PO377 Ethnic Conflict and Political Violence

PO377 Ethnic Conflict and Political Violence Week 5: Rwanda

Lecture Outline • Overview • History of Rwanda • Contested Views on Ethnicity in Rwanda: Ancient Hatred or Legacy of Colonialism? • 3 schools of thought • Ranked vs. Unranked Ethnic Systems • Ranked ethnic systems • Unranked ethnic systems • 4 directions in which subordinate groups can try to move a ranked system • Civil War and Peace Accords • Negotiations and aid conditionality • Arusha Accords • Genocide • Explaining Genocide? • Post-Genocide • Conclusions

Pop Quiz • I think I understand why genocide occurred in Rwanda: • Yes. • No.

Overview • Population: 10.9 million (2011). • Two thirds live below the poverty line (in 1994 figure was 86%). • 1994 genocide: 800,000-1,000,000 people killed (mostly Tutsi). 250,000-500,000 women and girls raped. • Killing rate 5 times that of the Nazis. • Genocide was carefully planned. • History of Rwanda is deeply contested.

History of Rwanda • Pre-colonial oral tradition. Myth of Gatwa, Gahutu and Gatutsi. Ruled by Tutsi monarchy at European contact but power structures and social relations complicated. Clan system which largely cut across Tutsi-Hutu-Twa identities. • 1885 Berlin Conference Rwanda ‘given’ to Germany as part of German East Africa (Ruanda-Urundi). • Pop. spoke same language (Kinyarwanda), shared same religion (Kubandwa then Christianity), told same myths and ancestral stories, yet three groups. Twa (1%): pygmy hunter-gatherers. Hutu (majority): peasant farmers; resembled neighbours, classed by Europeans as ‘Bantu’. Tutsi (ruling class): cattle-herders; taller and thinner, lighter skinned.

History of Rwanda (2) • European racial ideas: Tutsi as superior to Hutu and Twa, as quasi-Caucasian and as descendants of conquering ‘race’ from Ethiopia or Egypt (ref. explorer John Hanning Speke). Tutsis as ‘Hamites’: descendants of Ham, Noah’s son (Book of Genesis). (See Prunier 1997; Destexhe 1995.) • European contact during time of change towards greater centralisation, greater dominance by central Tutsi monarchy and increase in Tutsi chiefly powers. • Belgian rule succeeded German 1916; moves towards more direct colonial rule and further consolidation of Tutsi power at expense of Hutu. Forced labour, beatings.

History of Rwanda (3) • 1933 Belgian census in Rwanda and implementation of ethnic identity cards (14-15% classed as Tutsi). • 1945 UN formed; Trusteeship Council to oversee 3rd world decolonisation. Rwanda is made a trusteeship. • UN Trusteeship Council critical of Belgian rule; 1950s moves towards democracy. Formation of political parties, established on ethnic lines: Parmehutu party (Parti du Mouvement de l’Emancipation Hutu); opposition party mainly Tutsi, Union National Rwandaise (UNAR).

History of Rwanda (4) • 1957: Hutu manifesto calls for emancipation and majority rule, receiving support from Belgium and the UN etc. • 1959 inter-ethnic political violence after suspicious death of Tutsi king. Hutu revolution, exile of 150,000-200,000 Tutsi, abolition of monarchy; republic established. • 1962 Rwanda and Burundi become independent as separate states. • 1963, 1967, 1973 slaughters of Tutsi. Hutu rule until 1990 civil war.

Contested Views on Ethnicity 3 schools of thought: • Primordialists: distinct ethnic groups in Rwanda for 100s of years (colonial administrators and missionaries; some anthropologists; used as part rationale for genocide). • Hutu and Tutsi are one ethnic group as they share language, religion and culture; Hutu and Tutsi were purely caste/class groupings. Existing divisions are entirely a colonial legacy. • In between such views: pre-colonial Tutsi monarchy created differences and distinct identities but these were more fluid and about wealth/class, not ethnicity; colonial era and racial agendas entrenched Hutu and Tutsi labels as ethnic/racial groups. (Uvin 1997 is useful on these debates.)

