Paper long abstract:

A diverse scholarly community has examined outbreaks of violence since the 1990s in Rwanda, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Somalia, Uganda and Sudan through myriad disciplinary lenses, narrating the stories of peoples these events displaced. This paper seeks to make a historical contribution to this literature by adopting as its analytical focus Tanzania as a “host” country. Tanzania possesses both a large contemporary refugee population as well as a substantial history of accepting refugees stretching back to the 1970s. This perspective reveals refugees and internally displaced peoples in East and Central Africa to represent more than the sundry byproducts of separate outbreaks of violence. They are part of a wider phenomenon best comprehended historically and inclusively. To understand them appropriately, and therefore collectively, scholars must situate the region’s modern refugee crises occur within a longer history of moving populations in East and Central Africa prior to colonial conquest. Not unlike Diaspora studies, historical scholars of refugee crises must seek out coherent communities in inherently ephemeral social contexts. Western Tanzania represents a solid point of departure for such research. There, longstanding Burundi refugee communities established in Tabora in the 1970s reside not far from more recently founded refugee camps dotting Tanzania’s Western borders. In turning our attention to the sungusungu community watch institution which owes its origin to this part of Western Tanzania, scholars may begin to appreciate historically the security efforts of refugee communities as they come to define themselves in the process of ensuring their mutual safety.

Paper long abstract:

Refugee militarization is not a new phenomenon in Sub-Saharan Africa. However some scholars have argued that it has increased during the 90’s and has been critical in the origin and extension of civil war. This paper considers the historical context and the structural factors that allow refugee militarization. It also tries to explain why some refugees have not only been victims of violence but also have resorted to armed struggles to produce social changes. Considering the history of grievances produced during the process of forced displacement this paper pretends, at the same time, to contest the greed hypothesis on the causes of civil war. It will be argued that the forced migration literature, specifically on the causes and social transformations during the experience of exile, can contribute to an understanding on the causes and dynamics of civil wars.

Through an historical analysis the paper will explain the link between exile, militarization and civil war. Although it will show that arms transfers and conditions in host countries (asylum crisis, structural adjustment programmes, democratization process, growing xenophobia and security concerns) help to get a better understanding of the processes of violent social changes that have taken place in Africa, it will point out that the relationship between violence and exile can be better understood taking into account the history of exclusion, expulsion and deprivation that have accompanied the evolution of the African state since independence. The paper will also consider how grievances are created and recreated through narratives of exile (MALKKI, 1995) and how the relationship between diasporas and their states of origin are defined by the desire of transformation, contestation and political change (HORST, 2006). Finally, it will show how this framework of historical and structural factors and individual narratives is applied to the case of Rwandan refugees in Uganda.