International Journal of Conflict and Violence (IJCV - Universität Bielefeld)
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A Reappraisal of the Expulsion of Illegal Immigrants from Nigeria in 1983
Full text linkIn recent years, Nigeria has been quietly expelling more and more immigrants from Niger, Mali, Chad and Cameroon. These foreigners – migrant workers or small traders – face the reinforcement of migration control and the blind fight of the government against Boko Haram. Despite its political instability, Nigeria remains a major immigration destination in West Africa. In this article, I analyze the “undocumented” expulsion of aliens in 1983, officially three million people. I argue that the expulsion was due to the economic crisis but also to a nationalist revenge against Ghana and a political calculation of President Shagari. This implies the exclusion of foreigners from the national labour market and the weakening of the supposed electoral base of his opponents
Protecting the “Most Vulnerable”? The Management of a Disaster and the Making/Unmaking of Victims after the 2008 Xenophobic Violence in South Africa
Full text linkIn 2008, South Africa witnessed a bout of xenophobic violence, requiring the state to declare a disaster to manage a massive displacement of migrants and foreigners. How did the South African state come to care for these populations, whereas it had previously sought to avoid providing protection to foreigners, and was seen as responsible for fostering xenophobia, if not violence? Analyzing the management of the disaster at the local level (in Cape Town), and the various discourses and mobilizations involved in it, this article shows how widespread violence and displacement rendered migrant vulnerabilities visible in the urban space and forced the state to temporarily recognize and protect those who became seen as “victims.” It also questions the idea that xenophobia and failure to comply with international norms were responsible for the lack of protection of migrants and foreigners. Rather, it is the kind of protection displayed, restricted to the “most vulnerable,” that failed to address the root causes of the violence and envision broader social integration issues. The article provides further theorization on what it means to treat violence as disaster and points out to the need to envisage critically humanitarian and social assistance by including them in broader welfare patterns
Violent Caracas. A Socio-economic and Political Approach to Understand Urban Violence in Contemporary Venezuela
No full textThe worrisome panorama of increasing homicide rates in Venezuela requires to review critically the different theoretical approaches that explain the roots of violent crime in Latin American urban conglomerates. Such paradigms, based on the relationship among violence and inequality, exclusion, and social marginalization, seem to be inaccurate to comprehend the scope and dimensions of the problem in contemporary Venezuela. An alternative approach suggests to review the socio-political causes of violence in polarized societies, such as it is observable in the selected case during the Hugo Chávez\u27s government (1999-2013). The research focuses on the city of Caracas, as epicenter of the political life of the country, and where the highest levels of socio-economic segregation, urban poverty, and violent crime are observable. A historical, theoretical, and empirical analysis is presented to describe the process of transformation of Caracas in an extremely violent city; to further delve into the explanations of the origins and causes of urban violence in Venezuela, from a combined approach which links violent crime with inequality and social exclusion, and with political legitimacy and social polarization during the Bolivarian Revolution times
The Secret Society of Torturers: The Social Shaping of Extremely Violent Behaviour
Full text linkHow do normal people become able to torture others? In order to explain this puzzling social phenomenon, we have to take secrecy – the characteristic trait of modern torture – as the lynchpin of the analysis. Following Georg Simmel’s formal analysis of the “secret society”, the contribution reconstructs structural and cultural aspects of the secret society of torturers that generate social processes that allow its members to behave extremely violently, forcing individuals to turn into torturers. The contribution argues that the form of social behaviour that we call torture is socially shaped. It goes beyond social psychology to develop an explanation from the perspective of relational sociology
Torture as Theatre in Papua
Full text linkConceptualised as theatre, this article examines 431 codified cases of torture in Papua during 1963-2010 as well as 214 testimonies of torture survivors, state actors and third parties in order to explore the interplay and dynamics of four interrelated elements: rationalities that underpin the web of power relations, techniques of domination, actors with their multiple and fluid identities as well as their motivational postures. Theatricality proffers a new analytical lens to examine half a century of state-sponsored brutality surrounded by virtually complete impunity and denials which leaves a little space to escape the theatre. It discloses ‘the art of government,’ the way the Indonesia state exhibits its sovereign power to govern Papua
A Gender Perspective on State Support for Crime Victims in Switzerland
Full text linkViolence causes physical and mental harm to others, and victims must find ways of coping with their injuries. Since the middle of the 20th century, the effects of violence and crime on the victim have become an increasingly important topic in politics and society. Many countries in the industrialised world have enacted programmes and laws designed to uphold the needs and rights of victims. Such steps were taken, e.g., in New Zealand in 1963, in the UK in 1964 and in Germany in 1976. The Swiss Victims of Crime Act (VCA) has been in place since 1993. It guarantees free legal, medical, psychological and social counselling, as well as some financial compensation for victims of violent crime. Comparatively, it is presently one of the most encompassing laws applied with regards to victim support legislation. It stipulates that victims of violence are to be offered quick and efficient support in specialised, state-subsidised counselling centres. This paper applies a gender perspective to the field of criminology and victim support to unpack the paradox, that according to the statistics men experience violence acts more often than women, yet receive support less often through Swiss victim support counselling centres
Collective Mobilization and the Struggle for Squatter Citizenship: Rereading “Xenophobic” Violence in a South African Settlement
Full text linkGiven the association between informal residence and the occurrence of “xenophobic” violence in South Africa, this article examines “xenophobic violence” through a political account of two squatter settlements across the transition to democracy: Jeffsville and Brazzaville on the informal periphery of Atteridgeville, Gauteng. Using the concepts of political identity, living politics and insurgent citizenship, the paper mines past and present to explore identities, collective practices and expertise whose legacy can be traced in contemporary mobilization against foreigners, particularly at times of popular protest. I suggest that the category of the “surplus person”, which originated in the apartheid era, lives on in the unfinished transition of squatter citizens to formal urban inclusion incontemporary South Africa. The political salience of this legacy of superfluity is magnified at times of protest, not only through the claims made on the state, but also through the techniques for protest mobilization, which both activate and manufacture identities based on common suffering and civic labour. In the informal settlements of Jeffsville and Brazzaville, these identities polarised insurgent citizens from non-citizen newcomers, particularly those traders whose business-as-usual practices during times of protest appeared as evidence of their indifference and lack of reciprocity precisely at times when shared suffering and commitment were produced as defining qualities of the squatter community
The Domestic Democratic Peace in the Middle East
Full text linkThe democratic peace theory has two complementary variants regarding intrastate conflicts: the “democratic civil peace” thesis sees democratic regimes as pacifying internal tensions; the “anocratic war” thesis submits that due to nationalism, democratizing regimes breed internal violence. This paper statistically tests the two propositions in the context of the contemporary Middle East and North Africa (MENA). We show that a MENA democracy makes a country more prone to both the onset and incidence of civil war, even if democracy is controlled for, and that the more democratic a MENA state is, the more likely it is to experience violent intrastate strife. Interestingly, anocracies do not seem to be predisposed to civil war, either worldwide or in MENA. Looking for causality beyond correlation, we suggest that “democratizing nationalism” might be a long-term prerequisite for peace and democracy, not just an immediate hindrance. We also advise complementing current research on intrastate and interstate clashes with the study of intercommunal conflicts and the democratic features of non-state polities