Review: Deciphering Disorder in Africa: Is Identity the Key?
Author(s): Crawford Young
Source: World Politics, Vol. 54, No. 4 (Jul., 2002), pp. 532-557
Published by: Cambridge University Press
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Review Article
DECIPHERING DISORDER
IN AFRICA
Is Identity the Key?
By CRAWFORD YOUNG
Stephen Ellis. The Mask ofAnarchy: The Destruction
ofLiberia and the Religious
an
Dimension
Civil
War.
New
York:
New
York University
Press,
of
African
1999,350 pp.
at Risk in theNew
Ted Robert Gurr. Peoples versus States:Minorities
Century,
D.C.: United States Institute of Peace Press, 2000,399
pp.
Washington,
Donald L. Horowitz.
The Deadly Ethnic Riot. Berkeley: University
of Califor
nia Press, 2001,588
pp.
Mahmood
Mamdani.
When Victims Become Killers: Colonialism, Nativism,
and the Genocide in Rwanda. Princeton: Princeton University
Press, 2001,
364 pp.
Luis Martinez.
Derrick.
The Algerian Civil War, 1990-1998.
Translated
by Jonathan
New York: Columbia University Press, 2000,265
pp.
Post-Cold
War
State Crisis
inAfrica
end of the cold war marked the close of an era forAfrica. The
postcolonial state in the form it took following independence
THE
proved
various
and was
unsustainable
everywhere
into
embattled?hounded
programs by the external donor commu
to democra
institutions
and compelled
"structural
adjustment"
financial
nity and international
tize by internal protest and outside
pressure.
Parastatalized
economies
and patrimonial autocracies faced bankruptcy and political delegitima
tion, and at the beginning of the 1990s, a continental tide of apparent
democratic
African
Democratization
ing
more
society
and economic
opening
resurrection.
briefly
raised
hopes
for an
some
successes, displac
registered
genuine
life
erstwhile
space for civil
opening
presidents,
a
and in the process generating
increas
large though
indeed
than a dozen
structures,
reform
WorldPolitics 54 (July2002), 532-57
DISORDER IN AFRICA
533
ingly skeptical literature.1 Economic reform, while unevenly applied
and imperfecdy tailored to theAfrican circumstance, brought some im
over the disastrous
provement
ex
of the continent
much
1980s?when
in per
failed to produce
capita income?but
the
renaissance
stub
African
however,
In retrospect,
the depth of state crisis in Africa
absolute declines
perienced
robust growth.2
Ultimately,
to come.
bornly refused
at the close of the cold war was
of the political
and economic
even
ity?or
survivability?in
the former Soviet orbit faced
socialism"
spects,
successor
and the
the troubled
states
The unanticipated
1989
changes
required
the more globalized
world
order. Only
a
between
gap
comparable
"really existing
re
in many
of a postcommunist
world;
and post-Soviet
of most East European
have closely tracked African
patterns.3
possibility of the complete disappearance of a
infrastructure?an
governing
in 1991?demonstrated
malia
the perils
stitutions
the magnitude
sustainabil
to achieve
imperatives
histories
since
of state
as was
underestimated,
outcome
revealed
the embedded
reconfiguration.
state
of a Liberian
clung
as conceivable
costs
of state decline
in So
and
in
From 1990 to 1997, the formal
to the
tenuously
capital city of Mon
rovia, artificially sustained by the Nigeria-dominated West African
intervention force, ECOMOG.In the last half of the 1990s Sierra Leone
as a state, and in the final Mobutu
years (and the tur
barely functioned
a
state created
his
the
bulence
1997
skeleton
of
ouster),
following
only
Assistant
of
the illusions
of rule in Congo-Kinshasa?as
Secretary
State forAfrican Affairs Herman Cohen observed at the time: "To say
be a gross exaggeration."4
has a government
today would
era of state crisis was
of en
by the appearance
accompanied
over
one
zones:
two
disorder
from
stretching
large geographic
that Zaire
This
demic
the Horn
to the two
and Angola,
and the other ex
Congo
new to
to Liberia. Civil war was
Senegal
hardly
postcolo
wars
in
territories
former
and in
liberation
the
Portuguese
of Africa
from
tending
nial Africa;
1
Two
areMichael
Bratton and Nicolas van deWalle, Democratic Ex
especially influential works
in
Transitions
in
Africa: Regime
Comparative Perspective (Cambridge: Cambridge University
periments
inAfrica (Boulder, Colo.: Lynne
Press, 1997); and Richard Joseph, ed., State, Conflict and Democracy
Rienner, 1999).
2
See the skeptical assessments by van deWalle, African Economies and the Politics ofPermanent Cri
sis, 1979-1999
Press, 2001); Carol Lancaster, Aid toAfrica: So
University
(Cambridge: Cambridge
toDo, So Little Time
and
Much
of Chicago Press, 1999); and Thomas Callaghy
(Chicago: University
eds., Hemmed In: Responses toAfrica sEconomic Crisis (New York: Columbia University
John Ravenhill,
Press, 1993).
3
A systematic comparison
is undertaken
inMark R. Beissinger
and Crawford Young, eds., Beyond
State Crisis? Postcolonial Africa and Post-Soviet Eurasia in Comparative Perspective (Washington, D.C.:
Woodrow Wilson
Center Press, 2002).
4
of a Failed State," in David Birmingham
and Phyllis M.
Crawford Young, "Zaire: The Anatomy
Martin,
1998), 97.
eds., A History of Central Africa: The Contemporary Years since 1960 (London: Longman,
534
WORLD
the white-dominated
out
the cold war,
territories
and Angola
POLITICS
of southern
Africa
and Mozambique
through
persisted
experienced
damaging
postcolonial internal wars (partly fueled by South African destabiliza
tion policies).
Sudanese
civil
strife
simmered
the period?
throughout
save for a decade remission from 1972 to 1983?and Chad experienced
repeated episodes of violent instability. Several key instigating factors
in these
abandonment
peared
of armed
earlier patterns
erative by 1991.With
conflict,
however,
were
no
longer
op
the final triumph over apartheid and Ethiopian
of its Eritrean
at an end.5 The
great
the epoch of liberation
lost their competitive
powers
claims,
warfare
ap
motivation
tomeddle, and South African mischief ended, facilitating an end to the
civil war
in
Mozambique.
Rather than ending, however, civil strife multiplied
in the 1990s,
arcs of conflict. More
the two vast, entangled
than a quarter of
forming
states were
the African
of
faced
with
armed
community
insurgency
or
as many
were di
all
of
this
and
almost
others
part
during
period,
in these
recdy engaged
or via armed
erations
different
internal wars, either through peacekeeping
op
or rebels.
to governments
In very
support
the books under review tackle the analytical
challenge
ways,
this widespread
of the authors?Steven
disorder
poses. Three
Mahmood
and
Luis
Martinez?examine
critical cases
Ellis,
Mamdani,
in Liberia,
of civil conflict,
and Algeria,
The
Rwanda,
respectively.
other two scholars, Ted Gurr
and Donald
broad
Horowitz,
propose
that
comparative
frameworks?quantitative
over
to achieve
conceptual
purchase
A core problematic
communal
identity?ethnic,
and qualitative,
violence.
taken up by all five volumes
racial,
respectively?
internal
or
religious.
Does
is the impact of
identity
politics
provide the key to deciphering African disorder? The works under re
in violence
of rationality
that at times appear to
identify patterns
as
the external world
the
lines of the "new bar
simply atavistic?along
or the "ancient tribal hatreds"
barism" thesis of Robert Kaplan6
expla
view
5
status of the former Spanish colony ofWestern
This omits the unresolved
Sahara, whose annex
de Saguia el-Hamra y
ation by Morocco
remains contested by the Frente Popular para la Liberaci?n
R?o de Oro (Polisario) in Algeria. Actual combat, however, ceased long ago.
6
is borrowed from Paul Richards, Fighting for the Rainforest: War, Youth and
This characterization
Resources in Sierra Leone (London: International African
Institute, 1996). Richards
suggests in his in
troduction
that he wrote his book because of his conviction
the
that Kaplan grossly misrepresented
Sierra Leone conflict and then unjustifiably projected his distorted understandings
upon a vast canvas.
House
conference on Africa
The original Kaplan article did reach an influential audience; at aWhite
in 1994, President Clinton, Vice President Gore, and Secretary of State Warren Christopher
all men
was also faxed to
tioned that the article had been brought to their attention as indispensable
reading; it
all American
embassies. See Robert D. Kaplan, "The Coming Anarchy," Atlantic Monthly,
February
1994,44-76.
DISORDER IN AFRICA
nation
often
presented
in the media.
