The sorting stage

The refinement of individual information networks involved a sorting of potential transmitters and agents, such that the most reliable of possible networks was maintained.

Several respondents had, by the time of the interview, been in contact with several relatives in Mozambique. For some, like the respondent from whose interview the excerpt below is taken, the range of possible transmitters was extended as relatives returned to Mozambique:

’After the first year my mother went back. She sent a message to say she had reached there safely, and now she sends messages often’ (J:28)

For another, the same occurred when he successfully located his mother using the Red Cross Tracing Scheme. For several others, marriage in exile also had the effect of extending the range of transmitters.

Most of these respondents, however, only maintained regular contact with one of these relatives. In social network analysis, as described in Chapter 3, the extent to which contacts which can potentially exist actually do, is termed density. This was identified as one of the quantitative aspects of information flows. As discussed in the last chapter, respondents did not generally identify closer relatives as more trustworthy than distant relatives. Instead, a variety of other reasons were normally given for the maintenance of contacts with some relatives rather than others. Sometimes these relatives were the closest, sometimes they were more accessible, and sometimes they lived in the respondent’s intended destination. The most important variable seemed to be the functionality of contact with the relative. The following excerpt demonstrates this principle:

I write to my cousin in Mandimba regularly, but I haven’t written to my parents in Cabo Delgado for several years...there’s no point in contacting them until I go home and can visit them, but my cousin should be able to help me start a business in Mandimba’ (C:13)

A second quantitative aspect of information flows was described as range. This aspect relates to the accessibility of the transmitter and receiver to one another. In some cases, this bridge was formed by visits to or from Mozambique. In others, it depended upon agents. The ability of agents to reach the respondent’s selected transmitter was one of several iaspects in the sorting of agents by respondents.

As military activity in both Mandimba and Lago districts in Niassa diminished rapidly following the principal attacks in each area, the number of possible information agents increased as cross-border trade routes which had traditionally existed were resurrected, and new trade based upon the refugee settlements commenced. Traders replaced new

arrivals as the principal agents of information. One refugee trader from Chiumbangame told me:

’I cross two, and sometimes three times a week. Last time I went was last week, and I took seven letters and brought back eighteen... There are at least a hundred traders like me in this camp... W e’ve been crossing like this for about four years’ (C:149)

As a result, by the time of their interviews, many respondents had sorted potential agents. I asked all the respondents: ’How would you go about finding out information about Mozambique?’, and many were able to identify a specific agent who they would use. Several respondents had cultivated agents, by giving them gifts in return for contacting relatives in Mozambique.

One sorting process was the perceived reliability of the agent, as discussed in the last chapter. A significant trend, for example, was the discontinuation of contacts with institutional agents as soon as they had served their purpose. However personal agents were also differentiated, as this excerpt demonstrates:

’I used to send messages with other refugees who returned for trade, but often they didn’t get as far as Cabo Delgado. About two years ago a man who lives near my parents in Cabo Delgado visited Mtaja [Malawi], and took back a message. Now he comes often to sell salt, and so I send all my messages with him’ (C:36)

Thus the agent’s range was another aspect in the sorting process. Nevertheless, agents had generally enjoyed a considerable range, as the border was permeable, and internal mobility in Niassa and Malawi to an extent engendered by the low intensity of the conflict and the lack of restriction upon movement within Malawi.

Through 1992, however, the number of agents available to respondents in Mangochi, and the agents’ mobility, was decreasing in response to renewed military initiatives and Malawi Government responses to them. As discussed in Chapter 5, the security situation in the Mangochi camps deteriorated because of a spate of cross-border raids by soldiers of unclear allegiance. The Malawi Government reaction was to clamp down on cross-

border movement. One agent told me:

’I used to cross at Chiponde, where I got documents for the visit. Its difficult to cross now: there used to be a regular border crossing point there, but it’s been closed now’ (C:150)

These initiatives coincided with the planting of mines, apparently by both FRELIMO and RENAMO, along the Mozambican border, which further restricted the mobility of agents. One told me:

I used to cross at Mjawa, but I’m scared now because so many people have been injured by land mines there’ (C:151)

These excerpts highlight the degree to which the information system is dependent upon security and political conditions in particular, in both the country of origin and host country. The recent limitations on movement in Mangochi notwithstanding, it is still a fair generalisation that by the time of my interviews, the information networks which did exist, and the system of networks as a whole, were in a mature stage.