Pundits who decry 'tribalism' know nothing about real tribes

[stuck in the middle]

Pundits who decry ‘tribalism’ know nothing about real tribes

Their rhetoric has more to do with Western stereotypes than tribal reality

The Washington Post

Perspective by Christine Mungai

Christine Mungai is a writer and journalist in Nairobi, Kenya. She was a 2018 Nieman Fellow at Harvard University.

January 30, 2019 at 10:21 a.m. EST

The U.S. electorate, commentator Andrew Sullivan wrote recently, has devolved into “two tribes whose mutual incomprehension and loathing can drown out their love of country.” In the New Yorker, George Packer argued last fall that politics today “requires a word as primal as ‘tribe’ to get at the blind allegiances and huge passions of partisan affiliation.”

“Tribalism” has become an inescapable concept in American politics, partly because the partisan divide in America’s public sphere is becoming more shrill and polarized (though the hyper-partisanship is asymmetrical: The right leans further right than the left leans left).

But there’s a significant problem with using the words “tribal” and “tribalism” to describe this trend: The usage is historically inaccurate when you consider the actual behavior of indigenous peoples, whether African, Native American or Asian. The current use of “tribal” is based on a racist stereotype about how groups of such peoples have interacted historically, and even today.

I know something about “tribalism,” since I was born and raised in Kenya, a country made up of 44 different ethnic groups. My parents are Kikuyu, but they raised my siblings and me in a cosmopolitan, urban environment. My experience with tribes, and my historical knowledge of them, do not resemble what I read about in the writings of political pundits.

snip--- (much, much more at link)

Gifted article, no subscription necessary: https://wapo.st/3sjf3vy

[TreasonousBastard]

1. Mungai certainly knows her tribalism, but modern political...

tribes are a different thing. Why not discuss the Iroquois Federation which had some influence on our founders? It still didn't last, but not entirely to Federal meddling.

Or the Plains wars with the Sioux and Apache who terrorized the more peaceful locals.

Tribalism involves groups, by birth or orientation that can have positive effects (but rarely).

[stuck in the middle]

2. She's in Kenya.

Why not discuss the Iroquois Federation which had some influence on our founders?

I could just as easily ask why she didn't discuss my wife's culture, which is considered a "tribal" culture, and which had quite an influence on our founders here in America.

Catholicism and Orthodox Christianity (Group)

Some history of interest to me.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/122111682

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Maroons in the Americas

December 1, 2001.

https://www.culturalsurvival.org/publications/cultural-survival-quarterly/25-4-maroons-americas

The Rights of Maroons In International Human Rights Law

Author: Fergus MacKay

https://www.culturalsurvival.org/publications/cultural-survival-quarterly/rights-maroons-international-human-rights-law

The vast majority of American states have ratified international human rights treaties that obligate them to respect the rights of individuals and certain groups. Some have also ratified International Labor Organization Convention No. 169 (ILO 169), which deals exclusively with the rights of indigenous and tribal peoples. The rights of Maroon individuals and collectivities are also protected under these instruments. This article provides an overview of the nature and content of those rights, with an emphasis on collective rights.

Prior to turning to the substance of Maroon rights, I should point out that states have an obligation to give effect to ratified human rights treaties in their domestic law, as without these measures international guarantees for the most part cannot be enforced or enjoyed by the intended beneficiaries. By virtue of both general principles of international law and specific provisions found in human rights treaties,(1) states are obligated, first, to give effect without discrimination to human rights in their domestic law by constitutional amendment, adopting new legislation and/or modifying existing legislation; and second, to ensure that effective remedies are in place permitting rights to be enforced in domestic courts and other tribunals.

While the underlying rationale for protecting the collective rights of Maroons -- the right to cultural integrity, the right to self-determination, the right to equality before the law and freedom from discrimination -- holds true in all cases, the manner in which Maroons are classified under international law -- as minorities, as tribal peoples, or as some other entity -- is important. Without engaging in a (contentious) discussion of how to classify Maroons, I will simply state that under international definitions, imperfect as they are, Maroons can be described as both "minorities" and as "tribal peoples," the latter being most relevant in terms of collective rights.(2) And while they are not indigenous peoples, Maroons enjoy largely the same rights as indigenous peoples under international law -- the main distinction being that Maroons cannot claim aboriginality and the rights that attach to that status. For this reason, but also due to a lack of international jurisprudence on Maroon rights, I will make frequent reference here to indigenous peoples' rights.

Maroon Rights Under International Instruments

Minority rights are encapsulated in Article 27 of the UN International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), which provides that "[in] those States in which ethnic, religious or linguistic minorities exist, persons belonging to such minorities shall not be denied the right, in community with the other members of the group, to enjoy their own culture, to profess and practice their own religion, or to use their own language." These rights are held by individuals but exercised "in community with other members of the group," thereby providing some measure of collectivity. Similar language is found in Article 30 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child; the points made here are therefore also relevant to the rights of Maroon children, and by implication, the larger community, under that instrument.

The UN Human Rights Committee (HRC) has interpreted Article 27 to include the "rights of persons, in community with others, to engage in economic and social activities which are part of the culture of the community to which they belong." In reaching this conclusion, the HRC recognized that indigenous peoples' subsistence and other traditional economic activities are an integral part of their culture, and that interference with those activities can be detrimental to their cultural integrity and survival. By implication, the land, resource base, and the surrounding environment also require protection if subsistence activities are to be safeguarded.

snip--- (more at link)

https://www.culturalsurvival.org/publications/cultural-survival-quarterly/rights-maroons-international-human-rights-law

[TreasonousBastard]

3. Sure, but show how it's relative to us and our system, such...

as it is. Or not relative.

It's interesting in it's own right, but so is the story of American Irish and Italian families interesting. And closer to home

And German families trying to get the Bund working over here. That went on until the Fifties, and is still going on quietly.

I wouldn't argue she's wrong, just that definitions and situations are constantly changing.

[stuck in the middle]

4. Who's us?

I'm talking about my wife's culture.

She's been half of "us" for more than a quarter century since we got married in 1997, and your government tried to kick us out of the country with a 10 year ban on even applying for re-renry, just because of her identity.

The disastrous, forgotten 1996 law that created today's immigration problem

https://www.vox.com/2016/4/28/11515132/iirira-clinton-immigration

The law that broke US immigration

[TreasonousBastard]

5. That's a serious point.

[stuck in the middle]

6. Even more serious is that...

...her ancestors, as cimarrones, having run away from their masters, were considered as "illegals' right here in America five centuries ago.

INVISIBLES: Las Guerrillas Del Patia

[raging moderate]

7. Yes, but Europe also had tribes, and many of them fought each other constantly.

Last edited Thu Aug 24, 2023, 03:09 PM - Edit history (2)

I think the people who talk about tribalism as a source of our difficulty in the United States are talking about oppositional traditions that originated, thousands of years ago, in different tribes situated in the British Isles and in the rest of Northern Europe. Perhaps you have no idea of the bloodthirsty activities of many of these tribes, which actually horrified even the vicious Roman conquerors. Many of the ideas I hear from right-wing fanatics remind me of some of the rumors that have drifted down about the fierce ingrown fanatical tribal loyalism that may have been carried over to this continent by some of the early immigrants from the places where most of my ancestral nationalities originated.