The
differences
535
in the authors'
illuminate
methods
of inquiry, and conclusions
conceptual
premises,
of
the
the daunting
conflict
complexity
phenomenon.
state
in which
The quest for an adequate understanding
of the ways
crisis and its attendant
intersect with
disorder
communal
determinants
of political
behavior
tions of
scholarship
tion; "development"
is a crucial
for inquiry. Earlier genera
challenge
a broad
to state evolu
assumed
linearity
implicidy
a
of institutions
implied
strengthening
progressive
of rule, disregarding the local fluctuations around the trend line. By the
a
in Africa,
of "state crisis"
however,
perception
particularly
to emerge and attract
The
that
enthusiasm
attention.7
analytical
began
in the early 1990s ob
the brief surge of democratization
accompanied
omens
state collapse
in Liberia
scured the portentous
of complete
1980s,
(1990), Somalia (1991), and other regions such as Georgia, Moldova,
and Afghanistan. The first major examination of state collapse, led by
retained the premise of stateness as a natural condi
Zartman,
tion only momentarily
interrupted.8
the euphoria
unleashed
As the millennium
by democ
approached,
Leone
ratization
of state collapse?Sierra
faded, as other examples
by
in 1998?emerged
and the two arcs of con
1997 and Congo-Kinshasa
nor
ex
states that neither
flict took form. Many
joined the
collapsed
a
zones of violence
marked
deflation
nonetheless
panding
experienced
William
to exercise ride over their territory. A new "state cri
in their capacities
to appear, one that assumed
that circumscribed
sis" literature
began
was
a
not
but rather an endemic
aberration,
governance
momentary
condition.9
as an
state weakness
this newly discovered
Some scholars interpreted
or
a
to the
trait
back
perceived
enduring
extending
precolonial
polity10
attributed
the
of political
of older modes
resurgence
practice.11 Others
striking
state deflation
to the scope of the
hegemonic
pretensions
of the
postcolonial state, which incorporated and expanded the legacy of its
colonial predecessor by pushing political monopoly and command
7
Po
Influential early examples were Naomi Chazan, An Anatomy
of Ghanaian Politics: Managing
litical Recession (Boulder, Colo.: Westview
Press, 1982); and Richard Sandbrook and Jonathan Barker,
The Politics ofAfrica's Economic Stagnation
Press, 1985).
(Cambridge: Cambridge University
and Restoration
81.William
Zartman,
of Legitimate Authority
Collapsed States: The Disintegration
(Boulder, Colo.: Lynne Rienner, 1995).
9
See, for example, Patrick Chabal and Jean-Pascal Daloz, Africa Works: Disorder as Political Instru
ment (Oxford: James Currey, 1999); Richard Joseph, ed., State, Conflict and Democracy inAfrica (Boul
and Young (fh. 3).
der, Colo.: Lynne Rienner, 1999); and Beissinger
10
States and Power inAfrica: Comparative Lessons inAuthority and Control (Prince
Jeffrey Herbst,
ton: Princeton University
Press, 2000).
11
of California Press, 2001).
Achille Mbembe,
On the Postcolony (Berkeley: University
WORLD POLITICS
536
economy far beyond the bounds of sustainability.12Though these earlier
works offer many productive insights, the full implications of pro
longed state crisis, especially if accompanied by endemic civil disorder,
necessitate further inquiry.Unfortunately, the dangers and difficulty of
serious research in conflict zones make fulfillment of this need unlikely;
since
1996,
political
circumstances
the huge
of Congo-Kinshasa
expanse
a
is
merit
It
populations.
particular
that careful field inquiry was
pursued
Although
on the
in vast stretches
of
ground
to local
have been known
only
of the Martinez
and Ellis
studies
in risky environments.
the basic importance of cultural diversity in the political
in the state crisis and civil disorder
is acknowledged
literature,
equation
a sustained
lack
with
the conceptual
discourse
and
engagement
they
in the
race, and religion. The
analysis of ethnicity,
comparative
not
in
does
turn,
literature,
identity politics
systematically
incorporate
state
into its analytical vision, focusing
instead upon the so
incapacity
or
extreme forms of communal
cial pathologies
mobilization13
shaping
debates
searching
for policy
formulas
capable
of managing
cultural
diversity14
These two bodies of literature fail to identify the analytical connective
tissue
that joins
of mobilized
the phenomenon
of sustained
state crisis with
patterns
identity politics. The books under review help fill this gap.
The three country-focused
studies all take as their point of departure
that a process of state weakening
is a critical enabling
factor preceding
internal conflict.
In the 1970s, states began to accumulate
debt burdens
that crippled their capacities by the end of the 1980s. As a result,meet
ing the legitimation imperative either direcdy by supply of basic valued
or
(schools,
clinics, roads, safe water)
indirecdy
through provi
a
the channels
of patrimonial
distribution?once
sioning
manageable
task?became
all but impossible. The
real value of public bureaucracy
services
wages sharply declined and strongly demotivated state cadres.A young
generation?especially
nial liberation was
ing
to confront
its males?for
now
a remote
incumbent
whom
mythology,
of anticolo
the mystique
became
available and will
regimes.
12
See, for example, Zaki Ergas, ed., The African State in Transition
(Houndmills,
Basingstoke:
Macmillan,
1987); and Crawford Young, The African Colonial State in Comparative Perspective (New
Haven: Yale University
Press, 1994).
13
Recent examples include Stuart J. Kaufman, Modern Hatreds: The
Symbolic Politics ofEthnic War
E. P. Seligman,
(Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University
Press, 2001); and Daniel Chirot and Martin
eds.,
Psy
Ethnopolitical Warfare: Causes, Consequences, and Possible Solutions (Washington, D.C.: American
Association,
2001).
chological
14
inAfrica (Atlanta:
See, for example, Harvey Glickman,
ed., Ethnic Conflict and Democratization
African Studies Association
Ethnic Conflict inAfrica: Pres
Press, 1995); Donald Rothchild, Managing
sures and Incentives
Institution Press, 1997); and Craw
for Cooperation (Washington, D.C.: Brookings
ford Young,
Macmillan,
ed., The Accommodation
1999).
of Cultural Diversity:
Case-Studies
(Houndmills,
Basingstoke:
DISORDER IN AFRICA
New Patterns
537
of Civil Violence
in the international
concomitant
changes
sphere occurred
the decay of the institutional
fabric of governance.
First, the inter
to commit
resources
national
lost its willingness
community
significant
as cold war clients
states or their rulers, who
of force to preserve
might
well have warranted
Ellis persuasively
argues that the two
protection.
Two
critical
with
thousand United States Marines
offshore of Liberia in the summer of
in cold war
a Liberian
times to preserve
that
substantial
and
regime
provided
strategic
security services, rather
to
than limiting
evacuation
their role
of foreigners.
Such a force input
1990 would
have
intervened
would certainly have been decisive. After 1989, the disposition for de
termined
extra-African
intervention
evaporated,
illustrated
by the So
malia fiasco of 1993, the Rwanda disgrace of 1994,15 and the French
even in
to intervene
country that was the
Ivory Coast?a
unwillingness
carr??in
innermost
of
the
1999.
precinct
francophone
pr?
con
the
African
the
within
universe,
Conversely,
spillover effects of
flict?the
a newfound
"bad neighborhood"
syndrome?and
states
in nearby
older
replaced
Organization
of nonintervention.16
Tanzania's
(OAU) doctrines
to intervene
Unity
Uganda
invasion
of
in 1979 to spearhead dissident forces there was widely criti
cized in African
diplomatic
of a prior Ugandan
military
ous nature of the Idi Amin
were
disposition
of African
involved
circles
at the time,
the provocation
despite
into Tanzania
and the murder
incursion
regime.
in the Congo-Kinshasa
By
the time
civil war
seven African
in 1998,
however,
armies
ear
lier OAU norms had all but vanished. This new dynamic has nurtured
the flow of conflict across borders, multiplied the interests involved in
its pursuit, and vasdy
the search for resolution.
complicated
a number
to tactics,
In addition,
of crucial developments
pertaining
and
have
the
of in
increased
weaponry,
manpower,
funding
probability
were
a
ternal warfare
and altered its nature. The
1979 events inUganda
prelude
surgents
to a
new
destruction
pattern?the
significant
or a
from the rural periphery
neighboring
of a regime by in
Such events
state.
occurred in Chad (1990), Liberia (1990), Ethiopia (1991), Somalia
(1991), Rwanda (1994), and both Congo (1997). Unlike amilitary
take over the state apparatus
intact,
coup, in which
army conspirators
ex
the seizure of power by
involves dismantling
insurgents
periphery
soldiers vanish into the countryside,
often
isting security forces. Former
15
see the valuable new book
to
On the international dimensions,
Barnett, Eyewitness
by Michael
Genocide: The United Nations
and Rwanda
(Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University
Press, 2002).
16
See Rothchild,
and Comparisons
"The Effects of State Crisis on African International Relations
with Post-Soviet
and Young (fn. 3).
Eurasia," in Beissinger
538
POLITICS
WORLD
or sold on arms black
that then can be either concealed
weaponry
are
armories
markets.
abandoned
by civilian
emptied
Alternatively,
a
new
local
maraud
who
for
warriors,
dramatically
capacity
acquire
common
result is the spread of violent militias much better
ing.17 The
armed than those of the past.
with
The
huge
of black markets
expansion
was
in weaponry
to
essential
the expansion of armed conflict. The Ethiopian and Somali armies that
dissolved in 1991 were among Africa's largest,well equipped by coldwar
Embattled
patrons.
regimes
scour
for additional
the world
weaponry,
some of which ultimately falls into the hands of insurgents. Some of the
states of the former Soviet zones
Bulgaria,
(especially
bankrupt
from
and Russia),
for cash, were willing
Ukraine,
suppliers
desperate
such
sales
have
their vast and now largely superfluous
stocks;
may
orig
arms
the security forces themselves.
inated with
Furthermore, Western
most
too, were
merchants,
to market
not oblivious
opportunities.
