Conference: “Custom and tradition in contemporary political systems”
Call for Papers
Location: Department of Anthropology and African Studies (ifeas), Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU), Germany
Date: 6-7 November 2026
The post-colonial era, and particularly the period since 1989, has seen the (re-)emergence of alternatives to a Western hegemonic political and social orthodoxy. Claims that Western democracy is the end point of human political evolution are now being challenged, and since the turn of the century the global order has increasingly been contested, whether through a problematisation of the concept of the state itself (for example ISIS) or through Trumpian and other populist challenges to established political norms.
Amongst these changes there has been a reassessment and a return to (and, certainly, reinvention of) local voices, customary political systems and processes as states recognise that these alternatives are apposite. Such observations recognise that the discursive hegemony of the West silenced perspectives on alternative systems that were always already present, and it is now generally acknowledged that customary systems (whether characterised as legal or political) never really disappeared. This is true in places that were never colonised as well as in former colonies – particularly the British ones, where they were recruited to the colonial endeavour, but also the French ones.
Contemporary customary political systems have been the object of much scholarly attention and debate, particularly in Africa and in the Pacific, and particularly at the sub-national level. We call for contributions that speak to this theme. Although we welcome proposals that consider custom on a sub-national level, we are particularly interested in considerations of the tensions and the accommodations between the customary and the formal at the national level.
Participants might consider questions such as:
What are the constraints and the advantages in granting a political role to custom?
How do states that draw on customary alternatives to western political systems at a national level find a place in the contemporary (democratic) world?
To what extent is custom, frequently critiqued for its undemocratic nature, really undemocratic?
Why is there often resistance to customary political systems, despite the evidence that they can function efficiently?
Does formal recognition accord custom greater authority or does custom function more efficiently when formally dissociated from the state?
Custom is a “total social phenomenon”, so if a Western political system replaces customary political structures, can other customary practices survive?
Conference participants will contribute to debates over tradition, modernity, and custom in today’s global order, by examining the ways custom is perceived, enacted, criticised and esteemed.
Organisation:
The conference will take place over two days, 6-7 November 2026, at the Department of Anthropology and African Studies (ifeas), Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Germany. Meals and accommodation will be provided for conference participants. Assistance with travel costs may be available but priority will be given to those without access to institutional funding.
It is expected that the conference will result in a publication and participants should bear this in mind when preparing their contributions. Papers will take the form of draft articles to be pre-circulated to conference participants in order that conversations at the conference itself be as productive as possible. Please note that the working language of the conference will be English and all papers should be in English.
Please send a title, an abstract of not more than 250 words, author’s name, email and institutional affiliation, to walkeria@uni-mainz.de before 31 March 2026. We would expect to advise of acceptance by the end of April.
For further information please contact Iain Walker at walkeria@uni-mainz.de
Funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG), project number 571915249.
