The art of (respectfully) disagreeing

There is probably nothing more terrifying than presenting your work in front of a panel of experts. (Aside from massacres, ebola, famine, hate crimes, Nazis, etc, but somewhere up there with swine flu and corruption) Not just any old experts, but experts who also have the legitimacy to claim that it is their field – artists who are now art theorists, historians of their own country, and, in this particular case, Rwandans studying the genocide. It is already quite difficult to present a compelling reason to many Rwandans why an [insert ethnicity/skin color/ nationality here] would be studying the genocide. Some, of course, are encouraging and supportive, appreciating the outside interest in their tragedy and our effort to make it a tragedy of humanity, not just a small African country most famous for its gorillas. But it is hard to avoid the suspicion that we are engaging with their tortured past with a nefarious purpose (the dirty ‘d’ word of denial perhaps) – after all, it was the ‘international community’ that turned a blind eye to the 100 days of massacre.



It is not hard to see where this distrust comes from – even if we disregard the hyper-generalized guilt/accusation towards the ‘international community’ or ‘West’ (whatever that means….I always wonder where I stand in terms of the ‘West.’ I am a minority in the ‘West’, but here, that doesn’t really seem to matter.), objectivity in social sciences is easily under attack. It is like discussing colonization, post-war politics or the likes in Korea with Japanese – regardless of the soundness of their method, it is easy for Koreans to criticize the Japanese of approaching the topic with an ‘agenda’ in mind. Of course, it is impossible to completely discard inherent prejudices. Prejudices are more often than not subconscious, so yes, even the best researcher comes in with their own world view intact. Hell, I probably have some racist tendencies I don’t even know of. But in the end, I am still an idealist (like many people in the academia) in that I still do believe that if we do apply methodology with rigor, research with a conscience as an academic first, and national citizen second, we will reach a universal dialogue, if not consensus. But the ability to disagree with grace is not one of our innate abilities, and often, in sensitive subjects such as genocide in a place like Rwanda, it is easier said than done. (Of course, I may say this with the subconscious confidence of a student of a ‘Western’ academic tradition – even a minority within the top of the hegemony still belongs, more or less, to the dominant forces – because I know in the end what my academia produces is what really ‘matters’. And I just used air-quotes there, and also rolled my eyes. But now I sound like a dusty professor who can’t make up her mind. Moving on.)


I had the good fortune to attend a presentation by Omar Mcdoom (double check), who I had heard of on numerous occasions through different people.
Omar (I think) was a fellow at the Belfer Center (or something of the likes) at Harvard, and I had heard about his work through other people studying Rwanda. In fact, Omar was how we (by we I mean the people I came to Rwanda with last summer) got to know Moses, our translator (and my repeated savior in my clumsy attempts to adjust here). He also is the director of the Child Is Innocent organization, where my amigo Robbie (shout out, love/miss your crazy self) used to work/ was part of. Long story short, it was someone I sort of knew by association, and was planning on meeting while I was in Kigali, just for inspiration’s sake. I actually had a morning appointment with a respected academic/journalist/political figure nearby, but he (my interviewee) suggested we end the interview early and go there together. I was curious as to what Omar’s research was actually about, and the interview wasn’t going too well anyways, so I decided to go.



Omar’s topic was about, broadly speaking, why people chose to kill. (I missed a good half of the talk so I might have gotten it wrong, but this was the topic of the second half I managed to catch). He pointed out some unique characteristics of the Rwandan states that created a necessary condition for a genocide, or ethnic conflict more broadly speaking, to happen. I didn’t take good notes, so I can’t be 100% sure, but it ran along the lines of political reach of the state, the fact that an internal revolution (rather than an independence struggle vis-à-vis the white rulers) that triggered independence, geographic continuity, population density and the likes. But what actually mobilized the population? So all these conditions were in place, but why did Rwanda’s Joe sixpack pick up his machete, and kill his neighboring hockey mom? Omar pointed to the dominant role of local coercion and authority, which was often accompanied by material threats (taking away livestock, destroying crops, etc), and threats to power for the lower-level local authorities. I am really in no position to adequately defend or criticize his thesis, as far as my untrained eye can tell it sounded pretty well grounded methodologically (there were a few blind spots, but they were realistically understandable considering the circumstances of a PhD student), and his conclusions raised a few subtle points that was beyond the common discourse, which I think was enlightening. Especially his point about how different regions were mobilized in a different manner, (some had less latent hatred, hence there was an initial power struggle between the center and local authorities, and a great deal of threat was needed to make the local authorities call for violence) seemed interesting and significant in terms of today’s Rwandan society – perhaps the narrative of the genocide is different in those regions, hence the process of reconciliation should also be adjusted.



