ABSTRACT
Politics is the process by which people seek power. It is a two-sided endeavour involving cooperation and solidarity, on the one hand, and competition and conflict on the other. This chapter initially concentrates on the cooperative side of the political equation. The goal here is to explore patterns of cooperation, other than the chieftaincy system, which emerged among leaders when a political community began to form. As we have seen, leadership was fragmented and not organised in the early 1950s. Yet it quickly solidified to the extent that Mushin’s political system resembled a political machine by the early 1960s. At this point conflict began to dominate the political picture. The chapter therefore turns from an examination of the unifying forces in Mushin’s early years as a district, to an examination of the external forces which threatened to destroy the machine, and to civil disturbances which broke out in response.