The disintegration of existing armies provided dissident militias with
reservoirs
of suddenly
skill than
marketable
warriors?often
unemployed
soldiering.
Equally
important,
no other
possessing
former officers be
came available. Some of them had been schooled in the finest military
institutions
phisticated
of France, Britain,
warfare
knowledge
war
guerrilla
against
Soviet
and the United
States
to
groups.
insurgent
in
occupation
Afghanistan
so
and brought
Veterans
of the
were
another
important source of military skills; the international corps of jihad
fighters included a number of Africans, especially Algerians. Although
mentioned only in passing byMartinez, "Afghans"played an important
in the
Algerian
role
military
publication
armed
insurrection.
that aTuareg
revolt
A Malian
in that nation
officer writes
s northern
in a
region
in the early 1990s was beyond the capacity of its army to suppress be
cause
at the core
of the rebel
Afghanistan;
negotiation
a
contrast,
by
comparable
ership, however?was
was
Tuareg
were
in
schooled
leadership
guerrillas
In the early 1960s,
the only alternative.
lead
sophisticated
uprising?lacking
suppressed
with
great
brutality.18
Ellis
(pp.
110-12 and passim) documents the important role of Libyan training
17
On
the impact of the huge escalation in armaments in the Karamoja region of northeast Uganda,
to the emptying of the well-stocked
in 1979, see
Moroto
armory by Karimojong warriors
"AMemory
of Loss: Ecological Politics, Local History, and the Evolution
of Karimojong
and Crawford Young, "Pas
59, no. 4 (2000); and Mustafa Mirzeler
Violence," Human Organization
as
in the Northeast
of Uganda: AK-47
toral Politics
Change Agent," Journal ofModern
Periphery
a
in southern Sudan, see Sharon Elaine
parallel dynamic
African Studies 38 (September 2000). On
in Richard
of Ethnicity,"
and theMilitarization
and Jok Madut
Hutchinson
Jok, "Gendered Violence
subsequent
Sandra Gray,
Werbner,
ed., Postcolonial Subjectivities inAfrica (London: Zed Books, 2002).
18
in the Sahel: The Tuareg Insurgency
Kalifa Keita, Conflict and Conflict Resolution
Pa.: Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College,
1998).
inMali
(Carlisle,
539
IN AFRICA
DISORDER
camps in providing military instruction to the initial combatants of the
dissident militias during the 1980s in Liberia and Sierra Leone.
Novel
of war
dependencia
were
of the
another
development
as
In
such
the
Uni?o
Nacional
da
insurgent movements,
on
as
Total de Angola
survived
external
(UNITA),
mostly
methods
1990s. Older
finance
sistance from South Africa
their war
Thereafter,
zones that
provided,
and the United
efforts were
States before
financed
at their
peak value
1990.
diamond-rich
by occupying
in the mid-1990s,
an estimated
four billion dollars in revenues between 1993 and 2000. In Liberia,
Charles
Firestone
carved out
Taylor
rubber plantations,
a lucrative
economic
timber
creating
realm
the
by seizing
and
market
concessions,
ing Sierra Leone diamonds, thus assuring ample funds for his National
Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL) in the early 1990s (pp. 164-70). The
Revolutionary United Front (RUF)of Sierra Leone, in partnership with
Taylor,
funded
its insurgency
also financed
with
diamonds.
The
their operations with
Congo-Kinshasa
and
columbite-tantalite
monds,
gold, timber, coffee,
armies
foreign
insurgent militia
backing
(Uganda,
armed
factions
in
the plunder of dia
(coltan); the main
and Bu
Rwanda,
rundi), aswell as those backing the Kinshasa regime (especially Zim
babwe),
This
were
in
also partners
form of war finance
pillage.19
has important
of civil conflict. Motivations
for the nature
consequences
to seek local support disappear in favor of
as vio
the single goal of protecting
the resource base. Guerrilla warfare
lent entrepreneurship
incentives
for
the
weak
provides
provisioning
civil populations in its zones of operation; the logic of warlord politics
comes
to the fore.20
to the liber
in sharp contrast
Particularly
striking,
ation wars of an earlier generation,
is the minimal
level of local support
as the RUF, the
that existed for such rebel movements
sundry Liberian
two
factions
the
of
the
Rassemblement
1990-97,
pour
wings
Congolais
la D?mocratie
(RCD)
in Congo-Kinshasa,
or the Lord's
Resistance
Army (LRA)andAllied Democratic Forces (adf) inUganda. However,
the combined weight of available finance, sufficient military skills,
state
and support, and an enfeebled
sanctuary
adversary
it possible
for such groups to persist over extended
periods with
cross-border
make
out
popular
support.
19
Bank official Paul Collier that greed, not griev
This gave rise to the influential thesis ofWorld
in
ance, drives African
conflicts; see Collier,
"Doing Well Out ofWar: An Economic
Perspective,"
Mats Berdal and David Malone,
in Civil Wars (Boulder,
eds., Greed and Grievance: Economic Agenda
Colo.: Lynne
20
William
Rienner, 2000).
Reno, Warlord Politics
and African
States (Boulder, Colo.:
Lynne
Rienner,
1998).
WORLD POLITICS
540
The deliberate and systematic use of child soldiers, particularly
in Sierra Leone,
prevalent
another novel development.
Liberia, Uganda,
tactic was
This
and both
first
Congo,
employed
was
yet
systemati
in the mid-1980s
cally inMozambique
by Resistencia Nacional
which
had difficulty recruiting adult fight
Mo?ambicana (RENAMO),
of the 1990s were
insurgents
in some cases, adolescent
males
ers.21 Agenda-less
this expedient;
frequently
in marginal
to
driven
circum
stances willingly joined rebel militias, but in other instances they were
abducted
forcibly
Liberia,
in Sierra Leone,
rural communities?especially
often
and
the
terrorized,
Brutalized,
drugged,
from
and Uganda.
child soldier could prove to be a ruthless killer.
an
conflict
note
in the broader context of violent
changes
politics pro
frame
for
the
manifestations
of identity
indispensable
exploring
are a theme of the volumes
that
review.
under
One may
settings
critical
These
vide
that
these
with
new
in and of themselves
patterns
and race. A host of factors
ethnicity,
to do
nothing
related to opportu
have
religion,
resource
for rebel action,
nity structure,
possibilities
deteriorated
life chances,
and
contents,
well-being
other elements?explain
armed
states?among
why
war Africa. Cultural
in
pluralism
prevalent
post-cold
countries
prime determinant;
verse than those in which
that have
dis
generalized
and weakened
disorder
conflict
escaped
conflict has erupted.
is interwoven
armed conflict
alone
is more
is not
the
are no less di
In a culturally
once
with
plural society, however,
politics,
con
to become part of the
is
certain
identity
virtually
larger patterns of
even
inwhich
communal
determinants
frontation,
op
though the ways
erate
armed
are very diverse.
Civil War
is a pseudonym
Martinez
inAlgeria
for a scholar
of Algerian
ancestry
in
residing
France. His richly detailed book is based upon extensive interviews
with participants in the Algerian civil war, especially members of the
Groupe Islamique Arm? (gia). This congeries of local militias, the
major
actors
in armed
challenge
to the
Algerians
after the initial phases
of warfare, is based in the periphery of Algiers and the nearbyMitidja
zones
in some mountainous
of the Blida Atlas,
Ouarsanais,
plain,
in
and
the
of
the
Constantine
Aures,
high plateaus
region. His
inquiry
is influenced
institutionaHsm,
by rational choice
theory and historical
a virtu
in his core conclusion
reflected
that "war is, to the protagonists,
21
For more
Independence
detail, seeMargaret Hall and Tom Young,
(Athens: Ohio University
Press, 1997).
Confronting
Leviathan: Mozambique
since
IN AFRICA
DISORDER
ous way of
accumulating
consolidation
of violence
541
and prestige
and that, in that sense, the
is the result of the
for social ad
opportunities
vancement
it creates"
which
(p. 245).
as a discourse with
Islamism
is presented
invoked
registers,
multiple
two
most
several
different
armed
of
which
the
formations,
by
impor
wealth
tant were the GIA and the Arm?e Islamique de Salut (Ais), the armed
wing of the political movement Front Islamique de Salut (Fis). For an
inner
state and the
Islamic
core, the goal of an integral
a faithless
were
to overthrow
and
corrupt regime
jihad
But for much
of the rank and file and
ideological motivators.
intellectual
commitment
powerful
to
especially the GIA combatants, Islamism josded with more worldly in
terests
in social
The
advance.
discontents
deepening
of a young
urban
for whom
generation,
the national liberation and socialist revolution heritage claimed by the
ruling Front de Lib?ration Nationale (FLN)meant littlemore than ster
ile slogans,
lay
at the roots of an
explosion
of urban
rioting
in October
1988 thatwas violently repressed.A badly shaken regime subsequendy
to electoral
and new parties; among these,
opened politics
competition
as the most
to
the FIS emerged
rival
the FLN. In local elections
in
potent
won
a
1989, the FIS
offices, and in parlia
sweep of communal
stunning
mentary competition in 1991, it held a commanding lead in the first
round and seemed headed for triumph until the army intervened in
1992 to avert an Islamist victory. Civil war broke out shortly
January
one hundred
thousand
lives, and
thereafter,
taking by official estimate
at low
to this
continuing
intensity
day.
