Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Fiscal Disobedience: An Anthropology of Economic Regulation in Central Africa
    Fiscal Disobedience: An Anthropology of Economic Regulation in Central Africa
    Fiscal Disobedience: An Anthropology of Economic Regulation in Central Africa
    Ebook216 pages6 hours

    Fiscal Disobedience: An Anthropology of Economic Regulation in Central Africa

    By Janet Roitman

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    Fiscal Disobedience represents a novel approach to the question of citizenship amid the changing global economy and the fiscal crisis of the nation-state. Focusing on economic practices in the Chad Basin of Africa, Janet Roitman combines thorough ethnographic fieldwork with sophisticated analysis of key ideas of political economy to examine the contentious nature of fiscal relationships between the state and its citizens. She argues that citizenship is being redefined through a renegotiation of the rights and obligations inherent in such economic relationships.


    The book centers on a civil disobedience movement that arose in Cameroon beginning in 1990 ostensibly to counter state fiscal authority--a movement dubbed Opération Villes Mortes by the opposition and incivisme fiscal by the government (which for its part was eager to suggest that participants were less than legitimate citizens, failing in their civic duties). Contrary to standard approaches, Roitman examines this conflict as a "productive moment" that, rather than involving the outright rejection of regulatory authority, questioned the intelligibility of its exercise. Although both militarized commercial networks (associated with such activities trading in contraband goods including drugs, ivory, and guns) and highly organized gang-based banditry do challenge state authority, they do not necessarily undermine state power.


    Contrary to depictions of the African state as "weak" or "failed," this book demonstrates how the state in Africa manages to reconstitute its authority through networks that have emerged in the interstices of the state system. It also shows how those networks partake of the same epistemological grounding as does the state. Indeed, both state and nonstate practices of governing refer to a common "ethic of illegality," which explains how illegal activities are understood as licit or reasonable conduct.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPrinceton University Press
    Release dateJun 5, 2018
    ISBN9780691187044
    Fiscal Disobedience: An Anthropology of Economic Regulation in Central Africa

    Related to Fiscal Disobedience

    Related ebooks

    Globalization For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Who’s The Thief?

      Feb 20, 2020

      Who’s The Thief?
      6 min read

    • Article

      Michael Hiltzik: America Is Falling Out Of Love With Billionaires, And It's About Time

      Feb 1, 2019

      Our emerging political debate over taxing the rich seems to be getting bogged down in details - how high a tax rate, should we tax income or wealth, etc., etc. But this fixation on nuts and bolts is obscuring what may be the most important aspect of

      5 min read

    • Article

      The Fight For Reparations

      Aug 8, 2023

      The Fight For Reparations
      6 min read

    • Article

      Filthy Rich And Sick Of It

      Feb 4, 2022

      Filthy Rich And Sick Of It
      2 min read

    • Article

      Reparations – An Idea Whose Time Has Come?

      Dec 17, 2020

      KEHINDE: Transatlantic slavery was pivotal in the efforts to build what we now think of as the West. It was hundreds of years of slaughter, enslaving millions of Africans – turning us into commodities – in order to create unparalleled wealth for the

      5 min read

    • Article

      Surviving A Financial Crisis

      Oct 5, 2018

      Surviving A Financial Crisis
      12 min read

    • Article

      Lands Of The Free

      Apr 28, 2023

      Lands Of The Free
      3 min read

    • Article

      Heretics In The Marketplace

      Jul 24, 2017

      The ballot box was now obsolete, supplanted by a vast, continual referendum that had rendered political institutions little more than speed bumps on the road to market efficiency. The post Heretics in the Marketplace appeared first on The Millions.

      8 min read

    • Article

      Reaping A Thieves’ Harvest

      Sep 6, 2020

      The last snag, some will speculate, that was ultimately the undoing of state capture was the inability of its engineers to successfully field a permanent, servile yes-man to Treasury. Though they came achingly close to that objective, a few good men

      3 min read

    • Article

      How To (Re)Make Money

      Aug 9, 2019

      How To (Re)Make Money
      7 min read

    • Article

      Best Podcasts Of The Week: Kim Kardashian, Reality Star Turned Activist Lawyer, Pivots To True Crime

      Oct 6, 2022

      Kim Kardashian’s The System: The Case of Kevin KeithSpotify, episodes weekly “I think you’ll be surprised by what you hear,” says Kim Kardashian. But she’s not talking about her impressive podcasting chops and clear passion for justice. The focus is

      3 min read

    • Article

      From The Archives

      May 20, 2022

      From The Archives
      2 min read

    • Article

      Bird’s Words

      Jul 17, 2023

      Stupidity might one day be seen, if it is not already, as the biggest guiding force in human history. Studied, adopted, clearly thought-out inanity, not a kind of off-the-cuff thoughtlessness. The invasion of Iraq, brokered and orchestrated by George

      3 min read

    • Article

      Hope From The Seed Of Trauma

      Feb 13, 2023

      Hope From The Seed Of Trauma
      10 min read

    • Article

      A Cause For Celebration

      Sep 30, 2020

      A Cause For Celebration
      15 min read

    • Article

      Commentary: Money Talks, But Does Anyone Understand It?

      Jan 18, 2019

      I always took a shine to language. When I was in second grade, Mrs. Peloso put me with the owl readers, the top animal ranking of us 8-year-olds with the finest reading comprehension, ahead of the bears, turtles, even dogs. Years later then, during t

      3 min read

    • Article

      Corruption Will Kill The Country

      Jul 12, 2020

      When South Africa went into hard lockdown as a result of the Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic, economic fallout was inevitable as the country ground to a halt. The impact the virus has had on our financial lives has been dramatic. Coupled with an alread

      1 min read

    • Article

      The Solutions We Don’t Need

      Jul 24, 2020

      a few weeks ago, a small group of social scientists, most of whom enjoy, like I do, the comforts of academic life, wrote an open letter to finance minister Tito Mboweni, telling him to spend more. They are concerned about the prudent supplementary bu

      4 min read

    • Article

      Should The West Stop Giving Aid To Africa?

      Nov 1, 2018

      FIROZE: Since its inception, the logic of international aid from the West has been to integrate African economies into a global capitalist system, which relies on Africa’s resources for its own growth. The way aid is given has never fundamentally cha

      5 min read

    • Article

      The Big Breakup

      Dec 13, 2023

      The Big Breakup
      10 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Fiscal Disobedience

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      Fiscal Disobedience - Janet Roitman

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1