scholarly journals ""In the case of Africa in general, there is a tendency to exaggerate”: Representing Mass atrocity Coverage in Africa"

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Siguru james Wahutu
Keyword(s):  
Print Media ◽  
Social Location ◽  
Mass Violence ◽  
Mass Atrocity ◽  
Nuanced Understanding

*Pre-Print abstract*Based on an analysis of print media and journalists’ interviews, thisarticle examines the representation of atrocity and mass violence inAfrica. It specifically focuses on the atrocities in Darfur and Rwanda andcompares African and western coverage of them. It argues that sincerepresentations (just as the knowledge that anchors them) are highlydependent on one’s social location it is necessary to understand multiplerepresentations of the same atrocity. Though literature on representationof Africa has been critical of western representations of Africa, thisarticle argues that including African representations of the same providesfor a more nuanced understanding.

‘In the case of Africa in general, there is a tendency to exaggerate’: representing mass atrocity in Africa

2017 ◽  
Vol 39 (6) ◽  
pp. 919-929 ◽  
Author(s):  
J Siguru Wahutu
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Print Media ◽  
Multiple Representations ◽  
Interview Data ◽  
Social Location ◽  
Mass Violence ◽  
Mass Atrocity ◽  
Nuanced Understanding

Based on an analysis of print media and journalists’ interviews, this article examines the representation of atrocity and mass violence in Africa. It specifically focuses on the atrocities in Darfur and Rwanda and compares African and Western coverage of them. It argues that since representations (just as the knowledge that anchors them) are highly dependent on one’s social location, it is necessary to understand multiple representations of the same atrocity. Although the literature on representation of Africa has been critical of Western representations of Africa, this article argues that including African representations of the same provides for a more nuanced understanding. It uses interview data from Kenya and South Africa, both of which have had peacekeeping engagements in Sudan. Kenya and South Africa also have media fields that are more robust and freer than many other countries in the continent.

The sequence form of accounting for atrocity

2021 ◽  
pp. 175069802110179
Author(s):  
Meredith Kimenyi Shepard
Keyword(s):  
Original Work ◽  
Alternative Form ◽  
Mass Violence ◽  
Mass Atrocity ◽  
New Form ◽  
Poetry Collection

Discussions of aesthetic representations of mass atrocity have tended to focus on a particular form—the atrocity allegory—that figures a collective horror through the narrative of an individual protagonist. This essay outlines some of the limits of the atrocity allegory and then examines an alternative form of denoting collective horror, the sequence, through two examples of sequential representation of the genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda: Juliane Okot Bitek’s poetry collection 100 Days and Wangechi Mutu’s photography essay #100Days. I argue that the sequence offers a radically different method of conceptualizing mass violence than the atrocity allegory by forcing the audience to confront multiple, intimate portraits of loss in quick succession. Unlike the allegory, the sequence does not require the audience to extrapolate from the singular to the collective, as the plurality of sequencing performs that link between individual and collective on its own. I furthermore suggest that the atrocity sequence inspires collaboration and activism by inviting audiences to continue the sequence in a new form where the original work ends, a continuation made possible by the sequence form’s resistance to closure.

Doing Justice to History

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barrie Sander
Keyword(s):  
International Criminal ◽  
Historical Narratives ◽  
Criminal Courts ◽  
Mass Violence ◽  
The Past ◽  
Institutional Settings ◽  
Historical Justice ◽  
Mass Atrocity ◽  
Historical Accounts ◽  
Historical Function

As communities—both local and international—have struggled to make sense of mass atrocity situations, expectations have increasingly been placed on international criminal courts to render authoritative historical accounts of the episodes of mass violence that fall within their purview. Taking these expectations as its point of departure, Doing Justice to History seeks to understand international criminal courts through the prism of their historical function—critically examining how such courts confront the past by constructing historical narratives concerning both the culpability of the accused on trial and the broader mass atrocity contexts in which they are alleged to have participated. The book argues that international criminal courts are host to struggles for historical justice, discursive contests between different actors vying for judicial acknowledgement of their preferred interpretations of the past. By examining these struggles within different institutional settings, the book surfaces the legitimating qualities of international criminal judgments—illuminating, in particular, what tends to be foregrounded and included within, as well as marginalised and excluded from, the narratives of international criminal courts in practice. What emerges from this account is a sense of the significance of thinking about the emancipatory limits and possibilities of international criminal courts in terms of the historical narratives that are constructed and contested both within and beyond the courtroom in different institutional and societal contexts.

Beyond the Purview of International Criminal Judgments

2021 ◽  
pp. 250-275
Author(s):  
Barrie Sander
Keyword(s):  
Financial Institutions ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
International Financial Institutions ◽  
Criminal Courts ◽  
Mass Violence ◽  
Mass Atrocity ◽  
Peacekeeping Forces ◽  
Slow Violence ◽  
International Peacekeeping ◽  
Forms Of Violence

This chapter examines three aspects of mass atrocity situations that have generally received little or no attention within the judgments of international criminal courts: first, the structural and slow violence that tends to exist prior to, during, and after the outbreak of situations of mass atrocity; second, the interventions of international actors, including the policies and practices of colonial powers, international financial institutions, and international peacekeeping forces; and finally, the roles performed by bystander communities and resisters during episodes of mass violence. By highlighting these blind spots, the chapter directs attention to the narrative limits of international criminal courts and highlights the risk that their judgments may undermine more nuanced understandings of human agency in mass atrocity contexts, whilst legitimating some of the structural and slow forms of violence and international interventions that they marginalise or exclude.

