HA.01.0331 Inventaire Des Archives De Jan Vansina
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Evidence from the Kuba Kingdom*
The Evolution of Culture and Institutions:Evidence from the Kuba Kingdom* Sara Lowes† Nathan Nunn‡ James A. Robinson§ Jonathan Weigel¶ 16 November 2015 Abstract: We use variation in historical state centralization to examine the impact of institutions on cultural norms. The Kuba Kingdom, established in Central Africa in the early 17th century by King Shyaam, had more developed state institutions than the other independent villages and chieftaincies in the region. It had an unwritten constitution, separation of political powers, a judicial system with courts and juries, a police force and military, taxation, and significant public goods provision. Comparing individuals from the Kuba Kingdom to those from just outside the Kingdom, we find that centralized formal institutions are associated with weaker norms of rule-following and a greater propensity to cheat for material gain. Keywords: Culture, values, institutions, state centralization. JEL Classification: D03,N47. *A number of individuals provided valuable help during the project. We thank Anne Degrave, James Diderich, Muana Kasongo, Eduardo Montero, Roger Makombo, Jim Mukenge, Eva Ng, Matthew Summers, Adam Xu, and Jonathan Yantzi. For comments, we thank Ran Abramitzky, Chris Blattman, Jean Ensminger, James Fenske, Raquel Fernandez, Carolina Ferrerosa-Young, Avner Greif, Joseph Henrich, Karla Hoff, Christine Kenneally, Alexey Makarin, Anselm Rink, Noam Yuchtman, as well as participants at numerous conferences and seminars. We gratefully acknowledge funding from the Pershing Square Venture Fund for Research on the Foundations of Human Behavior and the National Science Foundation (NSF). †Harvard University. (email: [email protected]) ‡Harvard University, NBER and BREAD. (email: [email protected]) §University of Chicago, NBER, and BREAD. -
The Rwandan Genocide: Combating Stereotypes And
The Rwandan Genocide: Combating Stereotypes and Understanding the Origins Nicola Skakel Senior Honors Thesis Department of History April 9th 2018 Defense Committee: Dr. Susan K. Kent, Department of History, Primary Advisor Dr. Matthew Gerber, Department of History, Honors Council Representative Dr. Paul Shankman, Department of Anthropology, Advisor 1 Introduction On the 7th of April 1994, the small east African country of Rwanda erupted into one of the most deadly and intimate genocides the modern world had ever witnessed. Whilst the western world stood by and watched in just 100 days over 800,000 Rwandans out of a total population of 7 million, were systematically murdered in the most brutal and violent of ways. Those who were targeted made up the country’s minority ethnic group the Tutsis, and moderates from the majority group, the Hutus. For many, the legacy of Rwanda is a monstrous example of extreme pent up ethnic tensions that has its roots in European colonialism. In contrast, I will argue that the events not just of 1994 but also the unrest that proceeded it, arose from a highly complex culmination of long-standing historical tensions between ethnic groups that long pre-dated colonialism. In conjunction, a set of short-term triggers including foreign intervention, civil war, famine, state terrorism and ultimately the assassination of President Habyarimana also contributed to the outburst of genocide in 1994. Whilst it would be easy to place sole responsibility on European colonists for implementing a policy of divide and rule and therefore exacerbating ethnic tensions, it seems to me that genocide is never that cut and dried: it can never be explained by one factor. -
Power and Politics in Precolonial Rwanda
DYNAMICS OF DISCOURSE: POWER AND POLITICS IN PRECOLONIAL RWANDA _______________________________________ A Thesis presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School at the University of Missouri-Columbia _______________________________________________________ In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts _____________________________________________________ by COLIN MCMILLIN Dr. Robert M. Baum, Thesis Supervisor DECEMBER 2014 The undersigned, appointed by the dean of the Graduate School, have examined the thesis entitled DYNAMICS OF DISCOURSE: POWER AND CULTURE IN PRECOLONIAL RWANDA presented by Colin McMillin a candidate for the degree of Master of Arts, and hereby certify that, in their opinion, it is worthy of acceptance. Professor Robert M. Baum Professor Nathan C. Hofer Professor Ibitola Pearce ACKNOWLEDGMENTS For the guidance, support, and encouragement without which this work would never have been able to exist, I wish to thank first and foremost Robert M. Baum, who invited and introduced me to the study of African religions and who was chair of my thesis defense committee. Thanks also to the other committee members, Nathan C. Hofer, Ibitola Pearce, and Dennis F. Kelley. Additionally, for help and advice in this and other aspects of the academic field of religion, thanks to Richard J. Callahan, Rabia Gregory, Justin Arft, Nathan Desrosiers, Bob Flanagan, Daniel Cohen, Signe Cohen, Edward Drott, and my other professors and friends in the Religious Studies Department at the University of Missouri-Columbia. Each of you has contributed along the way to my thinking about this problem and about the field of religion in general. Thank you all. ii TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgments………………………………………………………………………...ii Introduction: Re-framing the Conflict between “Tutsi” and “Hutu” ................................ -
