32 research outputs found
A microdynamics approach to geographies of violence: Mapping the kill chain in militarized conservation areas
Within segments of the overlapping fields of political ecology and political geography, there is an emerging consensus that direct physical violence is over-studied, and that it cannot be analytically separated from other forms of violence. This article argues the opposite, namely, that direct physical violence remains understudied, and that analyzing it separately is warranted to grasp its specificities. To corroborate this argument, the article examines the study of green militarization and green violence. Whereas a substantial part of this literature discusses direct physical violence, most studies focus on broader conditions and discourses of violence, without empirically demonstrating how they feed into the production of direct physical violence. Consequently, these studies do not accurately map the entire âkill chainâ. A case study of violence in Virunga National Park, in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, demonstrates the analytical merits of studying direct physical violence through a âmicrodynamicsâ approach, implying the detailed study of specific acts of violence and how they were committed. Far from distracting from broader conditions, structures and histories of violence, a microdynamics approach provides an entry point for understanding how these dimensions feed into the production of direct physical violence, and how this violence interacts with other forms of violence. In addition, it allows for a more accurate understanding of how the kill chain is constituted in time and space. The article concludes that acknowledging the particularities of different modalities of violence, instead of conflating them, will significantly advance the study of geographies of violence
Navigating âtaxationâ on the Congo River: the interplay of legitimation and âofficialisationâ
Based on comprehensive research among boat operators and navy personnel working on the Congo River (DRC), this article explores how assessments of âtaxationâ are shaped by the interplay of legitimation and âofficialisationâ. As such, it draws upon and contributes to scholarly debates on taxpayersâ attitudes towards taxation. While boat operators resent having to pay a plethora of authorities, including the navy, along the Congo River, the article demonstrates how they locate these âtaxesâ on a spectrum from more to less legitimate. These assessments are shaped by various factors: authoritiesâ legitimacy as âmeasuredâ by their official mandate and importance; public and non-official service provision; and the deployment of symbols of âstatenessâ. In interaction, these factors legitimise and âofficialiseâ âtaxesâ by the navy that are prohibited in legislation. These findings caution against the a priori use of the labels âofficialâ and ânon-officialâ, emphasising the need to better grasp these notionsâ emic understandings
Mayhem in the mountains. How violent conflict on the hauts plateaux of South Kivu escalated
This report analyses the history and causes of the escalation of violence on the Hauts Plateaux, a mountainous area located in South Kivu Province, eastern Congo. It argues that this violence can be ascribed to four mechanisms.
The first is discourses of âethnic conflictâ and âautochthonyâ. Yet the tendency to see all violence as linked to ethnicity is problematic as it obscures other drivers of conflict and violence and leads to attributing collective responsibility, revenge violence and the blurring of boundaries between armed groups and civilians. The second mechanism is the security dilemma. In part due the perceived partiality of the Congolese army, the presence of armed groups considered âethnicâ prompts counter-mobilization. The third mechanism is militarization, or the tendency of local, national and regional politico-military elites to resort to force to win disputes. The fourth mechanism is the multilayered nature of dynamics of conflict and violence, as local, provincial, national and regional developments alike shape the crisis on the Plateaux.
