines in the construction of an inclusive ‘Tanzanian’ citizenship. Protesters counter-narrate their sense of citizenship with insurgent strategies ranging from strike action to calls for secession. In short, natural gas discoveries actually extend the fragmentation of an already ‘differentiated citizenship’. Studies of resource conflict and sovereignty, we conclude, should pay more attention to the contested nature of citizenship.
AB - Recent discoveries of oil and natural gas across East Africa have provoked a wave of political optimism fuelled by imaginaries of future development. Tanzania is a paragon of this trend; its government having asserted its potential to become a globally significant natural gas producer within a decade. Yet, this rhetorical promise has been countered by a series of violent confrontations that have taken place between state forces and residents of southern Tanzania. Although these struggles are about various articulations of resource sovereignty, this paper argues that they should be located less in questions of resource control, than in a historical marginalization of the south, or what has been called a ‘hidden agenda’, that privileges urban centres to the north. Drawing on original qualitative data generated over three years in Mtwara and Lindi regions, it shows how gas discoveries reveal the fault lines in the construction of an inclusive ‘Tanzanian’ citizenship. Protesters counter-narrate their sense of citizenship with insurgent strategies ranging from strike action to calls for secession. In short, natural gas discoveries actually extend the fragmentation of an already ‘differentiated citizenship’. Studies of resource conflict and sovereignty, we conclude, should pay more attention to the contested nature of citizenship.
KW - Tanzania
KW - Mtwara
KW - citizenship
KW - gas
KW - differentiated citizenship
U2 - 10.1080/17531055.2018.1518366
DO - 10.1080/17531055.2018.1518366
M3 - Journal article
VL - 12
SP - 696
EP - 715
JO - Journal of Eastern African Studies
JF - Journal of Eastern African Studies
SN - 1753-1063
IS - 4
ER -