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Abstract

In the midst of tensions and disadjustments provoked by the formal
application of Occidental economic and enterprising models in Mozambique, the knowledge of the oral tradition maintained in different
ethnic cultures apparently had "submerged" during a certain period,
but has nowadays again emerged and imposes itself upon the performarce of the different organisational actors by processes and symbols of the Mozambican ethnic imaginary. Actuaily, one can notice throughout the country that, however there are ethnic differences, as for the performance of the leadership, in the processes, decision-taking rituals, in the power and status symbols prevails a convergence of traces and attitudes which translate a certain homogeneity.
For the last decade the rituals of the life cycles, mainly the rituals related to the ancestors appear more intensely, maybe as a way to fill up the omissions of the war. The privatisation of enterprises
has implied the appropriation of the economic bases of the future
sustentability of the "economics of affection" by the ethnic elite's. The
peace made with the supernatural, the magic universe permeated by
ambiguities, is juxtaposed with the dual economics as proposed by the
negotiators of the IMF, requiring flexibility of the leaders because of
the co-existence of the two worlds with almost antagonistic demands.