Stemming the violence requires addressing all four mechanisms. However, stabilization initiatives neither account for militarization nor the multiplicity of drivers for conflict and violence. To tackle the crisis, interventions need to acknowledge the role of political-military elites at all levels, including national and regional dynamics
Military business and the business of the military
Contrary to dominant approaches that locate the causes for military entrepreneurialism in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo predominantly in criminal military elites, this article highlights the importance of the Congolese militaryâs (FARDC) civilian context for understanding military revenue-generation. It analyses how the latter is shaped by structures of domination, signification and legitimisation that drive and are driven by the FARDCâs governance, private protection and security practices. It argues that these practices contribute to bestowing a degree of legitimacy on both the FARDCâs position of power and some of its revenue-generation activities. Furthermore, by emphasising that the FARDCâs regulatory and protection practices are partly the product of popular demands and the routine actions of civilians, the article contends that the causes of military revenue-generation are co-located in the militaryâs civilian environment. In this manner, it offers a more nuanced conceptualisation of military entrepreneurialism, thus opening up new perspectives on policy interventions in this area
Mitochondrial phylogeography and population structure of the cattle tick Rhipicephalus appendiculatus in the African Great Lakes region
Abstract Background The ixodid tick Rhipicephalus appendiculatus is the main vector of Theileria parva, wich causes the highly fatal cattle disease East Coast fever (ECF) in sub-Saharan Africa. Rhipicephalus appendiculatus populations differ in their ecology, diapause behaviour and vector competence. Thus, their expansion in new areas may change the genetic structure and consequently affect the vector-pathogen system and disease outcomes. In this study we investigated the genetic distribution of R. appendiculatus across agro-ecological zones (AEZs) in the African Great Lakes region to better understand the epidemiology of ECF and elucidate R. appendiculatus evolutionary history and biogeographical colonization in Africa. Methods Sequencing was performed on two mitochondrial genes (cox1 and 12S rRNA) of 218 ticks collected from cattle across six AEZs along an altitudinal gradient in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, Burundi and Tanzania. Phylogenetic relationships between tick populations were determined and evolutionary population dynamics models were assessed by mismach distribution. Results Population genetic analysis yielded 22 cox1 and 9 12S haplotypes in a total of 209 and 126 nucleotide sequences, respectively. Phylogenetic algorithms grouped these haplotypes for both genes into two major clades (lineages A and B). We observed significant genetic variation segregating the two lineages and low structure among populations with high degree of migration. The observed high gene flow indicates population admixture between AEZs. However, reduced number of migrants was observed between lowlands and highlands. Mismatch analysis detected a signature of rapid demographic and range expansion of lineage A. The star-like pattern of isolated and published haplotypes indicates that the two lineages evolve independently and have been subjected to expansion across Africa. Conclusions Two sympatric R. appendiculatus lineages occur in the Great Lakes region. Lineage A, the most diverse and ubiquitous, has experienced rapid population growth and range expansion in all AEZs probably through cattle movement, whereas lineage B, the less abundant, has probably established a founder population from recent colonization events and its occurrence decreases with altitude. These two lineages are sympatric in central and eastern Africa and allopatric in southern Africa. The observed colonization pattern may strongly affect the transmission system and may explain ECF endemic instability in the tick distribution fringes
Genetic and antigenic variation of the bovine tick-borne pathogen Theileria parva in the Great Lakes region of Central Africa
BACKGROUND : Theileria parva causes East Coast fever (ECF), one of the most economically important tick-borne diseases
of cattle in sub-Saharan Africa. A live immunisation approach using the infection and treatment method (ITM)
provides a strong long-term strain-restricted immunity. However, it typically induces a tick-transmissible carrier state
in cattle and may lead to spread of antigenically distinct parasites. Thus, understanding the genetic composition of T.
parva is needed prior to the use of the ITM vaccine in new areas. This study examined the sequence diversity and the
evolutionary and biogeographical dynamics of T. parva within the African Great Lakes region to better understand the
epidemiology of ECF and to assure vaccine safety. Genetic analyses were performed using sequences of two antigencoding
genes, Tp1 and Tp2, generated among 119 T. parva samples collected from cattle in four agro-ecological zones
of DRC and Burundi.
RESULTS : The results provided evidence of nucleotide and amino acid polymorphisms in both antigens, resulting
in 11 and 10 distinct nucleotide alleles, that predicted 6 and 9 protein variants in Tp1 and Tp2, respectively. Theileria
parva samples showed high variation within populations and a moderate biogeographical sub-structuring due to the
widespread major genotypes. The diversity was greater in samples from lowlands and midlands areas compared to
those from highlands and other African countries. The evolutionary dynamics modelling revealed a signal of selective
evolution which was not preferentially detected within the epitope-coding regions, suggesting that the observed
polymorphism could be more related to gene flow rather than recent host immune-based selection. Most alleles
isolated in the Great Lakes region were closely related to the components of the trivalent Muguga vaccine.