In the Martinez
than
were
analysis
Islam
figures
more
as an
not
surge of religiosity. The
irrepressible
of Islamism,
endorsements
necessarily
as an idiom
three million
nor were
of protest
FIS votes
the thousands
who enlisted as guerrilla fighters beginning in 1992 allmotivated by ji
sector in the
the important
Algiers
private trading
periph
the FISwas strong, frustration was high over the innumerable
to their mercantile
ef
activity?a
impediments
legacy of the vigorous
to
in the Boumedienne
forts
orientation
socialist
years
impose
hadism.
For
ery, where
(1965-78). The
large cohort of urban youth educated in the Arabic
access to the
Is
facing
public bureaucracy,
perceived
an Arabization
as
to
the
their
that would
doors
open
ensuring
men were
social ascent. The numerous
young
readily avail
unemployed
able for protest.
limited
stream,
lamism
The
weakness
initial
uprising
for the regime.
came
The
at a moment
1980s
of extreme
had been
a decade
conjunctural
of stagnation
and escalating debt; by 1992 the debt reached $26 billion, requiring $8
542
WORLD POLITICS
billion of the $12 billion state revenue to service (pp. 92-93). The fiscal
the capacity of the regime to respond mili
severely constrained
an Islamist
to the
of
among
tarily
uprising; many,
especially
challenge
was
FIS followers,
immi
believed
that the collapse of the government
source?
nent. Its salvation, Martinez
argues, came from a surprising
crisis
the International Monetary Fund (IMF).The structural adjustment
program the IMFprovided the government in 1993 brought debt relief
the resources
and, by 1995,
to redouble
army counterinsur
necessary
a repres
to construct
its
and
ranks,
enlarge
to
gency capacities,
greatly
sive network
that first contained
then
circumscribed
gradually
limiting them to a few mountain
Islamist guerrillas, mostly
the
and high
zones.
In 1999, the AIS abandoned
armed combat and accepted
extreme
GIA and a more
for its six thousand
the
fighters;
et le
Pr?dication
Salafiste
pour la
splinter?the
Groupe
plateau
an amnesty
breakaway
Combat
(GSPC)?maintain
sporadic
activity.
In February
2002,
leader Antar Zouabri was killed by the army, further weakening
still at large, believed
thousand.22
rebel combatants
dred
and three
no
to Martinez,
According
to number
generalized
between
"Islamist
fifteen
imaginary"
GIA
the
hun
con
ceiving a "City of Virtue" ruled by a literal application of Islamic pre
drives
cepts
the
insurgents.
Rather,
the mosaic
of conflict
must
be
understood as being defined by the elemental assibiya solidarities of
are inserted into
Arms
and fighters
clan, and local community.
kinship,
creates
units
and village
which
this equation both by the army,
auxiliary
into
bands integrate themselves
self-defense
forces, and the GIA, whose
GIA
unit
The
"emirs"?
leaders?the
other local communal
groups.
are the natural heirs to a
than being religiously
driven jihadists,
to
the corsairs of Ottoman
back
bandits
stretching
lineage of political
of the Al
state, and the colonels
times, the caids serving the colonial
who
local
bosses.
revolution
became
postwar
gerian
rather
Neither
Zouabri
nor
or other. At
theological
those seen as cultural
the
local
police
or army
asMartinez
leaders
some
had much
education,
of victims?
targeting
or
such as intellectuals
journalists,
their
families
and
conscripts
serving
apostates,
regime. Initially,
some
port in
periurban
their operations.
nanced
22
Cherif
GIA
preceding
first, there was
or
the
shows, the GIA bands had some real sup
fi
local traders at first willingly
communes;
as GIA assassinations
more
But
became
aGIA: ?chec et mat," Jeune Afrique
18-24, 2002, 33-35.
2145, February
Ouazani,
the sixth supreme commander of the GIA, had declared himself "national emir" in 1996, be
coming by far the longest surviving nominal head of this loose-knit grouping. A former drug dealer of
slender education and minimal
theological knowledge, Zouabri had declared that any Algerian who
failed to take up arms to install an Islamic republic was an apostate.
Zouabri,
DISORDER IN AFRICA
and as security
indiscriminate,
force
repression
543
more
became
effective,
support diminished and finance came through extortion and criminal
(such as the drug trade and stolen cars).
activity
smany
those of the
interviews with GIA cadres, particularly
Martinez
in sup
much
evidence
tantalizing
provide
Algiers
periurban
periphery,
port of his thesis. Yet there is something a little unsettling about this
reading of religion
so central to the Horowitz
instrumentalized
lacks the affective
and conflict?it
levels
analysis. The extraordinary
of entire
the part of the GIA in particular?massacres
ac
as
to understand
calculated
rural communities?are
difficult
merely
dimension
on
of violence
tion, however
Martinez's
primitive
study
orientation
of the GIA might
be.
the theological
FIS
of
also lacks a detailed
exegesis
ideology.
the FISs electoral support can be easily attributed to the dis
Though
the FLN regime, as well as to its Islamic mes
enveloped
asMartinez
activists. The AIS militia,
sage, FIS leaders were
religious
more
recruits
than
the GIA,
informed
attracted
religiously
points out,
was
FIS
elite
civilian
refrained
from
The
and generally
targets.
attacking
that had
credit
in touch with currents of radical Islamic thought more broadly, but he
not
does
examine
its theological
Martinez
does
Furthermore,
axis of dissidence?the
demands
internal
any treatment
was much
Kabylia
debates.
of the ethnic
than
movements
of Kabyl
and heritage,
guage
and
include
less attracted
Kabyl question.
to the
in part
of
parts
Algeria,
perhaps
arabophone
s association with radical Arabization.
The cultural
of Islamism
to Islamism
because
orientation
not
however,
of Berber
for greater
recognition
have been an important
element
lan
in Al
gerian identity politics for more than two decades.
The
elements
in the analysis are suggestive
of the limits of a
to
himself never uses
identity issues. Martinez
absent
choice approach
this phrase, nor does he cite its canonical
texts, but this characteriza
and of
introduction
tion of his approach
does appear in John Entelis's
course is
content
inter
in the
of the analysis. The
implicit throughout
rational
ests
are well
in Algeria's
but not the passions.
Participants
captured,
a
of re
transcendent
of
motives?the
obligations
diversity
a
were
For
belief
the decisive
factor for minority.
others, how
civil war had
ligious
threats posed
fear of the unknowable
ever, an abiding
order gave reason to back the regime as a lesser evil. The
violence
ducible
and
the emotions
to the calculus
it unleashed
engendered
by
an Islamist
ferocity of the
not re
reactions
of advantage.
is still an ad
book
the Martinez
of its shortcomings,
Regardless
sensitive
and
mirable
contribution,
grounded.
empirically
conceptually
it is based is both
It is also a courageous
book; the research on which
WORLD POLITICS
544
difficult
and dangerous.
The
is
volume
for an under
indispensable
standing of the tormented politics of the 1990s inAlgeria.
one compares
case with other instances of disor
the Algerian
in the 1990s, the relative strength of the state stands out
When
der
in Africa
this was
(to a lesser degree,
was
weakened
when
badly
also true of Rwanda).
the regime
Although
the civil war broke out, there was no mili
tary or administrative discontinuity; only for a brief moment
was
in
its survival
was
parts, Algeria
and successfully
repudiate
tion. Algeria's
substantial
to
cient
and other
may
blow
to its
adjustment"
advantage
to socialist orienta
commitment
its earlier
oil resources
reshape and enlarge
Islamist militias.
be the final
a revenue base suffi
provided
its security forces to cope with GIA, AIS,
the depredations
of al-Qaeda
Ironically,
to the Islamist
can now count
revolt, as Algeria
as well as an end to
of the uprising,
of fugitive leaders
upon extradition
criticism of the human
Western
rights violations
These
pressive
campaign.
late the few remaining
Ellis's monograph
counter
of its sub-Saharan
many
question. Unlike
able to turn "structural
in 1992
developments
insurgent bands.
will
in its re
it committed
further
undoubtedly
iso
on the devastating Liberian disorder is equally
resource
editor of the invaluable
author, the longtime
a
relies upon
inter
variety of sources?extensive
Africa Confidential,
in Liberia,
views conducted
Liberian
Liberian
archives,
press
remaining
information
derived from several visits to Liberia on Amnesty
coverage,
literature. Part of
International
teams, as well as an abundant
secondary
The
compelling.
the study
is in reportorial
mode,
providing
an incisive
anatomy
of the
Liberian civil wars from the time of the Charles Taylor-led National
Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL) invasion from Ivory Coast inDecem
ber 1989 through Taylors election as president in 1997, which at the
time
seemed
to
provide
a coda for armed
conflict
in a country
trauma
tized and prostrate from the years of violence. (By 2002, however, the
war
had reignited
tive uncertainties
with
of former militias,
and the destruc
fragments
to return.) Ellis then turns to
of the 1990s appeared
unravel
the complex
causal mechanisms,
which
the
might
explain
nature
forms of violence,
the
of fragmentation
of rebel forces, and the
bizarre
aspects
of insurgent
combat
dress
and ritual practices.
