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This book provides a unique perspective, at once scholarly and fully engaged, on the political violence in South Africa during 'The Time of the Comrades' in the mid-1980s. The work of a group of social scientists and professionals, whose own work and thinking have been profoundly affected by the political crisis of that time, it provides an in-depth research and analysis as well as critical reflections on the difficult political and theoretical issues raised by political violence and the struggle in South Africa.
Violence in South Africa contains contributions on various issues related to violence in South Africa. The variety of perspectives, explanations and intervention strategies indicates that violence, its causes and prevention are diverse and complex matters. Hence a single perspective or universal explanation cannot properly explain the phenomenon. Factors related to the micro- and macro-levels, as well as the interaction between these levels, should be considered. The contributions consequently do not deal only with violence of a structural, collective or political nature, but also the far more prevalent forms of interpersonal and small group-violence.
The Natal Midlands in South Africa was ravaged by conflict in the 1980s and 1990s between supporters of the United Democratic Front and Inkatha. The violence left thousands of people dead, injured, homeless, and emotionally wounded. In Violence and Solace, Mxolisi Mchunu provides a historical study of the origins, causes, and nature of political violence in the rural community of KwaShange in the Vulindlela district, one of the areas most affected by the political violence in the Natal Midlands. Mchunu survived the internecine violence in Natal and reflects on his childhood experiences and the complex political situation in the homelands between 1985 and 1996. Threading individual and local factors with regional and national forces, he entwines autobiographical reflections with historical scholarship to explain the political violence that rocked parts of Natal. While provincial and national leaders emerge as complex actors negotiating a chaotic world with no predictable outcomes, Mchunu shines the brightest spotlight on the women and children who suffered most during the conflict. The result is a seminal work on transition violence during the twilight of apartheid.
This handbook brings together global research on violence in Africa from academics, practitioners and activists across a multitude of subjects. It seeks to create the widest possible space for debate, discussion, and analysis of the broad range of issues and problems of violence. It transcends disciplinary and geographic borders in order to create new ground in this space. The chapters in this handbook cover diverse themes such as: the topography of violence, technologies of violence, terrorism, civil war and insurgent violence, child soldiers and violence, epistemic violence, structural violence, violence and memory, violence and the law, cultural mechanisms for creating, sustaining, resisting, and mitigating violence, political violence, violence in moments of religious, social and geo-political transformation, gender and violence, violence against nature, and violence and social media. It centralises new meanings, understandings and fresh ideas to the concept of violence, broadening its scope, and contributing to the debates that will shape Africa’s common future. It shines a light on key elements of African culture and the cultural mechanisms for creating, sustaining, resisting, and mitigating violence in Africa. It strives to be relevant to the needs and concerns of African societies by suggesting practical solutions for overcoming violence. This book ties in with development initiatives in Africa, such as Agenda 2063, for the Africa We Want, and the 2030 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Civil Paths to Peace contains the analyses and findings of the Commonwealth Commission on Respect and Understanding, established in response to the 2005 request of Commonwealth Head of Government for the Commonwealth Secretary-General to 'explore initiatives to promote mutual understanding and respect among all faiths and communities in the Commonwealth.' This report focuses particularly on the issues of terrorism, extremism, conflict and violence, which are much in ascendancy and afflict Commonwealth countries as well as the rest of the world. It argues that cultivating respect and understanding is both important in itself and consequential in reducing violence and terrorism. It further argues that cultivated violence is generated through fomenting disrespect and fostering confrontational misunderstandings. The report looks at the mechanisms through which violence is cultivated through advocacy and recruitment, and the pre-existing inequalities, deprivations and humiliations on which those advocacies draw. These diagnoses also clear the way for methods of countering disaffection and violence. In various chapters the different connections are explored and examined to yield general policy recommendations. Accepting diversity, respecting all human beings, and understanding the richness of perspectives that people have are of great relevance for all Commonwealth countries, and for its 1.8 billion people. They are also importance for the rest of the world. The civil paths to peace are presented here for use both inside the Commonwealth and beyond its boundaries. The Commonwealth has survived and flourished, despite the hostilities associated with past colonial history, through the use of a number of far-sighted guiding principles. The Commission argues that those principles have continuing relevance today for the future of the Commonwealth--and also for the world at large.
Multiparty elections have become the bellwether by which all democracies are judged, and the spread of these systems across Africa has been widely hailed as a sign of the continent’s progress towards stability and prosperity. But such elections bring their own challenges, particularly the often intense internecine violence following disputed results. While the consequences of such violence can be profound, undermining the legitimacy of the democratic process and in some cases plunging countries into civil war or renewed dictatorship, little is known about the causes. By mapping, analysing and comparing instances of election violence in different localities across Africa – including Kenya, Ivory Coast and Uganda – this collection of detailed case studies sheds light on the underlying dynamics and sub-national causes behind electoral conflicts, revealing them to be the result of a complex interplay between democratisation and the older, patronage-based system of ‘Big Man’ politics. Essential for scholars and policymakers across the social sciences and humanities interested in democratization, peace-keeping and peace studies, Violence in African Elections provides important insights into why some communities prove more prone to electoral violence than others, offering practical suggestions for preventing violence through improved electoral monitoring, voter education, and international assistance.
This volume critically interrogates, from different angles and dimensions, the resilience of conflict and violence into 21st century Africa. The demise of European colonial administration in Africa in the 1960s wielded fervent hope for enduring peace for the people of Africa. Regrettably, conflict alongside violence in all its dimensions physical, religious, political, psychological and structural remain unabated and occupy central stage in contemporary Africa. The resilience of conflict and violence on the continental scene invokes unsettling memories of the past while negatively influencing the present and future of crafting inclusive citizenship and statehood. The book provides fresh insightful ethnographic and intellectual material for rethinking violence and conflict, and for fostering long-lasting peace and political justice on the continent and beyond. With its penetrating focus on conflict and associated trajectories of violence in Africa, the book is an inestimable asset for conflict management practitioners, political scientists, historians, civil society activists and leaders in economics and politics as well as all those interested in the affairs of Africa.