"If you have - you have to give also". Traditional systems of social security in the new state. The case of the Nama in Namibia
##Even though Namibia does offer a modern system of social security, the Nama - one of the Khoisan peoples of southern Africa - hold up their traditional exchange system, including a vast number of reciprocal obligations - being well aware of the fact, that it absorbs time, money and energy that can be detrimental to individual progress. This paper proposes, that exchange is not only a function of the prevailing social and economic conditions, but is a structural element of Nama culture. Based on the assumption, that society can only survive as society in exchange, there is a constant flow of goods, services and persons between individuals as well as households, and between rural and urban sites. As social obligations are also conceived of as a religious duty, vested in a specific value system and paralleled by powerful sanctions, generalised reciprocity provides for a comprehensive form of security plus a sense of ethnic identity, even if economic prosperity is at stake. This must be taken into account in any analysis of social change, focusing on the impact of western concepts of individualism, which do prove to be a challenge for traditional systems of security.##
Keywords: systems of security, traditional security, modern systems of security, Nama, reciprocity in Namibia, exchange systems, survival, values and exchange, individualism, modernity
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