Chapter One Chapter
Notes Chapter One 1. This narrative of events is taken from the official government report, as reported in the Ugandan newspaper The Monitor (18 January 2002, 13). 2. For good discussions of Kabila’s life and his early career as a rebel leader, see Kennes 1999 and Wilungula 1997. 3. Hall also notes that: “Precisely because identities are constructed within, not outside, discourse, we need to understand them as produced in specific historical and institutional sites within specific discursive formations and practices, by enunciative strategies. Moreover, they emerge within the play of specific modalities of power” (Hall 1996, 4). 4. My use of discourse and discourse analysis is drawn from the works of Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida, Ernesto Laclau, and Chantal Mouffe, who accept that a discourse is a relational totality of signifying sequences that together constitute a more or less coherent framework for what can be said and done. 5. Enunciating this Gramscian interpretation, Stuart Hall argues: “It becomes the horizon of the taken-for-granted: what the world is and how it works, for all practical purposes. Ruling ideas may dominate other conceptions of the social world by setting the limit to what will appear as rational, reasonable, credible, indeed sayable or thinkable, within the given vocabularies of motive and action available to us” (Hall 1988, 44). Chapter Two 1. Mehmed Emin Pasha, a German explorer, was the governor of an Egyptian province in the Sudan, but had been cut off from contact with Europe by a Mahdist revolt. Stanley left from Zanzibar with over eight hundred men and, after months of forced march and hunger, found Emin Pasha. -
Towards a History of Mass Violence in the Etat Indépendant Du Congo, 1885-1908
This is a repository copy of Towards a History of Mass Violence in the Etat Indépendant du Congo, 1885-1908. White Rose Research Online URL for this paper: http://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/74340/ Article: Roes, Aldwin (2010) Towards a History of Mass Violence in the Etat Indépendant du Congo, 1885-1908. South African Historical Journal, 62 (4). pp. 634-670. ISSN 0258-2473 https://doi.org/10.1080/02582473.2010.519937 Reuse Unless indicated otherwise, fulltext items are protected by copyright with all rights reserved. The copyright exception in section 29 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 allows the making of a single copy solely for the purpose of non-commercial research or private study within the limits of fair dealing. The publisher or other rights-holder may allow further reproduction and re-use of this version - refer to the White Rose Research Online record for this item. Where records identify the publisher as the copyright holder, users can verify any specific terms of use on the publisher’s website. Takedown If you consider content in White Rose Research Online to be in breach of UK law, please notify us by emailing [email protected] including the URL of the record and the reason for the withdrawal request. [email protected] https://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/ Towards a History of Mass Violence in the Etat Indépendant du Congo, 1885-1908* Aldwin Roes UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD Although the „atrocities of epical proportions‟ in the Etat Indépendant du Congo (EIC, Congo Free State) are „legendary‟, no up to date scholarly introduction to the issue is currently available1. -
Blood Rubber*
Blood Rubber* Sara Lowes† Eduardo Montero‡ Bocconi University, IGIER, and CIFAR Harvard University 27 November 2017 Most Recent Version Here Abstract: We examine the legacy of one of the most extreme examples of colonial extraction, the rubber concessions granted to private companies under King Leopold II in the Congo Free State, the present-day Democratic Republic of Congo. The companies used violent tactics to force villagers to collect rubber. Village chiefs were co-opted into supporting the rubber regime, and villagers were severely punished if they did not meet the rubber quotas. We use a regression discontinuity design along the well-defined boundaries of the ABIR and Anversoise concessions to show that historical exposure to the rubber concessions causes significantly worse education, wealth, and health outcomes. We then use survey and experimental data collected along a former concession boundary to examine effects on local institutions and culture. We find a negative effect on local institutional quality and a positive effect on culture. Consistent with the historical co-option of chiefs by the concession companies, village chiefs within the former concessions are more likely to be hereditary, rather than elected, and they provide fewer public goods. However, individuals within the concessions are more trusting, more cohesive, and more supportive of sharing income. The results suggest that colonial extraction may have different effects on institutions and culture. Keywords: Africa, development, culture, institutions, colonialism. JEL Classification: O15,N47,D72,O43,Z13. * We thank Alberto Alesina, Robert Bates, Alberto Bisin, Melissa Dell, James Feigenbaum, James Fenske, Claudia Goldin, Robert Harms, Adam Hochschild, Richard Hornbeck, Stelios Michalopoulos, Nathan Nunn, Rohini Pande, James A. -