Ranked vs. Unranked Ethnic Systems Ranked ethnic systems • Ethnic groups in hierarchical, ‘ranked’ relationship. Social class and ethnicity coincide; society stratified along ethnic lines. One ethnic group clearly superordinate over a subordinate group in political, economic and social status simultaneously. Ethnic groups often fill distinct occupational groups. Examples: Rwanda and Burundi; Jamaica; apartheid South Africa; any system of slavery.

Ranked vs. Unranked Ethnic Systems (2) Unranked ethnic systems • Ethnic groups are parallel, ‘unranked’. Social class and ethnicity don’t fully coincide; ethnic groups are cross-class so each is internally stratified. Each parallel group is potentially a whole society, covering range of occupations and statuses. Examples: Sri Lanka; former Yugoslavia; Northern Ireland. • Neither type of system is completely pure and both are subject to change.

Ranked vs. Unranked Ethnic Systems (3) 4 directions in which subordinate groups can try to move a ranked system: • Subordinate groups try to displace superordinate groups (e.g. Rwanda 1959). • Subordinate groups aim to abolish ethnic divisions altogether (e.g. United States). • Subordinate groups try to raise their position in ethnic hierarchy without denying legitimacy of that hierarchy (e.g. caste changes in India are similar). • Subordinate groups try to move the system from ranked to unranked (e.g. Rwanda 1990: RPF war). (On ranked and unranked ethnic systems see chpt. 1 of Horowitz 2000.)

Civil War and Peace Accords • 1980s Museveni gets Ugandan presidency through insurgency aided by Tutsi immigrants; backs Tutsi efforts to overthrow Hutu-led Rwandan government. • 1989 collapse of international coffee market increases economic hardship, followed by structural adjustment programme 1990-94. • 1990-91 exiled Tutsi (Rwandan Patriotic Front) war against Rwandan govt. RPF includes moderate Hutu and claims it wants multi-ethnic democracy. • 1991 cease-fire between Rwandan govt and RPF after strong international pressure. Govt negotiates with RPF and other opposition leaders.

Civil War and Peace Accords (2) Negotiations and aid conditionality • 1992 talks in Arusha (Tanzania) in response to pressure from USA, Belgium, and Organization of African Unity (OAU). • US State Department: continued aid dependent upon progress towards multi-party coalition government. • Negotiations led to Aug. 1993 Arusha Accords. Organized by OAU; delegations from African states; observers/monitors from France, Belgium, Germany, US, Britain, Canada, Netherlands, EU.

Civil War and Peace Accords (3) Arusha Accords • Democratic power-sharing governance. • RPF and Rwandan armed forces to integrate. • Intl. peacekeeping force (UN Assistance Mission in Rwanda) to be deployed and French soldiers to withdraw. • Refugees to be allowed home. • Hutu regime not genuinely committed to cease-fire or accords; 1991-1994 periodic massacres. Accords never instituted. Civilian militias are armed and trained by the MRND and CDR. • Many thought Accords were best settlement that could be achieved; problem was Habyarimana’s regime not committed. Others say Accords backed hardliners into a corner and created extremist reaction (see Khadiagala 2002, week 19 reading list).

Genocide • ‘[B]oth the mediators and the parties to the Arusha Agreement staked its implementation almost exclusively on international actors who were unwilling and unprepared to expend the resources required to meet its provisions’ (Khadiagala 2002, p. 463). • Implementation of Arusha Accords delayed; genocide of Tutsis began April 1994. UNAMIR peacekeepers withdrew. • Genocide ended July 1994 through RPF military victory. RPF governing in coalition with other political parties.

Genocide (2) • Systematic, murderous anti-Tutsi propaganda campaign began well before 1994. • Radio station Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines (RTLM) disseminated misinformation and propaganda. (Some staff later convicted by ICTR of inciting genocide.) • 6 April 1994 Hutu presidents of Rwanda and Burundi were killed when their plane was shot down by a rocket (still the subject of controversy).