The history of the Liberian state set the context for the 1990s disor
der. In its 1847 origins, the Liberian offspring of the American Colo
nization
Society
held
precariously
America
was
no
more
by descendants
than
a few
coastal
settlements
of freed
slaves
returned
from North
or by others intercepted by the British Navy and deposited
DISORDER IN AFRICA
545
there. French and British colonial occupation of neighboring areas in
the late nineteenth century necessitated gaining a hold on the interior
to protect
army was
claims. An
Liberian
created
for this purpose,
and a
mode of hinterland administration inspired by European models of in
direct rule followed. After 1940, rents collected from the Firestone
of Liberia
remolding
a
ce
single party,
a
state
and
practices,
nation-building
ideology
a "national" so
into
the hinterland
populations
African
inspired by emergent
mented
by patrimonial
to
incorporate
seeking
ciety dominated
by the settlers.
the elaboration
some
a
iron mines
and later from
plantation
from
emanating
was
fiscal resources
Expanding
as a
developmental
appeared
investment
and an extensive
patrimonial
of what
infrastructure
permitted
models?there
once
the presidency.
the end of the 1970s,
By
permitted
state, with
network
this
however,
pattern of state building had outstripped its fiscal possibilities, and the
system reached an impasse, leading to a 1980 military coup led by an
army
sergeant
of hinterland
Samuel
origins,
Doe.
Although Doe took Liberia beyond its historical role as anAmerico
Liberian
small minority
an
atop
indigenous
his
mass,
rule continued
the downward spiral that had begun in the late 1970s. A new element
was
of violence
introduced
with
the macabre
ing members of the formerWilliam
execution
of thirteen
lead
Tolbert regime on theMonrovia
the victims was a son of the assassinated
beach. Among
president Tol
of the late Ivory Coast
bert, whose wife was a goddaughter
ruler, Felix
was never
This
and Ivory
transgression
forgiven,
Houphouet-Boigny.
Coast eventually took its revenge through support for theTaylor NPFL
invasion. Another novel refrain in Liberian politics, dating back to the
1970s, was
imagination;
the emergence
of a radical intelligentsia
some of them found encouragement
in Libya. Despite
tary training
in 1985, and a negative
election
was able to
rely upon American
any other African state?until
cold war
communications
ingly, this aid supplanted
factor
ing it yet another
with
revolutionary
and eventually mili
a
corruption,
grossly
deepening
rigged
human
regime
rights report card, Doe's
more
than
backing?proportionately
the fall of BerlinWall,
and
in return for key
facilities
intelligence
(p. 63). Increas
revenue as the
regime's lifeline, mak
in the Doe's
swift collapse when
the NPFL
internal
invasion coincided with the new strategic expendability of Liberia.
a subtle and
Ellis provides
reading of the identity dimen
persuasive
war.
were evident
crosscurrents
in the
sion of the Liberian
civil
Ethnic
multiplication
ued throughout
of militias
that followed
the conflict.
Doe,
the NPFL
increasingly
invasion
insecure,
and contin
had deployed
546
WORLD
an ethnic
in military
map
security
POLITICS
recruitment,
army was
and his
viewed as being dominated by Krahn from his home region.23 The
NPFL
were
by contrast,
invaders,
initially
Gio; Taylor was of Americo-Liberian
of Gio
ancestry
its of an ethnic
his mother.
through
out
pointing
reading,
more
identifiable dialects which
hardly
understand
each others'
accuracy of the use of the word
home area near the Ivory Coast
and others
Ethnic
the lim
identifies
Ellis, however,
of the sixteen or
that "members
constitute the Krahn people could
the ethnonym
frontier,
inMonrovia,
undoubtedly
served
is rarely
Krahn
and widely
in characterizing
conflict"
(pp. 32-33).
were thus in a process of construction,
categories
of violence
troduction
predominantly
descent in paternal lineage, but
about the in
dialects, which
says much
Krahn as an ethnic category. In the Doe
heard; it is, however, employed
Liberians
as
perceived
used by
and the in
as an accelerator.
The
Doe
army, in its initial reaction to the entry of theTaylor force, launched in
discriminate
action
retaliatory
against
the Gio
and neighboring
Mano
(ethnic labels of comparable ambiguity), thereby ensuring a flow of new
to the NPFL. In turn, as the
for Monrovia,
force headed
Taylor
as "Krahn" discovered
in their
became
targets.
path
one who
of in
lacks the authenticity
concept of the "outsider,"
recruits
those
it identified
The
in his or her country, has become
impor
increasingly
in the decade of disorder,
of ethnicity
representing
and to some extent
issue in Congo-Kinshasa,
Uganda,
two
that have compelled
In Liberia,
key groups have origins
rooting
digenous
tant in the discourse
a central
Rwanda.
the legitimacy
of their status. The Americo-Liberian
stand
former slaves long claimed
of repatriated
superior
to
as bearers of Christian
civilization
and Western
enlightenment
ing
after the Doe
became
such pretensions
Africa;
coup, as his
dangerous
in
rested heavily upon the boast that he rescued
claim to legitimacy
other
The
from Americo-Liberian
Liberians
oppression.
digenous
is
of celebrated mer
the
under
group
Mandingo?Muslims
challenge
others
to contest
descendants
cantile skill who are widely dispersed inWest Africa. As Ellis notes,
"Many
Liberians
persist
in regarding
Mandingo
as outsiders,
people
who do not belong in Liberia even when they have lived there for gen
As Doe's
(p. 39).
erations"
pointed Mandingo
an authentic
ans who
rendered
support
base
shrank,
he
increasingly
ap
to office, and in 1986 officially recognized them as
group, "to the outrage of the many Liberi
as
them
antipathy
foreigners"
(p. 61). This
regarded
generally
to NPFL massacres;
in turn, a leading
vulnerable
the Mandingo
Liberian
23
This useful notion
eties (Athens: University
ethnic
comes from Cynthia Enloe, Ethnic
of Georgia Press, 1980).
Soldiers: State Sovereignty
inDivided
Soci
547
DISORDER IN AFRICA
Kromah?emerged
Mandingo?Alhaji
insurgent
the United
fragments,
as leader of one of themultiple
Movement
Liberation
for Democracy
in Liberia (ulimo-k).
Ethnicity
was
thus one element
in the language
of conflict.
In the shift
ing kaleidoscope of factional alignments andwarfare, ethnicity played a
in defining
part
social
choices
and categorizing
targets
of violence.
The
portrait of the civil war sketched by Ellis, however, is compelling
that
demonstrating
power was
agendas;
was
combat
not
the key object,
primarily
and resource
control
in
by ethnic
motivated
its currency.
is also central to the Ellis interpretation of the Liberian
Religion
not
as
or
orientation
of
identity. Religious
as a source of
of
the
understanding
origin
indigenous
reli
rituals and symbols through which violence was performed. African
or Islam, is a crucial element
in
often
with
gion,
coexisting
Christianity
war
the
is
which
civil
refracted.
melodrama
of
culture, through
political
conflict,
although
is instead
Michael
Schatzberg
makes
theology
examined
a
powerful
case for the Ellis
approach:
Most middle Africans understand that "politics" and "religion" are parts of the
same terrain, that power flows between the visible material world and the invis
ible spiritual world, and that the political kingdom contains a politically signif
icant
spiritual
terrain.24
a
with
violent
provides
supernatural
politics
entanglement
some
means
civil war such
of decoding
aspects of the Liberian
puzzling
as the invocation
to ensure their
of young warriors
of ritual protections
The
invulnerability to bullets (a practice found inmany African rebellions);
con
for the power it might
the consumption
of vital organs of victims
some
warriors
wed
of
and
the
bizarre
(for example,
fer;
young
apparel
of militia
The
and women's
syncretism
striking
ding gowns
wigs).
was
of outlandish
dress with
practices
by the combination
exemplified
military titles inspired by Hollywood
Bond. Martinez
Stallone,
James
actors
cruits with
ger and Bruce
Lee
of theatrical
(p. 99). Very
reports
violence
similar
action films: Rambo, Sylvester
a similar
fascination
such as Arnold
phenomena
were
of GIA re
Schwarzeneg
also observed
in the LRA inUganda; like some Liberian warriors, their leader, Joseph
Kony,
was
Ellis's
a cross-dresser.25
monograph
is an invaluable
guide
to the Liberian
civil war.
His combination of carefiilly documented political history with an in
24
inMiddle Africa: Father, Family, Food (Bloomington:
G. Schatzberg, Political Legitimacy
Michael
Indiana University
Press, 2001), 74.
25
aWitch?
