by Barbara Miller
One of the most unusual aspects of Rwanda’s genocide that continues to shock and puzzle, 13 years after the killings, is the high level of civilian participation. Other distinguishing characteristics are the speed of the civilian mobilization, the extensive geographic spread of the killing throughout the country, the velocity of the violence, and the high percentage of the victim group killed.
Dr. Omar McDoom, Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Political Science at the London School of Economics, spoke about these issues on September 17 in the Elliott School of International Affairs at the George Washington University. His talk was the first in the 2009-2010 CIGA Seminar Series. CIGA is the Elliott School’s Culture in Global Affairs Research and Policy Program.
McDoom spent a year doing intensive fieldwork in Rwanda including conducting over 300 interviews with two groups of Rwandans: those who had killed (they were in prison at the time of the interviews) and those who were related to people who had been killed. He also uses population census data to estimate the number of victims and GPS data to locate regional patterns of killing.
In his talk, McDoom linked macro and micro levels in explaining why the Rwandan genocide occurred and its distinctive patterns. For example, he ties the unusual strength of the Rwandan state to the speed and extensive of the violence. Rwanda, in contrast to many other post-colonial states, had enduring boundaries and longstanding coherence as a “state.” A strong state can accomplish good things more effectively than a weak state and also bad things more effectively than a weak state.
At the micro-level, McDoom’s interviews reveal that killers cluster in families. That is, if one brother had killed, it was likely that his brother would also kill. GPS data indicate regional patterns. Killings were more frequent in densely populated areas. Those who lived in remote regions were less vulnerable.
McDoom is not a “political ethnographer” in the sense of someone who learns the local language and lives with the local people for a long time doing everyday things with them. While he did spend a substantial period of time in Rwanda, he had to use an interpreter for his interviews with killers and victims. And, of course, he was not in Rwanda during the genocide doing “participant observation.” Nonetheless, it is clear that his research benefits immensely from his interviews with many people who were involved and in recording and analyzing their views. If there were an anthropological award for a non-anthropologist, I would nominate McDoom for consideration.
McDoom’s MA training in International Development Studies at GW and his exposure to anthropology during that time likely had a formative influence on how he defines research questions and goes about finding data to answer them. His PhD from LSE is also in Development Studies. Given his postgraduate credentials (that also include a law degree), I am not quite sure how he recrafted himself to look enough like a political scientist to be hired in the Political Science Department at LSE in a regular faculty line. It is, though, a hopeful sign for the discipline. And a hopeful sign for genocide studies and genocide prevention.
Photo by Anne Wernikoff, from the GW Hatchet.
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