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Commerer 2016 Crippling the Will of a People NO THIRD PARTY

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Commerer 2016 Crippling the Will of a People NO THIRD PARTY CRIPPLING THE WILL OF A PEOPLE: MORPHOSTATIC STRUCTURES OF VIOLENCE AND THE CRAWL-SPACE OF AGENCY IN THE LIVES OF ERITREAN REFUGEES [title image removed due to copyright] JARED COMMERER A THESIS SUBMITTED TO VICTORIA UNIVERSITY OF WELLINGTON IN FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTERS OF ARTS IN CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY VICTORIA UNIVERSITY OF WELLINGTON 2016 ABSTRACT In conjunction with an exposition of the larger historical and political context of the nation of Eritrea, this thesis examines the life narratives of five refugees hailing from the Horn of Africa. In doing so, certain institutional, relational, and embodied forms of violence are identified as permeating Eritrea’s socio-political fabric and thus also the inter- and intra-personal lives of the participants. Where morphostatic structures are deemed as those that constrain an individual’s capacity to pursue their ultimate concerns, it is maintained that violence in the form of extreme nationalism, routinised fear, and varying subjective affects partially accounts for the fact that an estimated 5,000 people are fleeing this small, modernising African nation every month. Following this, I argue that, by examining the life-narratives of Eritrean refugees, violence can be understood as transpiring at the interstices of an ongoing – albeit skewed – dialectic between, on one hand, morphostatic structures of violence appearing in institutional, relational, and embodied forms, and, on the other, a degree of mimetic agency that, when harnessed, acts as a crawl-space through which individuals – if they are to realise their ultimate concerns – must absent themselves relative to such structures of violence. iii iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS My highest thanks and unremitting gratitude go to the participants whose stories are outlined in this thesis. On the far side of the personal gains that have come my way via undertaking such a project – and if the act of storytelling can be considered a “vital human strategy for sustaining a sense of agency in the face of disempowering circumstances” – I hope that those who took the time to share their lives with me have, in doing so, also benefitted in some small way. Throughout the course of this thesis, my supervisors – Catherine Trundle and Jeff Sissons – have been an unshakable form of encouragement and guidance. In particular, Catherine’s ongoing support – including during the period leading up to the commencement of this thesis – has been vital in my seeing the project through to completion—her consistent generosity and compassion does not go unnoticed. I hope that my persistent slew of questions and rejoinders during supervisor meetings have been interpreted as anthropological curiosity and emancipatory commitment, not parochial arrogance(!). I would like to thank Sandra Grey and Charles Sedgwick for the many opportunities they provided me relevant to research experience and critical insight over the years preceding the outset of this thesis. Also, thanks to Diane O’Rourke for assistance during the formative stages of the project. Outside the immediate arena of my anthropological interests, many thanks to Sanjay Dixit and John Psathas for sustained friend- and mentor-ship over the years; it was through conversations with John that I eventually turned directly toward the anthropology of war, conflict, and violence. As always, my lucidity is maintained via copious amounts of coffee and tangential conversation with Luke and the Clapham family, Lisa Gregg, and Oksana Pudailo. Also, much love goes to Anna Lehman, Stefane Guercio Bin, and Riley Kinnunen for their own reciprocal love from afar. Thanks to Karen Pashley for assisting by way of providing the physical space that solitude necessitates. Lastly, I would like to proffer deep bows and appreciation to Marguerite Agnès Tercier for appearing at the right time – “Society—That’s true! I can’t believe it…” v ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .......................................................................................... v LIST OF FIGURES ................................................................................................. viii LIST OF TABLES ................................................................................................... viii LIST OF NOTES .................................................................................................... viii INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................................... 1 § 1 Crippling the will of a people .................................................................................... 1 § 2 Eritrea: a history of violence coalescing in crimes against humanity ....................... 3 § 3 Anthropological perspectives on war, conflict, and violence ................................... 4 § 4 Chapter outline ......................................................................................................... 7 METHODOLOGY ................................................................................................... 11 § 1 Preamble ................................................................................................................. 11 § 2 Reflexivity & anthropology ...................................................................................... 12 § 3 Critical realist ontology ........................................................................................... 15 § 4 Topic selection & methods ...................................................................................... 18 PART I The genesis of violenCe ............................................................................. 23 CHAPTER 1 The ChroniCity of Eritrea’s violent past: partiCipant introductions and pre- independenCe Eritrea ......................................................................................................... 25 § 1 Preamble ................................................................................................................. 25 § 2 Participant introductions: a narrative overview ..................................................... 26 § 3 Eritrea – a brief history: from antiquity to independence ...................................... 31 § 4 Chapter 1 summary ................................................................................................ 40 CHAPTER 2 “Take us to the front, mate; give us the gun”: formative narratives and post-independenCe Eritrea ................................................................................................. 41 § 1 Preamble ................................................................................................................. 41 § 2 The harbingers of extreme nationalism .................................................................. 41 § 3 Childhood, rumour, and self-sacrifice ..................................................................... 43 § 4 Militarism, repression, and the denial of democracy ............................................. 47 § 5 National service: moral obligation or fallacious coercion? ..................................... 48 § 6 The Ethiopia-Eritrea border war, 1998-2000 .......................................................... 49 § 7 Disappearance ........................................................................................................ 50 § 8 Enduring suppression and ‘no war, no peace’ ........................................................ 52 § 9 A state of emergency and indefinite conscription .................................................. 54 vi § 10 The ‘North Korea of Africa’ ................................................................................... 56 § 11 Chapter 2 summary .............................................................................................. 57 PART II The perpetuation of violenCe ................................................................... 61 CHAPTER 3 ‘Middle period’ narratives I ....................................................................... 63 § 1 National service, mimetic deception, and a universe of fantasy ............................ 63 § 2 Dis-/trust, risk, and interrogation ........................................................................... 72 § 3 Chapter 3 summary ................................................................................................ 81 CHAPTER 4 ‘Middle period’ narratives II ...................................................................... 83 § 1 Animalistic anaesthesia ........................................................................................... 83 § 2 “If you wanna be successful in your life, you have to be corrupt like them” ......... 86 § 3 Fractured families and the “useless” by-products of war ....................................... 91 § 4 Chapter 4 summary ................................................................................................ 94 PART III The subjeCtive reverberations of violenCe ............................................... 97 CHAPTER 5 ViolenCe, subjectivity, and resettlement ................................................... 99 § 1 Forgiving The Devil .................................................................................................. 99 § 2 Repeated ruptures and the subjective residue of imprisonment ......................... 100 § 3 Reflection, bare-life, and ‘the secret life of the state’ .........................................
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