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Remaking Rwanda: State Building and Human Rights after Mass Violence
In the mid-1990s, civil war and genocide ravaged Rwanda. Since then, the country’s new leadership has undertaken a highly ambitious effort to refashion Rwanda’s politics, economy, and society, and the country’s accomplishments have garnered widespread praise. Remaking Rwanda is the first book to examine Rwanda’s remarkable post-genocide recovery in a comprehensive and critical fashion. By paying close attention to memory politics, human rights, justice, foreign relations, land use, education, and other key social institutions and practices, this volume raises serious concerns about the depth and durability of the country’s reconstruction.
Edited by Scott Straus and Lars Waldorf, Remaking Rwanda brings together experienced scholars and human rights professionals to offer a nuanced, historically informed picture of post-genocide Rwanda—one that reveals powerful continuities with the nation’s past and raises profound questions about its future.
Best Special Interest Books, selected by the American Association of School Librarians
Best Special Interest Books, selected by the Public Library Reviewers
Edited by Scott Straus and Lars Waldorf, Remaking Rwanda brings together experienced scholars and human rights professionals to offer a nuanced, historically informed picture of post-genocide Rwanda—one that reveals powerful continuities with the nation’s past and raises profound questions about its future.
Best Special Interest Books, selected by the American Association of School Librarians
Best Special Interest Books, selected by the Public Library Reviewers
382 pages, Paperback
First published April 18, 2011
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
May 14, 2016
Scott Straus and Lars Waldorf’s Remaking Rwanda is a detailed volume which seeks understanding of Rwandan’s post-genocide trajectory. The book addresses a critical gap in the literature on Rwanda, in addressing the human rights abuses which have occurred through the post-genocide rule of current President and leader of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) Paul Kagame. Analysis in this volume moves past a narrative dominated by Rwanda as victim throughout the genocide, and instead, seeks to understand the manner in which the post-genocide Rwandan state pursued its dual aims of statebuilding and social engineering. This book directly challenges the dominant discourse on Rwandan as success story, both in economic terms as well as in regards to post-conflict reconciliation.
The first of the book’s four sections, Governance and Statebuilding, analyzes how the RPF has maintained a firm centralization on the exercise of power in the country, what Strauss and Waldorf refer to as a “deft authoritarianism.” Timothy Longman’s chapter focuses on the overall history of the RPF’s post-genocide rule, and their authoritarian practices. Waldorf provides analysis of the manner in which the RPF condemns critics as being followers of ‘genocide ideology’, while Paul Gready stresses the manner in which the regime has successfully controlled civil society organizations through a combination of coercive and exclusionary tactics.
The second section, titled “International and Regional Contexts”, provides fascinating – if brief – commentary on the regional implications of Rwandan statebuilding. Eugenia Zorbas explores the mechanisms through which the state has maintained high levels of international assistance, in spite of authoritarian practices. Rachel Hayman’s chapter questions the Rwandan economy as a success story through analysis of the role of aid dependence. Filip Reyntjens, meanwhile, analyzes Rwandan involvement in the First and Second Congo Wars, and the massive crimes committed against civilians by both the Rwandan military and its Congolese proxy forces. Jason Stearns and Federico Borelio discuss successive attempts to bring accountability to Rwandan crimes perpetrated in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
The third section, “Justice”, opens with Don Webster’s chapter on the tenuous relationship between the RPF and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR). Don Webster follows this with questions on manner in which separate streams of justice – namely the ICTR and the local gacaca courts – negatively impact the dual pursuits of justice and reconciliation. The following chapter focuses on rural social engineering programs conducted by the state, with chapters by Catherine Newbury, An Ansoms, and Chris Huggins challenging state-dominated discourse on the subjects of villagization programs, economic reconstruction, and land reform respectively.
The final section focuses on the role of History and Memory in the post-genocide state, which is dominated by the official RPF line that ethnicity is an exogenous construct with no relevance to pre-colonial Rwandan history. Nigel Eltringham questions the RPF attempt to legislate out of existence all discussion on ethnicity, while Jens Meierhenrich discusses the role of both official and local sites of genocide memorialization. Additional chapters question the manner in which genocide can be taught in Rwanda, as well as the manner in which young Rwandans conceptualize, understand and discuss both ethnicity and history.
This volume presents a challenge to theoretical discussions on statebuilding, and directly questions the line of argument asserting need of institutionalization before democratization in post-conflict states. By questioning the dominant narrative of Rwanda as a success story, in terms of economy, democracy, and post-conflict reconciliation, this book questions the theoretical underpinnings of discourses which assert that institutional strengthening and capacity-building should precede democratic reforms. The book provides needed discussion both on the anti-democratic tendencies of the RPF – namely, the manner in which it stymies open discussion or criticism of its policies – while also denying the ability of both opposition parties and civil society organizations to operate free of state control.