"Is Alice Lakwena
The Holy Spirit Movement
and Its Fight against
Heike Behrend,
inHolger Bernt Hansen
andMichael Twaddle,
Evil in the North,"
eds., Changing Uganda: The Dilem
mas
Change (London: James Currey, 1991).
of Structural Adjustment and Revolutionary
WORLD POLITICS
548
terpretive
frame
for that nation's
culture
political
an authorita
provides
tive reading of the conflict. The identity aspect of the complex, faction
is effectively
and the necessity
contextualized,
struggle
constructivist
clear.
is
of
the
ethnic
factor
made
reading
alized
Explaining
Mahmood Mamdani
of a
the Rwanda Genocide
is a highly respected African scholar of Ugandan
to Columbia
University.
origin, recendy
transplanted
a
as he stresses,
the Rwandan
is
venture,
genocide
into
inquest
new
into
terrain;
His
though he was brought up not far from the Rwandan border, he had
only
passed
the country
through
once,
at the age of four. His
engage
ment with Rwanda began only after the genocide; the Council for the
inAfrica
of Social Science Research
Development
cellent pan-African
research center based
in Dakar,
(CODESRIA), the ex
a collabo
undertook
sources of the
inquiry into the
catastrophe.
Subsequendy,
a
CODESRIA mission
in 1997, he went on
in
of inquiry into the violence
a radical
eastern
accompanied
by Jacques Depelchin,
Congo-Kinshasa,
rative African
intellectual
Congolese
for a time with
associated
subsequendy
Rassemblement Congolais pour laD?mocratie
reviewers
Mamdani
(RCD).
for his
attack
intemperate
castigated
on "area studies," based upon a fatuous caricature of this
In
enterprise.
nu
he relies heavily upon the seminal works written
fact, however,
by
merous
in this tradition,
scholars
trained
such as Rene Lemarchand,
Catharine
David Newbury,
Alison
des Forges,
and others;
Newbury,
Other
have
the rebel
without theirwork, his book could not have been written. The allegedly
atheoretical
nature
a master
of area studies
theorization
serves
as foil for Mamdani's
of the Rwandan
claim
that offers
to
both
genocide
of understanding
and a prescription
for exorcising
the demons of
mass ethnic
the depth of the passions, fears,
killing and retribution. Given
and antipathies
unleashed
the
this is no small ambition.
by
genocide,
supply
ameans
Mamdani naturally brings to his project the analytical frame estab
lished for his prize-winning 1996 book, Citizen and Subject?6The core
of his thesis is that colonial rule inAfrica had as its legacy a bifurcated
were "containerized"
within
the indirect rule appa
state; most Africans
as a mode
ratus of "native administration"
of "decentral
that operated
ized despotism"
and was
based
upon
a tribal
metaphor
of rural society.
The postcolonial state deracialized the subject, but its despotic heritage
remained. The Citizen and Subject model, heavily based upon East
26
Citizen and Subject: Contemporary Africa
Mahmood
Mamdani,
(Princeton: Princeton University
Press, 1996).
and the Legacy of Late Colonialism
DISORDER
549
IN AFRICA
as well as the British
ex
colonial
evidence,
into the very
both obscures
when
and illuminates
imported
context of Rwanda.
and South African
African
perience,
different
The key question of the book?how
for the large numbers
of Hutu
an extensive
and often astute
genocide became "thinkable"
who
answered
through
participated?is
of
the
colonial
and postcolonial
reading
of the genocide
itself receive only a few pages. In per
events
history; the
most valuable
haps the
situates his analysis
part of the book, Mamdani
in a regional
the
of identity
context,
interp?n?tration
demonstrating
events.
in Uganda
conflicts
and Congo-Kinshasa
with
the Rwandan
to
is much
There
commend
the Mamdani
that the ethnic
argument
categories in Rwanda should be understood as "political identities that
changed with the changing nature of the Rwandan state" (p. 73). The
to have
believed
originated
kingdom,
became
militarized
tury,
increasingly
at the end of the seventeenth
cen
extend
and centralized,
violendy
over
its
rule
and
ing
long-established
cultivating
pastoral populations
in the region. The most
of the origins
of the
compelling
explanation
is
ethnic
the
"Tutsi,"
Vansina;
categories
by Jan
ethnonym
provided
in use by a court elite, be
century was
by the early nineteenth
a label
as
to all warriors
extension
serving the king
by
applying
owners
to cattle
militarism
and was subsequently
attached
developed,
more
was
a term of disdain,
to
"Hutu"
generally.
originally
applied
court servants;
it
became
the
decades
colonial
rule,
during
preceding
which
came
generally
applied
to
subject
agricultural
who
populations,
continued
to
have important regional and local identities.27Although the insistence
on the purely political nature of Hutu and Tutsi identities may elide
some
cultural
ground
in
precolonial
dimensions
of ethnic
a constructivist
privileging
states.
and colonial
Mamdani
evolution,
and
the central
reading
is on firm
role of the
was codified
the colonial
and sys
regime, ethnic difference
During
be
tematized,
chieftaincy
during the Belgian
particularly
period, when
came a Tutsi
a
The
he
adds
lethal
colonial
state,
argues,
monopoly.
a racial
to the
of difference
second categorization
by overlaying
theory
Tutsi-Hutu
the application
of
through
were
The
this
Tutsi, by
doctrine,
myth.
in Ethiopia,
of immigrant
conquerors
originating
to
the Hutu
and culturally
intellectually,
superior
"Hamitic"
distinction
the now-discredited
a
set
racially distinct
and were physically,
mass. Racialization,
27
See the authoritative new study by Jan Vansina, Le Rwanda ancien: Le royaume nyiginya (Paris:
refutation of the thesis that "Tutsi" originate as an im
Karthala, 2001). Vansina provides a compelling
in relatively recent
that subdued and subjugated the existing populace
migrant group of conquerors
"Precolonial Burundi and Rwanda: Local Loyalties, Regional
historical time. See also David Newbury,
Studies 34, no. 2 (2001).
Royalties," International Journal ofAfrican Historical
550
WORLD POLITICS
adds, was
Mamdani
mere
to the
genocide;
central
ethnicity
did
not
supply the metaphors of difference making mass killing "thinkable."
The
of "deadly ethnic
riots" provided
catalog
on the thesis that racialization
is a prerequisite
doubt
of their racial superiority
latched
onto
the
message
justify
race of
oppressors who
had
assault
entered
independence,
and es
in the early 1990s, Hutu
ex
of
doctrine
a murderous
to
After
appealing.
pecially as appeals to hatred multiplied
tremists
out
many Tutsi elites in colonial times found the
bursts. Nonetheless,
theory
casts
by Horowitz
for genocidal
the
racialization,
inverting
a
to
those
considered
be
upon
as alien
conquerors.
There is certainly merit in distinguishing between ethnicity and race
as forms of identity.They draw upon different discourses and historical
narratives
and conceive
of "the other"
in divergent
Race
ways.
as his
torically constituted is tightly joined to notions of a hierarchy of status
linked to racism, which
has no analog in
is intimately
as used
the concept
of racialization
ethnicity. However,
by Mamdani
to
has problematic
his
effort
Rwandan
Tutsi
aspects, particularly
join
and worth,
and
in a single category,
and Ugandan
that of "settlers" of an inter
Asians
to the white
mediate
racial category
colonial
rulers but superior
subject
to the
mass. Furthermore,
some
as to how
is
there
indigenous
question
as a racial caste had pene
the
notions
of
Tutsi
"Hamitic
myth"
deeply
trated
the rural Hutu
prosperous
years
mass. Mamdani
of the "second
does
republic"
argue that in the relatively
under Juvenal Habyarimana
from 1973 until the late 1980s, Tutsi within the country became ethni
cized
as a
minority
rather
participation,
accorded
some
economic
than as a race of former
space
oppressors.
and
subordinate
The
1990
in
vasion from Uganda of theTutsi Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF),how
a civil war
in which
mutual
fears and
ever, launched
escalating
a
animosities
established
the
racial
theses.
dynamic,
reviving
polarizing
was essen
One
should doubt, however, whether
the 1994 holocaust
a "racial"
saw themselves
as
"a genocide
tially
cleansing,
by those who
as one of
sons?and
the soil, and their mission
daughters?of
clearing
were more
the soil of a threatening
alien presence"
(p. 14); the atrocities
a raw and violent
the
result
of
for
control?with
likely
struggle
political
in the language of ethnic conflict.
claims expressed
The Mamdani
but understates
the impor
analysis
acknowledges
tance of
and individual
response. From the precolo
regional variations
era
nial
relations between Hutu
and Tutsi varied substantially
onward,
was most marked
in the central core of the his
the
by region;
hierarchy
trans
torical monarchy.
The
1973 coup ousting Gr?goire
Kayibanda
to
from
Hutu
elites
of
the
south
of
those
the
power
northwest,
ferred
DISORDER IN AFRICA
551
and regional factors operated importandy in defining alignments in the
brief multiparty period of the early 1990s. The radicalization of the
characteristic
of the Tutsi
identity
diaspora?strangers
a
more
contrasted with
accommodative
perspective
within
even
in polarized
is ultimately
ethnicity
experienced,
individuals
who have a range of choice.
