Grenzen der Implementierung staatlichen Rechts im dörflichen Kontext. Eine Analyse der Rechtswirklichkeit in einem Baatombu-Dorf in Benin

Erdmute Alber and Jörn Sommer

Africa Spectrum, 1999, vol. 34, issue 1, 85-111

Abstract: State law and legal reality in village Borgu, a region in the north-east of Benin, do not correspond. Below a certain threshold of conflict escalation, the Benin state does not enforce its legal norms, but merely offers them and subjects their application to local demand. On the village level, this demand is restricted by the actors' appeal to community ideologies that, in general, do not carry a traditional character. Thereby, actors mobilise norms according to which demand for state law as such may be sanctioned negatively. In consequence, legal reforms designed to be effectual on legal reality have to take into account the village legal demand. The project of family law reform in Benin is one contemporary example of this. Based on long-term research in some villages of the region, this study analyses one exemplary case of village conflict processing in order to illustrate the theoretical theses discussed.

Date: 1999
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