The response of the Rwandan audience (I was the only foreigner save Omar) was explosive to say the least. Every time Omar mentioned the past (hutu) presidents, his opinion on ethnic hatred, and the hate media, there was an audible murmur among the audience, shaking their heads and given each other knowing smiles. Once the talk was over, hands shot up everywhere in the small room, and comments and questions overflowed.



What was interesting about the comments, was the general desire to magnify the role of the Belgian colonialists and the role of the central government. Furthermore, everyone was eager to point out that the violence of 1994 was not an isolated incident, but a continuation (a ‘climax’) of the prolonged ethnic oppression/violence starting from the 1950’s. Their comments, (‘they’ being the Rwandan politicians and academics sitting in the room) collectively achieved the following, in my opinion:
First, it diverted the bulk of the guilt away from themselves, or “Africans” and placed it on the West. This, I believe, has the interesting consequence of creating a hopeful message- the genocide was created by the West, or Belgians, and we Africans have less blame, hence, the future made by just Africans have the potential to be different. The killers were colonial Africans, hence, the new, independent, modern Africans can be different.
Second, the bulk of the guilt was associated with the (hutu) central government, as opposed to the local power structures or local residents themselves. This probably has a lot of implications that involves sensitive politics or today, but it also creates the reverse logic that if violent ethnic division was created by the central government, it can also be erased by the central government. (I may be giving them too much credit in saying this)
Third, by emphasizing the continuity…so I had an amazing point about this, but I forgot while trying to get myself an iced latte. It is a struggle…..hahah



But regardless, my point is this: the general atmosphere suggested that whatever nuance Omar was trying to bring to the more straightforward picture Rwandans were painting, it was dismissed as ‘overlooking history’, not understanding the ‘complications’ or simply wrong. The fact that there is a controversy should be an indication that the answer is not simple or intuitive. Yet, the disagreement here sounded more like a struggle to convey the real ‘truth’ to the hapless outsiders who are in the habit of misreading what is evident. The truth is only in Rwanda, and as Rwandans they had privileged access to it. The dialogue was not two-way, but a didactic one.



I don’t know that many post-colonial, post-conflict, post-authoritarian societies intimately, so I can only reliably draw upon my 10+ years living in South Korea, and 22 years living as a Korean, but it seems to me that this kind of defensive attitude (especially among the academia) is common in such societies, at least between Korea and Rwanda. To an extent (the favorite qualifying phrase of paper-writers), I think the defensive paranoia is justified. It is true (whatever that means at this point), that the perspective of the colonized was largely ignored. And it is true that the Western colonizing academia was complicit in their research to subjugate the…non-West colonial subjects. But that doesn’t make the subsequent generation’s non-Western view neutral or truthful. This does not erase the inherent interest or bias of the ‘local’ perspective – the fact that you are the victim does not make you innocent or neutral. This is something I find terribly difficult in conducting interviews – when you know the tortured past of the individual, you want to believe whatever they tell you. But does that make them tell you the truth and only the truth? Is there a totally objective perspective in any case? Knowing how many people lay dead in this country, and knowing how many friends and family people in that room lost, I want to say, yeah, forget what that guy is talking about, you are right. You deserve to be right. But the fact is, no one deserves to be right – the only thing that is deserved is the right to be respectfully contested. Now, try teaching that, Miss Manners.