Convenor(s)
Musch Tilman / Bayreuth University
Banhoro Yacouba / Ouagadougou University
The highly globalized world may offer to African countries possibilities in positioning themselves more advantageously inside new political and economic configurations. But does this really mean the end of neo-colonialism that Nkrumah defined as the external direction of an independent state’s economic system and political policy? One may suppose that the current world system does not at all promote the independence of national decision-making. Nevertheless, among people, the awareness of their global connectedness favors increasing self-assurance and may lead more frequently to opposition in front of neo-colonial patterns. Such global connectedness does not mean the neglect of the local. On the contrary, resistance to global impacts may be a phenomenon that is deeply rooted in local dynamics, which has been recently highlighted by the failing of worldwide anti-imperialist approaches promising emancipation and independence. In investigating such “rooted resistances”, the panel adopts an actor-centered approach: How do individuals, groups or societies realize innovative approaches in order to oppose resistance to neo-colonial patterns? How, on the contrary, may they adapt to those patterns? Which are the most significant global processes that influence local realities? What are the local patterns of a more and more intertwined world?
Résistances enracinées. Réponses locales au néo-colonialisme
Le monde globalisé pourrait offrir aux pays africains des opportunités pour un meilleur positionnement dans des nouvelles configurations politico-économiques. Mais cela signifierait-il pour autant la fin du néo-colonialisme que Nkrumah définit comme la direction externe d’un système économique et politique d’un État indépendant ? On peut supposer que le système mondial actuel ne promeut point l’indépendance de prises de décisions nationales. Néanmoins, parmi les citoyens, la prise de conscience de leur relation avec le global favorise une assurance croissante et pourrait les amener à s’opposer fréquemment au néo-colonialisme. Ces relations avec le global ne signifient en rien la négligence du local. Au contraire, la résistance au global pourrait être enracinée dans des dynamiques locales, qui plus est après l’échec d’approches antiimpérialistes universelles promettant émancipation et indépendance. En étudiant ces « résistances enracinées », le panel adopte une approche centrée sur les acteurs : comment des individus ou sociétés réalisent des approches innovatrices afin d’opposer de la résistance au néo-colonialisme ? Comment, au contraire, s’adaptent-ils à ces traits ? Que sont les procès globaux les plus signifiants qui influencent les réalités locales ? Que sont les traits locaux d’un monde de plus en plus relié ?
Musch Tilman / Universität Bayreuth
Au sujet du néocolonialisme et des résistances enracinées
Introduction au panel. Réflexions théoriques autour du néocolonialisme et des résistances enracinées.
Bekoin Tanoh Raphael / Université Alassane Ouattara de Bouaké
Survival of african medicinal practices, a form of resistance to the imported modern medicine: the case of Côte d’Ivoire
Resistance to modernity and its values has taken many forms in the development of Africa. Sometimes it could be violent for religious and political reasons. But sometimes, this resistance has taken silent forms. This is the case of African medicinal practices. Being undermined by the so-called western medicine, introduced by European during colonization, african traditional medicine was often undervalued. Holders of this medicine were marginalized and treated as fetish and charlatans. All these qualifications were intended to devalue it to the detriment of another, more reliable, medicine.Yet, in spite of this marginalization of traditional medical practices in the villages and especially in african cities considered the Mecca of modernity with major hospital infrastructures, african medicine is becoming more and more as a credible alternative. This form of resistance is related to the results of traditional medicinal practices well tested before colonization. As Ki-Zerbo points out, african society is in a state of chronic invention, it therefore seeks to assert itself on all levels. To better illustrate this form of African resistance, the study will be based on the specific case of Côte d’ Ivoire.
Banhoro Yacouba / Université de Ouagadougou
Élection présidentielle 2015 au Burkina Faso. De l’impasse à l’insurrection populaire d’octobre 2014
Les 30 et 31 octobre 2014, une manifestation insurrectionnelle mettait fin au régime de Blaise Compaoré au pouvoir depuis 27 ans, face à son désir de ne pas quitter le pouvoir au terme de son mandat en 2015 comme le prévoient les termes de l’article 37 de la constitution.
