Re-inventing a royalist ‘public sphere’ in contemporary Uganda: The Example of Central Broadcasting Services (CBS)
Résumé
This article sets out the daily negotiated and relatively stabilized rules of expression which
govern a royalist ‘public sphere’ in contemporary Uganda. It is based on the idea, inspired
by Habermas, that the analysis of day-to-day rules of discussion leads us to understand
better political and moral ideals. Away from a normative approach of the issue of the
‘public sphere’, this article analyses the formation of specific practices and rules of
deliberation, at the crossroad of the transformations of the Kingdom of Buganda, the
consolidation of journalism as a profession and President Museveni’s regime’s hegemonic
project. CBS, the radio station of the Kingdom, is a privileged empirical point of entry to
seize these processes, both because it is a central sphere of the reinvention of language and
expression and because of its central role in the reestablishment of the Kingdom on the
national political scene.