Swaziland report / Commonwealth Relations Office.

  • Great Britain. Office of Commonwealth Relations
Date:
[1959]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Swaziland report / Commonwealth Relations Office. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    115/156 page 97
    Chapter xiv : Sociological Research The rapid growth of population and of industrial and agricultural development in Swaziland has raised prob- ?ems which require urgent investigation. The Swazi are presented with problems similar to those facing the majority of African peoples; that of adjusting their way of life to the technical exchange economy into which they are being increasingly drawn, and of ac¬ commodating a rapidly increasing population on a fixed amount of land. In 1957, Government, with the assis¬ tance of a grant from Colonial Development and Wel¬ fare Funds, appointed a social anthropologist to undertake a study of land tenure in relation to the present political and social structure, and a demo¬ graphic study of population trends. On being approached by Government, the Institute for Social Research in the University of Natal agreed to collaborate in and supervise this research scheme. Land Tenure The principal research problem, that of investigating the traditional social organisation with particular emphasis on those aspects which might affect, or be affected by, adjustments to meet changing conditions, was undertaken first. This has involved a study of the Swazi National Administration, and four different types of areas; a planned Native Land Settlement, a chiefdom which is one of Ingwenyama’s cattle posts, one of the largest tributar' chiefdoms in the Territory and a chief¬ dom of the type distinguished by the Swazi as a “portion” (Liphaketo) allocated to a branch of the ruling house. The traditional rules of land tenure in these areas, and how they vary according to their political context, have been worked out, and present in¬ vestigations are concerned with finding out how they are being adjusted to meet modern conditions. Consider¬ able evidence has been found to support the hypothesis
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