Given that Strauss and Waldorf cast such a wide conceptual net in terms of the many areas of post-genocide Rwandan state and society, one criticism of the book would be the small amount of detail and discussion given to each subject. Each of the twenty-one chapters is given short space with which to engage the subject matter and theoretical implications. In spite of this, however, the chapters are weaved together almost seamlessly, and all are tied back to the book’s over-all aims of questioning the ‘success story’ which permeates discussion on Rwanda, while also questioning the extent to which post-conflict recovery has actually occurred. The volume is highly useful to those who seek understanding of both the theoretical concerns of statebuilding and reconciliation in general and Rwandan in specific, and will assist in continuing dialogue questioning the ability of the Rwandan state to overcome its history of conflict and the ‘deft authoritarianism’ which exploits the past for the interests of present centralization of power.
The first of the book’s four sections, Governance and Statebuilding, analyzes how the RPF has maintained a firm centralization on the exercise of power in the country, what Strauss and Waldorf refer to as a “deft authoritarianism.” Timothy Longman’s chapter focuses on the overall history of the RPF’s post-genocide rule, and their authoritarian practices. Waldorf provides analysis of the manner in which the RPF condemns critics as being followers of ‘genocide ideology’, while Paul Gready stresses the manner in which the regime has successfully controlled civil society organizations through a combination of coercive and exclusionary tactics.
The second section, titled “International and Regional Contexts”, provides fascinating – if brief – commentary on the regional implications of Rwandan statebuilding. Eugenia Zorbas explores the mechanisms through which the state has maintained high levels of international assistance, in spite of authoritarian practices. Rachel Hayman’s chapter questions the Rwandan economy as a success story through analysis of the role of aid dependence. Filip Reyntjens, meanwhile, analyzes Rwandan involvement in the First and Second Congo Wars, and the massive crimes committed against civilians by both the Rwandan military and its Congolese proxy forces. Jason Stearns and Federico Borelio discuss successive attempts to bring accountability to Rwandan crimes perpetrated in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
The third section, “Justice”, opens with Don Webster’s chapter on the tenuous relationship between the RPF and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR). Don Webster follows this with questions on manner in which separate streams of justice – namely the ICTR and the local gacaca courts – negatively impact the dual pursuits of justice and reconciliation. The following chapter focuses on rural social engineering programs conducted by the state, with chapters by Catherine Newbury, An Ansoms, and Chris Huggins challenging state-dominated discourse on the subjects of villagization programs, economic reconstruction, and land reform respectively.
The final section focuses on the role of History and Memory in the post-genocide state, which is dominated by the official RPF line that ethnicity is an exogenous construct with no relevance to pre-colonial Rwandan history. Nigel Eltringham questions the RPF attempt to legislate out of existence all discussion on ethnicity, while Jens Meierhenrich discusses the role of both official and local sites of genocide memorialization. Additional chapters question the manner in which genocide can be taught in Rwanda, as well as the manner in which young Rwandans conceptualize, understand and discuss both ethnicity and history.
This volume presents a challenge to theoretical discussions on statebuilding, and directly questions the line of argument asserting need of institutionalization before democratization in post-conflict states. By questioning the dominant narrative of Rwanda as a success story, in terms of economy, democracy, and post-conflict reconciliation, this book questions the theoretical underpinnings of discourses which assert that institutional strengthening and capacity-building should precede democratic reforms. The book provides needed discussion both on the anti-democratic tendencies of the RPF – namely, the manner in which it stymies open discussion or criticism of its policies – while also denying the ability of both opposition parties and civil society organizations to operate free of state control.
Given that Strauss and Waldorf cast such a wide conceptual net in terms of the many areas of post-genocide Rwandan state and society, one criticism of the book would be the small amount of detail and discussion given to each subject. Each of the twenty-one chapters is given short space with which to engage the subject matter and theoretical implications. In spite of this, however, the chapters are weaved together almost seamlessly, and all are tied back to the book’s over-all aims of questioning the ‘success story’ which permeates discussion on Rwanda, while also questioning the extent to which post-conflict recovery has actually occurred. The volume is highly useful to those who seek understanding of both the theoretical concerns of statebuilding and reconciliation in general and Rwandan in specific, and will assist in continuing dialogue questioning the ability of the Rwandan state to overcome its history of conflict and the ‘deft authoritarianism’ which exploits the past for the interests of present centralization of power.
January 21, 2025
A less optimistic collection I read before service, this series of essays looks at the democratic and governmental development of Rwanda after the genocide. Not nearly as positive as Rwanda, Inc., many of the essays would be at home in a college course on developing democracies or the aftermath of atrocities in terms of government.
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October 16, 2016I read this for my master's thesis, and while not every single essay in it was strictly useful, it offers a truly wonderful view of what peacebuilding and statebuilding in Rwanda really is. The majority of the world definitely views the state as a success story of conflict transformation and reconciliation and the important critiques and in depth views on what these programs look like on the ground along with how top-down they are and how controlling the post genocide regime is will really benefit my thesis. Additionally, it was very interesting.
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