KINSHIP BY RITUAL KINSHIPBASED POLITICS KINSHIP BY RITUAL

KINSHIP BY RITUAL & KINSHIP-BASED POLITICS

KINSHIP BY RITUAL

KINSHIP BY RITUAL IN THE FORM OF GODPARENTHOOD OR COMPADRAZGO - is best described as a system of fictive kinship, with its origins in the medieval Catholic church in Europe.

COMPADRAZGO Parents selected godparents for a child at his or her baptism, confirmation, and marriage. The godparents were then tied to the parents as co-parents. The tie between co-parents and parents reinforced that of kinship. The same godparents could serve for the couple's successive children, a practice that further strengthened the ties between the families involved.

Co-parents with political and economic resources are sought by the biological parents of a child in order to ensure political protection and economic support for the whole family, or perhaps financial support for the child, for example in the form of help with school fees. In the symbolic sense, compadrazgo often signifies that simply being born does not entitle a child to community membership, and that biological parents must be supplemented by social parents in order to give the child a social existence. In this sense baptism can be described as a rite of passage.

• The choice of a godparent also varied by social class. SOCIAL CLASS 1. The urban and rural upper class, and the urban middle class selected friends or relatives. • Parents and co-parents were usually social equals. • With social relations. 2. The peasants or the urban poor • the choice could be either a relative or an influential benefactor (patron).

KINSHIP-BASED POLITICS

KINSHIP-BASED POLITICS Kinship form important political groups, which change in size and relative inequality with demographic shifts. Increases in the rate of population growth, increase the size of kin groups but decrease their inequality. Each political actor is a member of a kin group. Each kin group can have from zero to some number of additional persons. Any member can be thought of as the principal actor in the group, or the group can be thought of as an entity. A political family or political dynasty is a family in which several members are involved in politics, particularly electoral politics. Members may be related by blood or marriage; often several generations or multiple siblings may be involved.