Ces deux jours qui ébranlèrent le régime sont la continuation d’une résistance sociale qui remonte à l’assassinat de Norbert Zongo. En un rien de temps, la carte des manifestations couvre tout le territoire dévoilant ainsi la démocratie de façade du régime. Ainsi est né le mouvement trop c’est trop qui s’est poursuivi sous d’autres formes pour aboutir aux événements des 30 et 31 Octobre.
Ce qui en cours au Burkina Faso, à travers ces manifestations d’opposition, de résistance et d’insubordination qui se nourrit des mouvements de contestation au niveau mondial, c’est bien la recherche d’une forme d’organisation autonome et efficace. L’analyse d’un tel fait social est d’abord une posture et ensuite l’élaboration d’outils de perception et d’analyse des phénomènes de contestation dans un contexte où des couches longtemps opprimées, marginalisées s’éveillent à l’expression publique.
Comment et pourquoi en est –on arrivé là ? Quels sont les outils et les moyens d’actions de ces nouveaux acteurs? Cette communication se propose d’analyser les processus d’entrée en scène des différentes couches sociales et leurs modalités d’expression jusqu’à la chute du pouvoir de Blaise Compaoré.
Materna Georg / Universität Bayreuth
Tourism Resistance: Senegal’s depreciation of the pleasure periphery
Tourism is promoted as a key industry for development. In Senegal, it was the World Bank that supported the beginning of mass tourism in the 1970s. Today, it figures as the second biggest export sector and employs roughly 100.000 people. Nonetheless, many Senegalese have a negative stance on tourism. Next to critiques of neo-colonialism, there are more locally rooted inconveniences. Marked by Islam, the Senegalese population disregards hotels as places of adultery. Tourist restaurants, where alcohol is being sold, are avoided. The architecture and historical persons of World heritage sites like Gorée or Saint-Louis remain non-incorporated into the local souvenir market. The tourist-vendor interaction is another case in point. Many souvenir vendors use the encounter with potential clients, besides the act of vending (jaay), to introduce themselves and ask for help in problems of quotidian life (ñaan) or praise the other as a good person in order to get financial offerings (woyaan).
Especially young vendors explain that the “rich” tourists need to share their “fortune” with them, “il faut me faire travailler”. The vendors’ demands often become a probe into generosity, compassion and morality in general. For the vendors, I argue, this is a way of coping with the various asymmetries of the tourist encounter. My paper will first sketch the population’s perspective on tourism and then provide ethnographic evidence for “rooted resistance” to the pleasure periphery.
Ihedru Okey / Arizona State University
African Mining Protests: Local Rebellions, Neocolonial Contestations and Prospects for Social Peace
Africa’s mining jurisdictions have seen a wave of protests in the past two decades, from Sierra Leone to Ghana; Tanzania to Mozambique & DR-Congo, and most infamously Marikana & other mobilizations in South Africa. On the surface, these protests may be about local grievances or development issues. Taken together, they represent revolts against neoliberal development agenda & against postcolonial state elite as agents of neocolonialism. This paper explores the complexity of these developments alongside longer-term histories of uprising, stand-taking and engagement on the continent. It analyzes novel strategies and social trajectories of actors involved in these contestations and the responses they elicit from mining companies and the state elite. African mining protests represent emerging trends in which local collective action, subversion and activism, increasingly intersect with global social, generational and gender causes, providing platforms for human rights associations, advocacy groups and other cause-driven organizations seeking to position themselves as watchdogs of state action and global capital without much benefit to local causes. Prospects for “social license” that would enhance sustainable mining and symbiotic relations between local & foreign NGOs are explored. The paper is based on the experiences of Ghana and Sierra Leone (West); Tanzania and DR-Congo (East/Central), and Mozambique and South Africa from 1990-2014.