Atrocity Speech Law

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gregory S. Gordon
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Hate Speech ◽  
Large Body ◽  
Case Law ◽  
Legal Framework ◽  
Crimes Against Humanity ◽  
Government Officials ◽  
Mass Violence ◽  
Mass Atrocity ◽  
The Individual

Hate speech is widely considered a precondition for mass atrocity. Since World War II a large body of case law has interpreted the key offenses criminalizing such discourse: (1) incitement to genocide; and (2) persecution as a crime against humanity. But the law has developed in a fragmented manner. Surprisingly, no volume has furnished a comprehensive analysis of the entire jurisprudential output and the relation of each of its parts to one another and to the whole. Atrocity Speech Law fills this gap and provides needed perspective for courts, government officials, and scholars. Part 1, “Foundation,” explores the historical relationship between speech and atrocity and the foundations of the current legal framework. Part 2, “Fragmentation,” details the discrepancies and deficiencies within that framework. Part 3, “Fruition,” proposes fixes for the individual speech offenses and suggests a more comprehensive solution: a “Unified Liability Theory,” pursuant to which there would be four criminal modalities placed in one statutory provision and applying to genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes: (1) incitement; (2) speech abetting; (3) instigation; and (4) ordering. Apart from the issue of fragmentation, experts have failed to find an accurate designation for this body of law. “International Incitement Law” and “International Hate Speech Law,” two of the typical labels, do not capture the law’s breadth or its proper relationship to mass violence. So with a more holistic and accurate approach in mind, this book proposes a new name for the overall body of international rules and jurisprudence: “atrocity speech law.”

Contextualizing mass atrocity crimes: The dynamics of ‘extremely violent societies’

2012 ◽  
Vol 9 (5) ◽  
pp. 499-513 ◽  
Author(s):  
Susanne Karstedt
Keyword(s):  
Pattern Analysis ◽  
Mass Violence ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Mass Atrocity ◽  
Atrocity Crimes

Mass violence and genocidal events are presently characterized by new patterns that clearly set them apart from previous genocides and mass atrocities. These changes in the nature of mass atrocity events have necessarily shifted perspectives and conceptualizations of genocide and mass atrocities. Gerlach’s (2006, 2010) concept of ‘extremely violent societies’ seeks to deconstruct conventional understandings of genocidal mass violence and to re-contextualize it within a larger framework of conflict and in the ‘grassroots nature’ of other types of violence from which these events emerge. Based on his concept, I constructed a ‘Violent Societies Index’ (VSI), which offers a new approach to the multifaceted nature of contemporary mass violence and provides a new tool for a contextual and pattern analysis: it is the ‘how’ of extreme levels of violence that is addressed rather than the ‘why’.

scholarly journals R2P and Prevention: The International Community and Its Role in the Determinants of Mass Atrocity

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-36
Author(s):  
Alexandra Bohm ◽  
Garrett Wallace Brown
Keyword(s):  
International Community ◽  
Responsibility To Protect ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Structural Determinants ◽  
Mass Violence ◽  
Preventative Measures ◽  
Mass Atrocity ◽  
Short Termism

There has been increased focus on atrocity prevention and the preventative elements associated with Pillar ii of the Responsibility to Protect. Policymakers and academics have offered a range of short-term preventative measures available so that the international community can better fulfil its Pillar ii responsibilities. This article challenges this current R2P thinking by arguing that its short-termism insufficiently focuses on de-escalation of risk within already present cycles of violence while dealing superficially with long-term causes and the ways in which the international community is a contributing factor in underwriting systemic and structural determinants of violence which erode state resilience against mass atrocity. As an alternative, this article examines a number of ways in which key actors of the international community contribute to determinants of mass violence and further offer recommendations for how they could better discharge their long-term preventative responsibilities by first reforming their own practices.

The Aftermath of Mass Violence: A Negative Methodology

2020 ◽  
Vol 49 (1) ◽  
pp. 161-173
Author(s):  
Yael Navaro
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Production ◽  
New Work ◽  
Ethnographic Methods ◽  
Research Practices ◽  
Mass Violence ◽  
Mass Atrocity ◽  
Positive Outlook

Recent anthropological works on the aftermath of mass violence can be studied as having generated a negative methodology. New work has addressed the gaps, voids, and hollows of knowledge production in and about sites of mass atrocity and is developing novel research practices within these schisms. While considering the (im)possibility of research as the condition of possibility (as well as the question) for anthropological (and historical) work on the long durée of mass violence, this review highlights some adverse ethnographic methods that have emerged (and have been conceptualized) in the interstices. A critical positionality vis-à-vis anthropology's positive outlook for evidentiary presences in the field has moved scholars of mass atrocity and its aftermath toward methods that would tarry in and through the negative.

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