Rwanda.
refer
egories
performed,
These
factors
Furthermore,
to collectivities,
and enacted
by
are
the complexity
were
not
only
but
petrators,
everywhere?
of those remaining
cat
contexts,
identity
but
to recall when
an
of
understanding
as a
starkly simple
genocide;
apparendy
moderates
targeted by the "Hutu power" per
also many
others who found ways not to par
important
of a drama
there Hutu
there were
seeking
so
to do so.
in spite of the
situational
pressures
overwhelming
on the
than most
of the now numerous
works
genocide,
stresses the African
Mamdani's
monograph
persuasively
regional di
ticipate
More
communities
the presence
of important
of Rwandan
origin in
an interactive
and
of con
Uganda
Congo-Kinshasa
dynamic
produced
to this
flict that continues
Also
but
mentioned
crucial,
only in
day.
was
in
the parallel Tutsi-Hutu
crucible
passing by Mamdani,
neighbor
mension;
to a massacre
ing Burundi?scene
of genocidal
proportions
in
of Hutu
1972, smaller but serious ethnic killings in 1988, and then awave of
ethnic violence beginning inOctober 1993 when newly elected presi
dent Melchior
Front
pour
movement
opposition
a
was
assassinated
(FRODEBU)
by
of the Hutu-dominated
Ndadaye
la D?mocratie
au Burundi
Tutsi clique in the army.The initial violence developed into an ongoing
In its im
victims may number one hundred
civil war, whose
thousand.
some
mediate
hundred
Hutu
fled
three
thousand
aftermath,
Burundi,
to Rwanda;
events fed Rwandan
these traumatic
Hutu
fears of
mostly
an armed Tutsi
The
how
Uganda
the status
in Rwanda.28
triumph
chapter,
insecurities
where
is on home
Mamdani
of a diasporic
Tutsi
community
Most
origins of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF).
community
in Uganda
expected
to remain
ground,
permanendy,
shows
the
explain
of the Tutsi exile
but their
status
was periodically challenged, indeed violently so in 1982-83 by party
Even though
thugs encouraged
by President Obote.
youth wing
were Rwandan
ter of the
of
Yoweri
Museveni
guerrilla
fighters
they found their legitimacy asUgandans
a quar
Tutsi,
again challenged in the late
the core of the RPF. Cu
and accordingly, many of them formed
to
many of whom
riously, the larger number of Hutu migrants
Uganda,
a
arrived as early as the 1920s, were not subject to aggressive
challenge,
1980s,
28
On
Genocide
the importance of the Burundi
(New York: Columbia University
factor,
see Gerard
Press,
1995),
Prunier,
198-206.
The Rwanda
Crisis: History
of
a
552
WORLD POLITICS
puzzle not addressed byMamdani;
were
Buganda
population
The
chapter devoted
in the 1950s, 40 percent of the
immigrants,
to
spillover
Rwandan
Hutu.29
mosdy
effects on Congo-Kinshasa,
essen
tially based on his brief field inquiry, ably demonstrates how mass eth
nic killings reverberate regionally and enter discourses of identity
conflict
Lakes
in surrounding
countries.
now
become
regions have
the value
Congo
of the regional
is much
chapter
The
civil wars
than
Great
interwoven,
inextricably
Mamdani
perspective
weaker
in the African
its Ugandan
underlining
the
However,
adopts.
it
is
counterpart;
based entirely on his brief visit, fails to make reference to any of the
sources on the eastern
of con
Congo mosaic
French-language
to
attention
and
sources.30
flict,
pays only cursory
English-language
rebels from Congo
The
continued
insurgent
operations
by Hutu
Kinshasa
of them once active in the genocide,
bases, many
keeps the
crucial
to at
of the genocide
alive for the RPF regime. A disposition
psychosis
as
to all Hutu
informs
the
tribute collective
evidently
guilt
g?nocidaires
in the ruling group, granted
visible
drift toward ethnicized
autocracy
indulgence
shame over
an international
still permeated
with
by
community
in the genocide
inaction.
its complicity
through culpable
a
In
the language of analysis it is painfully difficult to avoid aManichean
representation
perpetrators
of the tragedy, collectivizing
Mamdani
wrestles
or victims.
success.
complete
The Mamdani
monograph
It lacks
specialists.
Rwanda
has
received
the depth
entire
with
ethnic categories
this dilemma, without
a critical
of contextual
reception
knowledge
as
among
of the
crisis of authors such as Filip Reyntjens and Alison des
Forges.31 Although its theoretical achievements fall well short of its
Rwanda
a valuable
claims, Mamdani
brings
regional perspective
in the Great Lakes region.
alization of ethnic conflict
to the conceptu
of the
Irrespective
of the book, the stature of its author will assure it a place among
the influential works
genocide.
seeking the origins of the Rwandan
merits
29
A.
I. Richards,
ed., Economic Development
and Tribal Change
(Cambridge: W.
Hefner
and Son,
1954).
30
are
mouvantes et con
Filip Reyntjens, La guerre des Grands Lacs: Alliances
Particularly
important
en
Ban
1999); and Jean-Claude Willame,
Afrique Centrale (Paris: L'Harmattan,
flict extraterritoriaux
et
Violences ethniques et gestion de Videntitaire au Kivu
(Paris: L'Harmattan,
yarwanda
Banyamulenge:
1997).
31
See Reyntjens, LAfrique des Grands Lacs en aise: Rwanda, Burundi, 1988-1994
1994); idem (fn. 30); and Alison des Forges, "LeaveNone to Tell the Story": Genocide
York: Human Rights Watch,
1999).
(Paris: Karthala,
in Rwanda
(New
DISORDER IN AFRICA
through
Civil Disorder
The
Horowitz
scale. The
and Gurr
massive
form
particular
of cross-national
a Comparative
Lens
on a
ethnic conflict
global
to one
masterfid
gives
exposition
a
riot.
lifetime
ethnic
Gurr
caps
deadly
com
with a sophisticated,
quantitative
volumes
Horowitz
553
address
volume
of conflict?the
data collection
parative exegesis of confrontations
Horowitz
brings commanding
pitting
"peoples" against
to his ambitious
credentials
states.
project.
His 1985 classic, Ethnic Groups inConflict, remains one of the most in
fluential
works
in the field
of comparative
ethnic
studies.
even though
quent work, A Democratic South Africa?,
His
subse
it failed to
some
South African
constitutional
introduced
engineers,
persuade
novel and arresting
into the debate
about how deeply di
arguments
vided polities might be structured inways that embedded incentives for
among
cooperation
sometimes-trenchant
of his
scope
admiration.
of cultural
segments.
criticism
attract
positions
and the range
erudition
most
While
elites
Though
in some
Horowitz's
the
quarters,
evoke universal
of his knowledge
scholars of cultural pluralism bring to their toil a re
knowledge?or
specialized
towers over most
try?Horowitz
a focus
even
gionally
due
others
on a
coun
particular
to the
of
settings
diversity
inwhich his research is grounded upon field inquiry.He has collected
data inGuyana, Nigeria, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Fiji, South Africa, and
as a consultant
to
and is widely
solicited
Asia,
on how to accommodate
The
counsel
governments
diversity.
seeking
in
this
intuitions
broad
have
unusually
analytical
grounded
experience
that underlie his system
of basic understandings
created a substructure
former
Soviet
atic collection
ethnicity
"celebrate
Central
of data. His
is a timely
diversity"
ists to acknowledge
relentless
feuds,
of attributes.
here upon the darker
of the facile cheer
counterpoint
and the reluctance
notions
the potential
forms of identity politics.
The deadly ethnic riot?which
from
focus
side of
to some
for
lethal
of some multicultural
conflict
Horowitz
of the
inherent
in some
carefully distinguishes
civil wars, or genocides?has
lynchings,
in detail
To discover
these, he examines
an identifiable
set
one hundred
fifty
over an extended
since
time frame (though mainly
such episodes
covers a
the
for exhaustive
those selected
1965). Beyond
study,
study
lit
much
larger array of ethnic riot events, drawing upon the secondary
erature. For the cases examined
in depth, he relies upon documentary
odd
and
interview
materials,
as well
as case
studies
of these
episodes.
Al
though his mode of analysis is qualitative, his research design is sys
554
WORLD
POLITICS
tematic
and methodologically
and he effectively
refutes
self-conscious,
accuse him of
on the
variable.
analysis
dependent
never inevitable,
The
study argues that deadly ethnic riots, although
are
an
state
to occur when
is
there
of hostility
between
existing
likely
critics who
two groups
urban
setting.
immediate
more
recent
in an
but not always
normally
proximity,
a
not an "ancient
is
tribal
but
hatred,"
animosity
in
and circumstantial
sentiment,
grounded
relatively
not
is
The
mutual
dislike
determined
patterns.
by cul
in immediate
This
conflictual
tural distance; the degree of objective difference is unrelated to these
event that activates the hos
is some triggering
There
one
a
moment
of collective
rage and allowing
group, creating
tility of
a keen sense of the
to be
the perpetrators
of the mayhem
buoyed by
jus
tification
of their action. The
attack is perceived
after the event as a
violent
outbreaks.
a subliminal
in re
and one may also deduce
purpose
induce the objects of the collective
rage to
ducing heterogeneity?to
for
flee. A perception
of low costs dissolves
inhibitions;
example, when
in the attacks. Target
the security forces are weak or are even complicit
so
to have
groups are believed
characteristics?aggressive
threatening
lesson,
salutary
cial
or economic
of domination?and
project
of victims
their
remorse;
targeting
on social
relies heavily
psychological
its release in decoding
the ethnic riot.
rarely
Horowitz
and
or a
behavior
show
The
low correlation
between
state weakness
rioters
is usually
precise.
theories of aggression
and
the deadly
ethnic
riot is striking; most occur in settings inwhich the hegemony of the
ruling institutions iswell established. The contemporary African disor
der
is not often
punctuated
by the lethal urban
riot. Brazzaville,
which
experienced serious running clashes in 1993 and again in 1997 between
ethnic
militias
Sassou-Nguesso,
an
exception.32
related
Pascal
Ethnic
to the three
leading power contenders?Denis
to be
and Bernard Kolelas?seems
Lissouba,
riots can occur
as
in larger patterns
episodes
of
civil conflict, as has been the case in Burundi since 1993 and inCongo
riots in Bunia.
by the Lendu-Hema
1998?exemplified
occurrences
in Nigerian
riots
have
been
ethnoreligious
frequent
recent
have
been
the
civil
conflicts
of
1990s,
years
mostly
during
in rural areas.
