Cross-cutting Ties and Coexistence: Intermarriage, Land Rentals and Changing Land Use Patterns among Maasai and Kikuyu of Maiella and Enoosupukia, Lake Naivasha Basin, Kenya

• Main Authors: Eric Mutisya Kioko, Michael Bollig
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Stockholm University Press 2015-06-01
• Series: Rural Landscapes: Society Environment History
• Subjects: Maasai; Kikuyu; Land-renting; Intermarriage; Cross-cutting Ties; Peaceful Conflict Management
• Online Access: http://www.rurallandscapesjournal.com//articles/7

This paper explores the value of cross-cutting ties and conflicting loyalties for the peaceful management of conflicts and the emergence of collective action across previously violently contested community boundaries in two communities in the Lake Naivasha Basin, Kenya. In the researched communities cross-cutting ties result from intermarriages, land rentals and friendship. Fieldwork was conducted in six neighbouring villages on the border between Nakuru and Narok Counties in 2013 and early 2014. Half of these villages fall within the Maiella Sub-location and the other half within Enoosupukia Location. Enoosupukia, especially, has become notorious in the history of ethnicised violence in Kenya’s Rift Valley. In October 1993 more than 20 farmers of Kikuyu descent were killed in an organised assault perpetrated by hundreds of Maasai vigilantes with the assistance of game wardens and administration police; later thousands of farmers were evicted from the area at the instigation of leading local politicians. Nowadays, intercommunity relations between Maasai and Kikuyu are surprisingly peaceful and the cooperative use of natural resources is the rule rather than the exception. How did formerly violent conflicts develop into peaceful relations? How did competition turn into cooperation facilitating changing land use? In this paper we explore the role of cross-cutting ties and the conflicting loyalties associated with them to explain changing community relations.