Negotiations and morality: the ethnicization of citizenship in post-secession South Sudan

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Periodical article

Title:	Negotiations and morality: the ethnicization of citizenship in post-secession South Sudan
Author:	Marko, Ferenc David
Year:	2015
Periodical:	Journal of Eastern African Studies (ISSN 1753-1063)
Volume:	9
Issue:	4
Pages:	669-684
Language:	English
Geographic term:	South Sudan
Subjects:	nationality citizenship ethnicity
External link:	https://doi.org/10.1080/17531055.2015.1105441
Abstract:	In 2011, two days prior to its declaration of independence, South Sudan adopted a new nationality act and set up a bureaucracy to handle citizenship-related issues. Despite striking similarities with Sudanese bureaucratic traditions, this article argues that South Sudan altered the overarching logic of its citizenship and moved towards an ethnic definition, in which applicants chiefly have to prove their ethnic affiliation. While Sudan stratified its citizenship regime and thus discriminated against people among its citizenry, South Sudan preselects its applicants. The article, through the analysis of stories of citizenship applicants, seeks to investigate how people who do not immediately fit into the imagined categories of good citizens, cope with the situations. On these shaky grounds, where evidence is indecisive, bureaucrats and applicants invoke moral arguments, and thus, through these moral negotiations of citizenship, constantly redefine the state. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum. [Journal abstract]