Genocide (3) • Interim govt blamed plane crash on RPF and Belgian UNAMIR troops; Rwandan army killed 10 Belgians; Belgium withdrew troops then UN withdrew almost all peacekeepers. • UN decided to send expanded peacekeeping force (UNAMIR II) but didn’t arrive until Aug (already over). France intervened unilaterally; armed and supported Hutu elite. • Apr.-Jul. 1994 est. 800,000-1,000,000 Rwandans killed; majority Tutsi but also many moderate Hutu. Brutal deaths; most violence committed by civilian militia groups (interahamwe) armed with machetes and sharpened wooden and metal objects.

Explaining Genocide? • There is no consensus in the literature on exactly why genocide occurred in Rwanda and at the time it did so. Different scholars place different weights on various factors and how they interact: • racist narratives about ethnicity (Uvin 1997; Taylor 1999; Prunier 1997; Destexhe 1995; Mamdani 2002); • colonial changes to the nature of the state and traditional social and economic structures (Prunier 1997; Destexhe 1995; Mamdani 2002; Hintjens 1999); • socio-political contestation between the northwest and the rest of Rwanda: intra-Hutu competition (Uvin 1997; Hintjens 1999); • economic crisis, structural adjustment programme, and scarcity of land (Storey 1999; Uvin 1997; African Rights 1995a; Jones 2002);

Explaining Genocide? (2) • fear, insecurity and displacement generated by the civil war (Reyntjens 1996); • political manipulation by elites trying to hold onto power in the face of crisis and internal and external pressure to democratize (Uvin 1997; Hintjens 1999; Prunier 1997; Reyntjens 1996); • deliberate media propaganda (appears in all accounts); • a social tradition of extreme conformity (Reyntjens 1996; Hintjens 1999); • the failure of the ‘international community’ in various forms: structural adjustment, coercion via aid conditionality, involvement of particular individual states, role of NGOs, withdrawal of peacekeepers etc. (Clapham 1998; Prunier 1997; Storey 1997; Gourevitch 1999; Melvern 2000; Klinghoffer 1998).

Pop Quiz • I believe that ethnic tensions in Rwanda have… • Largely been resolved since the end to the genocide, with the ‘government of national unity’. • Been repressed but not overcome. • Been transferred to neighbouring states.

Post-Genocide • By 19 July 1994 RPF had control of most of Rwanda and installed themselves as govt ‘of national unity’, in coalition with 4 other political parties provided for in the Arusha Accords (exception of MRND). New President, PM and many cabinet members were Hutu but the current govt is more Tutsi-dominated. • Current President, Paul Kagame, is a Tutsi who was military commander of the RPF when it ended the genocide. • When RPF took power up to 2,000,000 Hutu fled to refugee camps in neighbouring states, mainly Zaire. From camps Hutu exiles launched attacks on Rwanda; Rwandan govt invaded Zaire (now DR Congo) to clear out Hutu refugee camps. Various types of Rwandan military involvement in DRC since then, including mass slaughter of Hutus.

Post-Genocide (2) • Today Rwanda is fairly stable but more like tenuous stalemate than genuine peace. Weakly democratic and really pretty authoritarian. Repression of political opposition and media. Focus on development. • Govt has arguably failed to move towards genuine national reconciliation. Approach seems largely to be to try and erase the notion of ethnic difference, rather than to acknowledge and value all – what do you think about this approach to ethnic conflict?

Conclusions • Different group identities existed in Rwanda prior to colonial contact but the nature of these identities/divisions remains hotly debated. • Colonial notions of race and colonial political administration had huge and negative impact on constructions of ethnic identity in Rwanda. • Arusha Accords were imposed upon Hutu elite and strongly resisted – did this contribute to causing the genocide? • The impact of the economic situation seems to have been very significant but fundamentally it was the interaction of this with political power struggles which led to state incitement to genocide.

PO377 Ethnic Conflict and Political Violence