Rearticulating Citizenship Amidst the COVID-19 Pandemic

State Legitimation and Lived Experiences in Tanzania and Uganda
1. Auflage 2026
ISBN: 978-1-041-21790-9
Verlag: Taylor & Francis Ltd

Buch, Englisch, 222 Seiten, Format (B × H): 156 mm x 234 mm

Reihe: The COVID-19 Pandemic Series

The book contributes to the literature on COVID-19 by offering a unique perspective on the reconstruction of citizenship in postcolonial Africa following the pandemic, with a particular focus on Tanzania and Uganda.

It explores tensions between state legitimation strategies and citizens’ lived experiences in semi-authoritarian African contexts, revealing how pandemic governance reinforced existing power structures while creating spaces for resistance and adaptation. It scrutinises Tanzania's 'denial' approach and Uganda's strict scientifically justified lockdown, demonstrating how different strategies shaped state-citizen relations. Drawing on a collaborative research project, it offers a novel theoretical framework connecting legitimation and lived experiences in citizenship studies, using empirical insights from presidential speeches, newspaper coverage, and firsthand accounts of vulnerable groups. Through a comprehensive analysis, it illustrates how these neighboring countries adopted divergent pandemic responses, revealing new understandings of crisis governance in hybrid regimes and citizens' navigation of state narratives during emergencies.

This book will appeal to scholars and graduate students in sociology, development studies, political science, citizenship education, and African studies. It also provides essential insights for policymakers, international organizations, and civil society actors working on governance, public health, and citizenship in the Global South, particularly those concerned with crisis response in semi-authoritarian contexts.

Zielgruppe

Academic and Postgraduate

Autoren/Hrsg.

Ahimbisibwe, Karembe F.

Kahamba, Judith S.

Kontinen, Tiina

Fachgebiete

• Sozialwissenschaften Politikwissenschaft Politische Kultur Staatsbürgerkunde, Staatsbürgerschaft, Zivilgesellschaft
• Sozialwissenschaften Soziologie | Soziale Arbeit Soziologie Allgemein
• Sozialwissenschaften Soziologie | Soziale Arbeit Soziale Gruppen/Soziale Themen Invalidität, Krankheit und Abhängigkeit: Soziale Aspekte
• Sozialwissenschaften Soziologie | Soziale Arbeit Spezielle Soziologie Gesundheitssoziologie, Medizinsoziologie

Inhaltsverzeichnis

1.Introduction: Rearticulating citizenship during the COVID-19 pandemic in Uganda and Tanzania. 2.Conceptualizing state legitimation and lived citizenship in Africa during COVID-19. 3.News framing as legitimation of COVID-19 responses in Tanzania. 4.‘On the advice of scientists…’: scientising the COVID-19 response to legitimise regime power in Uganda. 5.Effective pandemic management or rebuilding state legitimacy? Understanding President Samia Suluhu’s U-turn on COVID-19 in Tanzania. 6.Successful, caring, and arbitrary? Making sense of the Ugandan state during COVID-19 pandemic. 7.Making sense of intersectional inequalities during the COVID-19 pandemic: Analysis of two diaries from urban Uganda. 8.Everyday resistance to the COVID-19 response in Museveni’s Uganda. 9.Disrupted economic citizenship during Magufuli’s ‘Economy First’ COVID-19 approach: tourism workers in Arusha, Tanzania. 10.Gendered citizenship during the COVID-19 pandemic: narratives from vulnerable teachers in urban Uganda. 11.Conclusions: Reflections on the rearticulation of (post-)pandemic citizenship.

Über Autor(innen)

Karembe F. Ahimbisibwe is Lecturer in the Department of Adult and Community Education at Makerere University, Uganda.

Judith S. Kahamba is Lecturer in the Department of Development and Strategic Studies at Sokoine University of Agriculture, Tanzania.

Tiina Kontinen is Professor in International Development Studies at the University of Jyväskylä, Finland.