Kinshasa
While
cities
fought
An
since
exception
data of a number
to the
methodological
of fairly old African
cases
invoked
repeatedly
by Horowitz
is the overuse as
sophistication
cases. A number
of the African
occurred
long ago. For
example,
Horowitz mentions the 1959 Kananga (formerlyLuluabourg) ethnic riot
32
Remy Bazenguissa-Ganga,
Karthala,
1997).
Les voies du politique
au
Congo: Essai
de sociologie historique
(Paris:
DISORDER IN AFRICA
nineteen
times,
it never
yet
had
a successor
555
event. The
1966
anti-Igbo
riots in northern Nigerian cities are frequendy cited, but the lethal rioting
provoked by the heterodox Maitatsine
nor are the Muslim-Christian
riots
Islamic
are not,
the
during
1980
cult around
in Kaduna
and Kano
1990s.
the splendid
Nonetheless,
resources
for understanding
The broad geographic
Horowitz
a
study supplies
of
key manifestation
rich
interpretive
conflict.
identity
scope of his analysis and the richness of his
ensure
in
the classics
this book a place among
engagement
no reason to forecast any
the study of cultural
Horowitz
finds
pluralism.
in the
reduction
of the deadly ethnic riot, a sobering conclu
frequency
to Gurr's
sion in curious contrast
that
finding
surprising
quantitative
theoretical
identity conflict began to decline in the 1990s.
Gurr
has devoted
much
cross-national
ering
of his outstanding
to internal
relating
data
has directed theMinorities
academic
career
violence.
Since
to
gath
1986, he
at Risk project at Colorado, thenMaryland.
a team of collaborators,
he has painstakingly
on
trove of measurable
data
ethnic groups
around
With
assembled
a treasure
the world.
The
care
with which codings are applied to often qualitative and event data is
entirely
is this
nowhere
praiseworthy;
important
task more
carefully
rich resources have provided Gurr
and responsibly performed. These
situations.
for wide-ranging
analysis of ethnic conflict
on the same theme, Minorities
at Risk, attracted wide
as a
attention
of the prospect
of the continued
warning
well-grounded
spread of ethnic conflict.33
the ammunition
His
earlier work
data seven years later, Gurr comes to a very dif
Reviewing
updated
states had
armed conflict within
ferent conclusion:
"By the mid-1990s
new
was
a
onset
in
of
ethnic wars
decline
the
abated; there
pronounced
and a shift inmany ongoing wars from fighting to negotiation" (xiii).
He
attributes
this
improved
prognosis
by which
in part to a process of political
states have come to terms
diverse
many
culturally
learning,
abandoned muscular
with
their diversity,
for accommodative
and instead
searched
"national
integration" policies,
formulas.
Unfortunately,
much of Africa is exempted from this hopeful scenario. Yet Gurr still
finds
African
a
potential
conflicts
silver
are not
lining,
new
of protracted
past episodes
are other difficulties
There
cept
of "minorities
at risk"
in the debatable
but
outbreaks,
violence.
communal
with
his African
is drawn
from
a
observation
rather
that
continuations
the
of
con
analysis. The basic
state
constituted
type of
33
at Risk: A Global View
Ted Robert Gurr, Minorities
ofEthnopolitical
United
States Institute of Peace Press, 1993).
Conflict
(Washington,
D.C.:
556
WORLD POLITICS
a dominant
with
ethnocultural
"titular nationality,"
such
one can
states,
Hemisphere
or
as
readily situate African
diasporic
populations
indigenous
peoples
a
minorities
at
that can serve as units of analysis.
"minority
Identifying
risk" in much
of Africa,
is far more problematic;
the state as
however,
a
"nation" has a territorial
contains
and
of
personality
multiplicity
as is found
in much
of Eurasia.
grouping?the
InWestern
a number of the
In such settings,
identity groups.
coding concepts
come dubious,
discrimination
in the economic
including minority
or
realm
and
cultural
restrictions.
political
political
Categorizations
be
or
of
"ethnic minorities" become difficult; regional identities (for example
Cabindans inAngola on p. 255) by analytical metamorphosis become
ethnic
There
communities.
ismuch
merit
to Gurr's
in the management
learning
support his thesis with a number
litical
ploration
of newly
used
forms
of po
upon the importance
emphasis
of cultural diversity. Gurr
is able to
of African
of electoral
examples,
including
such
representation
portional representation in South Africa and amodified
an ex
as pro
form of the
In addition, Gurr shows reason, as reflected
Senegal.
to take a much more
realistic view of eth
doctrines,
was
case in 1960; no
a
to exor
than
the
nicity
usually
longer
pathology
a
to
is
and value.
cise, ethnicity
sociological
reality
acknowledge
German
system
in constitutional
in
Is identity politics, therefore, the key to deciphering disorder in
In some
and
cases, it is clearly central, as in Rwanda,
Burundi,
an
is
there
"war of visions"34 pitting
Sudan,
underlying
sharply
one another. But at
different
of
the
virtuous
imaginings
polity against
the same time, civil wars have
at
national
paradoxically
strengthened
one
in many
tachments
of
few
the
cards
held
those
cases;
trump
by
to resolve
in
internal
warfare
countries
such as
seeking
long-running
Africa?
where
or
Sierra Leone, Angola,
is that all contend
Congo-Kinshasa
to
insist
their
attachment
the
territorial
unit.35 Even in
upon
ing parties
cases
or
se
the many
where
is not per
the precipitant
ethnicity
religion
of disorder,
violence
discourses
of difference.
inevitably
incorporates
com
armed
escalates
mutual
and
fears, anxieties,
insecurities;
Ethnicity
Liberia,
inscribes memories
of ineffable
munally
targeted violence
and fellow ethnics, and inspires dreams of vengeance.
Thus
of protracted
disorder
should not be underestimated.
loss of kin
the dangers
34
See the imaginative
thesis of Francis M. Deng, War of Visions: Conflict of Identity in the Sudan
D.C.: Brookings
1995).
Institution,
(Washington,
35
This argument is developed
in more detail in Crawford Young, "Nationalism
and Ethnic Con
flict inAfrica," inMontserat
and John Hutchinson,
Guibernau
eds., Understanding Nationalism
(Lon
don: Polity Press, 2001).
DISORDER IN AFRICA
But
other
peace,
newed
are at work.
forces
even at a
high
security may
for
time, a profound
craving
such a desperate
desire for re
in Liberia
of Taylor
margins
Over
can take hold;
price,
the electoral
explain
in 1997 and Sassou-Nguesso
coexists
for forgetting
may be seen
in 2002. A capacity
inCongo-Brazzaville
an insistence
with
in coundess
557
uneasily
instances
on
as
remembering,
The two archipel
turns of
but sudden
the world.
around
in Africa
have not dissolved,
agoes of violence
events may open
demise of intransi
unanticipated
opportunities?the
as with
the
leaders
of
for
gent
insurgent movements,
example,
disap
in
of
Savimbi
and Zouabri
from the equation
pearance
early 2002.
Fragile accords theoretically ending the civil conflicts in Sudan and
Congo-Kinshasa
remain about fidl
were
in mid-2002,
signed
though
large uncertainties
implementation.
Conclusion
How
far do the five works
over
chase
under
the reciprocal
review
of
dynamics
take us toward
state
crisis,
conceptual
civil disorder,
pur
and
identity politics? Of course, none of the authors framed his inquiry in
some
resources
that con
terms, yet each provides
interpretive
such
in circumstances
of state
tribute to this end. Even
decomposition,
or
as in Liberia
frame defines most
of
the
territorial
Congo-Kinshasa,
the parameters
of conflict. The much more fluid and formless nature of
these
arena for
a
settings, however,
sharply different
provides
a
structured
than does the more
stage of Rwanda,
identity mobilization
aweakened
state. Where
the conflict pits in
but by no means prostrate
as in
a state
the
surgents primarily
security apparatus,
against
Algeria,
are very different
from those in a
open to civil society
identity options
conflict
web
in such
factions
in presence,
is only one of a number
in Sudan or
Congo-Kinshasa.
a state militia
in which
of conflict
as is the case
State crisis is not a passing moment
but
is instead
a
long-term
condition.
of armed
in the life of theAfrican polity,
This
simple
fact
alters
the basic
frames of social action within which the ongoing dynamics of identity
transaction
tions
and construction
of these volumes,
analytical
territory.
there
occur.
contribu
the appreciable
Beyond
of still uncharted
lies a very large domain