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E-book
Author Thomson, Susan, 1968- author

Title Whispering truth to power : everyday resistance to reconciliation in postgenocide Rwanda / Susan Thomson
Published Madison : The University of Wisconsin Press, [2013]
©2013

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Description 1 online resource (xxvii, 258 pages) : illustrations
Series Africa and the diaspora: history, politics, culture
Africa and the diaspora.
Contents Introduction : state power as lived experience -- Bringing in peasant Rwandans through life history interviewing -- The historical role of the state in everyday life -- A continuum of violence, 1990-2000 -- Practices of national unity and reconciliation -- Everyday resistance to national unity and reconciliation -- Everyday resistance to the Gacaca process -- Conclusion : explaining systems of power through acts of everyday resistance
Summary For 100 days in 1994, genocide engulfed Rwanda. Since then, many in the international community have praised the country's postgenocide government for its efforts to foster national unity and reconciliation by downplaying ethnic differences and promoting "one Rwanda for all Rwandans." Examining how ordinary rural Rwandans experience and view these policies, this book challenges the conventional wisdom on postgenocide Rwanda. The author finds that many of Rwanda's poorest citizens distrust the local officials charged with implementing the state program and believe that it ignores the deepest problems of the countryside: lack of land, jobs, and a voice in policies that affect lives and livelihoods. Based on interviews with dozens of Rwandan peasants and government officials, this book reveals how the nation's disenfranchised poor have been engaging in everyday resistance, cautiously and carefully - "whispering" their truth to the powers that be. This quiet opposition, the author argues, suggests that some of the nation's most celebrated postgenocide policies have failed to garner the grassroots support needed to sustain peace.--publisher's description
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (pages 215-235) and index
Notes English
Print version record
Subject Government, Resistance to -- Rwanda
HISTORY -- Africa -- Central.
Government, Resistance to
Politics and government
Social conditions
Politik
Soziale Situation
SUBJECT Rwanda -- Politics and government -- 1994- http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh2005003348
Rwanda -- Social conditions -- 21st century
Subject Rwanda
Ruanda
Form Electronic book
ISBN 9780299296735
0299296733