No abstract

This article describes how cross-border trade in West Nile, north-western Uganda to a large extent takes place outside of the legal framework. This does not mean that this trade is unregulated. We make use of the concept of ‘practical norms’ to show the existence of regulation within this trade, which diverges both from official norms and social norms (‘moral economy’). The article describes how these practical norms emerged and how they are enforced. First, it is shown how the moral economy of cross-border trade plays an important role in their articulation. Second, we ask which practical concerns play a role in sustaining these norms and how deviations from them activate open power struggles. And third, we show how concrete events have played a role in their emergence.

No abstract

In theory, urban governance involves non-state actors and the state working together in formally institutionalized ways to make collective decisions and provide urban services. However, in developing country cities with highly informalized economies, the processes that underpin 'real' governance often reflect informal bargaining power much more than formal institutional frameworks. This paper uses the case of Uganda's capital Kampala to explore how political configurations subvert structures of city governance, with particular attention to the increasing engagement between President Museveni and particular groups of informal workers. We present empirical research on market vendors and motorcycle taxi (boda-boda) drivers showing how this engagement benefits both the informal groups and the president. Increased political competition has created an environment where informal groups seeking to protect their livelihoods can tactically leverage a presidential intervention in their favour, helping them evade the policies and regulations of the City Council. Meanwhile, the president has used these interventions to build support in a city that was largely lost to the opposition. These processes have progressively undermined already weak formal institutions for urban governance.2

This article presents ethnographic evidence on the activities of the "tycoons'' - large-scale cross-border contraband traders in north-western Uganda. It shows how engagement with state officials, but also integration in the broader community are two crucial aspects which explain the functioning of informal cross-border trade or "smuggling'' in north-western Uganda. In doing so, it shows how, although there is a high degree of interaction between the "formal'' and the "informal'', the informal economy still has a distinct regulatory authority rather than simply merging in the state regulatory framework. Secondly, the regulatory authority governing this trade has a distinct plural character: rather than being either a "weapon of the weak'' for marginalised sections of the population or a "weapon of the strong'' for political elites, it has a much more ambiguous character, which influences the behaviour of the tycoons: both of these interactions limit the maneuvering space of these traders