Towards a History of Mass Violence in the Etat Indépendant Du Congo, 1885-1908*
!∀ !∀ #∃ % & ∋ ( )∗ +, − . / !%0012%3 04 ∀ ∋ 5 !6∃#& 626 ,447 ∃102∃ 8 /% % 0 ∃10∃∃ % 1%33 # ∃ % 9 Towards a History of Mass Violence in the Etat Indépendant du Congo, 1885-1908* Aldwin Roes UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD Although the „atrocities of epical proportions‟ in the Etat Indépendant du Congo (EIC, Congo Free State) are „legendary‟, no up to date scholarly introduction to the issue is currently available1. In providing such an overview, the present article aims to offer a point of access to the extensive literature and historical debates on the subject, while also making the case for exchanging the currently prevalent top-down narrative, with its excessive focus on King Leopold‟s character and motives, for one which considers the EIC‟s culture of violence as a multicausal, broadly based and deeply engrained social phenomenon2. The coherence of the „Congo Atrocities‟ as a clearly definable and bounded historical phenomenon owes as much to the humanitarian campaign mounted to denounce their occurrence as to the nature of the events themselves3. Reformers, and historians after them, have mainly focused on those features of the Leopoldian regime which violated the emerging international norms of colonial government, in particular those associated with * My sincere thanks go to Daniel Vangroenweghe, Jean-Luc Vellut, David Newbury and the four anonymous referees for their insightful comments on an earlier draft of this paper. 1 O. Likaka, Naming Colonialism: History and Collective Memory in the Congo, 1870-1960 (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2009), 35; K. Grant, A Civilized Savagery. Britain and the New Slaveries in Africa, 1884-1926 (New York: Routledge, 2005), 29. -
History of Centralization and Kingship in Sub-Saharan-Africa," the Omnipedia Review: Vol
The Omnipedia Review Volume 1 | Issue 1 Article 4 2019 History of Centralization and Kingship in Sub- Saharan-Africa Ibrahim Kante Longwood University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.longwood.edu/omni Part of the Arts and Humanities Commons Recommended Citation Kante, Ibrahim (2019) "History of Centralization and Kingship in Sub-Saharan-Africa," The Omnipedia Review: Vol. 1 : Iss. 1 , Article 4. Available at: https://digitalcommons.longwood.edu/omni/vol1/iss1/4 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Digital Commons @ Longwood University. It has been accepted for inclusion in The Omnipedia Review by an authorized editor of Digital Commons @ Longwood University. For more information, please contact [email protected], [email protected]. Kante: Kingship in Sub-Saharan-Africa History of Centralization and Kingship in Sub-Saharan-Africa Ibrahim Kante Longwood University Introduction Rwanda, a small land-locked country, has a very long and complex history, dating back to the precolonial period. Unlike most Sub-Saharan countries, numerous anthropologists and scholars have dedicated their time to uncovering and preserving Rwanda’s history. They have provided solid research and new interpretations on a topic filled with controversy over its social structure. Given the richness of the historical literature, Rwanda will serve as a case study for an analysis of the history of centralization and kingship in Sub- Saharan-Africa. The focus on political centralization is paramount in this study. First, every constitutional government, to a variable extent, necessitates centralization to operate properly. Even the central/federal power needs to exert authority over its decentralized constituencies. -
JAN VANSINA (1929–2017) David Newbury
David Newbury: OBITUARY JAN VANSINA JAN VANSINA (1929–2017) David Newbury Jan Vansina, a pioneering historian whose vast corpus of work transformed our understanding of African history—and the history of many other areas—died on February 8, 2017, in Madison, Wisconsin. He was 87. Trained in Belgium and Britain as both a medieval historian and a social anthropologist, Vansina began his work in the Belgian Congo in 1952, where he worked among the Kuba peoples of south-central Congo. From his work among the Kuba he published six books, ranging from linguistic studies and ethnographies to historical works on various periods of Kuba history. That fieldwork also served as the foundation for five other books of broader scope on the region, as well as for the insights that fundamentally altered the discipline of history in the late twentieth century. While working with Kuba elders, he came to realize that their oral testimonies not only provided accounts of the past, but when carefully analysed could be subjected to the same rigour of analysis that applied to all other historical sources. Reinforcing these insights by later work in Rwanda and Burundi—his second major pole of fieldwork—Vansina published a work that transformed the field, by dramatically expanding the source material of the discipline and by bringing into scholars’ understanding of historical process whole classes of actors hitherto neglected in historical analysis—colonised people, peasants, women, workers—all those omitted from the archives of written records on the past. The insight that these people have histories too—indeed, that all people have histories—and the inclusion of these people as historical actors in their own right, reconfigured historians’ understanding of the past in dramatic ways. -
