The Dynamics of Violence in Central Africa (review)

René Lemarchand has been studying Burundi, Congo/Zaire and Rwanda for more than forty-five years. It is hard to imagine anyone better placed to help make sense of the horrifying cycles of violence, at times genocidal, in Belgium's former colonies. Well written, solidly researched and carefully argued, his latest book is a welcome contribution.

A major strength of this book is Lemarchand's consistent use of a "regional lens." For instance, he emphasizes cross-border movement of people and ideas between the "genocidal twins," Rwanda and Burundi, in a "back-and-forth dialectic by which ethnic conflict in one state impacts upon the other" (139). In particular, the Tutsi massacre of Hutu in Burundi in 1972, a "partial genocide," contributed to an "anti-Tutsi backlash" in Rwanda and the coup that brought Juvénal Habyarimana to power the following year (71). Likewise, the violence that accompanied the Tutsi-dominated Burundian army's assassination in 1993 of the country's first Hutu president, Melchior Ndadaye, caused some two hundred thousand Hutu to cross over into southern Rwanda, where, as landless refugees who had fled Tutsi domination, many were prime recruits for the militias that committed genocide the following year.

Lemarchand's linking of Rwanda and Burundi adds an important dimension to understanding the mind-sets that can lead to wide-scale deadly violence. Each country served as an example of what the dominant group in the other country sought to avoid. The Hutu in Habyarimana's Rwanda worried about Burundi-style subjugation by the Tutsi. Burundian Tutsi, for their part, wanted to avoid the second-class citizenship and periodic violence to which Rwandan Tutsi were subjected.

Unsurprisingly, genocide figures prominently in Lemarchand's book, notably the myth-making, grievances, and fears that made it possible. His contributions include a much-needed reminder of the extent of historical violence in Burundi and how the roles of principal perpetrator and victim were generally the opposite of Rwanda's. He carefully explains, without ever condoning, how security concerns can make extreme retributive violence and even genocide rational in their own ways.

Lemarchand's multilayered regional analysis demonstrates the complexity and contextual variability of identity. At times, regional intragroup cleavages were more important than ethnic rivalry, notably the distinctions between northern and southern Hutu in both Rwanda and Burundi. He also explains how geopolitical events in the 1990s fractured some Kinyarwanda-speakers in eastern Congo from one ethnic group into two (or more) opposing groups.

A key theme of the book is that political, social, and economic exclusion are at the root of conflict in the region. Lemarchand believes that as long as important segments of the population remain excluded—for instance, the Hutu in Rwanda today—reconciliation will remain elusive. He finds some hope in the ability of Burundi's power-sharing arrangement to keep the peace, but expresses deep concern over continued extreme marginalization in eastern Congo.

In the acknowledgments at the end of the book, the reader learns that only one of the sixteen chapters was written specifically for this volume. Stand-alone pieces, the majority of which are available elsewhere, make up the other fifteen. It would have been helpful to mention this at the beginning of the book, as it explains the occasional instances of repetition and overlap among the chapters, some gaps, and the lack of a conclusion and bibliography. Nonetheless, these collected works of René Lemarchand, mostly written between 2000 and 2006, are an invaluable resource for those interested in Rwanda, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, political violence, ethnic identity, or African politics more generally.