King Leopold Ii‟S Exploitation of the Congo from 1885 to 1908 and Its Consequences
KING LEOPOLD II‟S EXPLOITATION OF THE CONGO FROM 1885 TO 1908 AND ITS CONSEQUENCES by STEVEN P. JOHNSON A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Honors in the Major Program in History in the College of Arts and Humanities and in The Burnett Honors College at the University of Central Florida Orlando, Florida Summer Term 2014 Thesis Chair: Dr. Ezekiel Walker ABSTRACT This thesis argues that King Leopold II, in his exploitation of the Congo, dealt the Congo a future of political, ethnic, and economic destabilization. At one time consisting of unified and advanced kingdoms, the Congo turned to one completely beleaguered by poverty and political oppression. Leopold acquired the Congo through unethical means and thus took the people‟s chances away at self-rule. He provided for no education or vocational training, which would stunt future Congolese leaders from making sound economic and political policies. Leopold also exploited the Congo with the help of concession companies, both of which used forced labor to extract valuable resources. Millions of Congolese died and the Congo itself became indebted through Belgian loans that were given with no assurance they could ever truly be paid back due to the crippled economy of the Congo. With the Congo now in crippling debt, the current president, Joseph Kabila, has little incentive to invest in reforms or public infrastructure, which stunts economic growth.1 For over a century the Congo has been ruled by exploitative and authoritarian regimes due to Leopold‟s initial acquisition. The colonization from Leopold lasted from 1885-1908, and then he sold it to his home country of Belgium who ruled the Congo from 1908 to 1960. -
The Congo Free State, in Search of the Historical Truth
The Congo Free State, In Search of the Historical Truth Elevator pitch For the first time the history of Congo Free State is presented on the basis of documents from direct eyewitnesses of the time and following an approach based on the constituent elements as existing in every State (genesis and international recognition, authorities, legislative, executive and judiciary, population, public order, setting the borders, etc.) Short description Today’s Democratic Republic of the Congo has its origins in the sovereign pre-colonial state known as the Congo Free State (CFS). The CFS itself emerged following the dramatic birth of the kingdom of Belgium in 1830 and reactions to William I of Orange’ s armed forces invading Belgium in August 1831. The Dutch assault had revealed the precariousness of Belgian resources, compared to countries which had already acquired the greater part of their colonial empires in Africa and elsewhere by that time. This prompted Leopold I to look for means of replacing the assets lost during the separation from Holland. Using his own funds, he financed several expeditions and attempts at settling in Central America and Africa – albeit without success – and passed this ideal on to his son, Leopold II, who would succeed him on 17 December 1865. The expeditions organized by the new king were equally unfruitful, however. That was until Anglo-American explorer Henry M. Stanley was rather poorly received in London following a memorable east-to-west crossing of the African continent in 1877. This snub led him to respond to an invitation from Leopold II, who agreed to fund the famous explorer’s further expeditions. -
Pluriarcs in the Sub-Saharan Africa Collection of the Weltmuseum Wien
View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Repository of the Academy's Library József Brauer-Benke Pluriarcs in the Sub-Saharan Africa Collection of the Weltmuseum Wien Pluriarcs consist of several smaller musical bows which are affixed to a resonator body. Following Sachs’s classification, this type of instrument is called Bogenlaute and bow-lute in German and English academic writing respectively (Sachs 1929: 157, 1940:94). French the term pluriarc, coined by Montandon, has become widely used (Montandon 1934: 35). In the inventory of sub-Saharan African collection of the Vienna Museum of Ethnology, the pluriarcs recorded with names given by their collectors or the responsible curators and appear as Bogenharfe, Bogenlaute, Harfe, Guitarre, Zither or simply Saiteninstrument (stringed instrument).1 Although the playing technique of some pluriarc types is similar to that of the lute, which may explain the name bow-lute, the strings of this musical instrument do not run parallel to each other above a straight neck, as in the case of lutes, but share the morphological features of musical bows. Consequently, it is more appropriate to use the Latin-based French term pluriarc (meaning several bows). According to Schaeffner’s hypothesis, pluriarcs presumably have their origins in Ancient Egypt and may have developed from musical bows affixed to the resonator body of sub-Saharan African bow harps (Schaeffner 1936: 185). However, pluriarcs are first mentioned only in the 16th century and thus the possibility that this type of musical instrument developed over a prolonged time in that era cannot be ruled out.