CONCLUSIONS : Our findings suggest that the extensive sequence diversity of T. parva and its biogeographical distribution
mainly depend on host migration and agro-ecological conditions driving tick population dynamics. Such
patterns are likely to contribute to the epidemic and unstable endemic situations of ECF in the region. However, the fact that ubiquitous alleles are genetically similar to the components of the Muguga vaccine together with the limited
geographical clustering may justify testing the existing trivalent vaccine for cross-immunity in the region.Additional file 1: Table S1. Cattle blood sample distribution across agroecological
zones.Additional file 2: Table S2. Nucleotide and amino acid sequences of Tp1
and Tp2 antigen epitopes from T. parva Muguga reference sequence.Additional file 3: Table S3. Characteristics of 119 T. parva samples
obtained from cattle in different agro-ecological zones (AEZs) of The
Democratic Republic of Congo and Burundi.Additional file 4: Figure S1. Multiple sequence alignment of the 11 Tp1
gene alleles obtained in this study.Additional file 5: Table S4. Estimates of evolutionary divergence
between gene alleles for Tp1 and Tp2, using proportion nucleotide
distance.Additional file 6: Table S5. Tp1 and Tp2 genes alleles with their corresponding
antigen variants.Additional file 7: Table S6. Amino acid variants of Tp1 and Tp2 CD8+
T
cell target epitopes of T. parva from DRC and Burundi.Additional file 8: Figure S2. Multiple sequence alignment of the 10 Tp2
gene alleles obtained in this study.Additional file 9: Table S7. Distribution of Tp1 gene alleles of T. parva
from cattle and buffalo in the sub-Saharan region of Africa.Additional file 10: Table S8. Distribution of Tp2 gene alleles of T. parva
from cattle and buffalo in the sub-Saharan region of Africa.Additional file 11: Figure S3. Neighbor-joining tree showing phylogenetic
relationships among 48 Tp1 gene alleles described in Africa.Additional file 12: Figure S4. Phylogenetic tree showing the relationships
among concatenated Tp1 and Tp2 nucleotide sequences of 93 T.
parva samples from cattle in DRC and Burundi.This study is part of the PhD work supported by the University of Namur (UNamur,
Belgium) through the UNamur-CERUNA institutional PhD grant awarded
to GSA for bioinformatic analyses, interpretation of data and manuscript write
up in Belgium. The laboratory aspects (molecular biology analysis) of the
project were supported by the BecA-ILRI Hub through the Africa Biosciences
Challenge Fund (ABCF) programme. The ABCF Programme is funded by
the Australian Department for Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) through the
BecA-CSIRO partnership; the Syngenta Foundation for Sustainable Agriculture
(SFSA); the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF); the UK Department for International Development (DFID); and the Swedish International Development
Cooperation Agency (Sida). The ABCF Fellowship awarded to GAS was
funded by BMGF grant (OPP1075938). Sample collection, field equipment and
preliminary sample processing were supported through the âTheileriaâ project
co-funded to the Université Evangélique en Afrique (UEA) by the Agence
Universitaire de la Francophonie (AUF) and the Communauté Economique
des Pays des Grands Lacs (CEPGL). The International Foundation for Science
(IFS, Stockholm, Sweden) supported the individual scholarship awarded to
GSA (grant no. IFS-92890CA3) for field work and part of field equipment to the
âTheileriaâ project.http://www.parasitesandvectors.comam2020Veterinary Tropical Disease
On assessing risk assessments and situating security advice : the unsettling quest for 'security expertise'
Scholars conducting ethnographic research in zones with ongoing violent conflict are inevitably faced with the continuous challenge of finding, processing and assessing âsecurity knowledgeâ. They are confronted with questions such as: who do they consider to be âsecurity expertsâ? How do these âexpertsâ produce knowledge on âthe security situationâ? And how to cope with contradictory or incredible risk assessments? During the first stages of field research on the microdynamics of civilian- military interaction in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, I frequently consulted foreign security personnel, including UN peacekeepers and other military. This allowed me to discover that those we are socialized into seeing as âsecurity expertsâ had superficial and at times erroneous readings of security dynamics. Consequently, my understanding of who was a âsecurity expertâ and what counts as âsecurity expertiseâ started to shift. Although initially unsettling, these shifts ultimately enhanced my awareness of how oneâs positionality and related biases shape readings of âthe security situationâ, and how these readings feed into the construction of âsecurity knowledgeâ
Democratic Republic of Congo: the democratization of militarized politics
More than ten years after the official conclusion of the peace process, more armed groups are operating in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo than during the two Congo Wars (1996â1997, 1998â2003), their numbers showing a steady increase over the past few years. However, the nature of armed mobilization is changing. Currently emerging groups (which exist alongside longer-standing insurgencies) are no longer large-scale, foreign-supported rebel movements or broad coalitions of rural-based nationalist self-defense groups, even if their commanders often started their military career in these predecessor armed movements. Rather, they represent a multitude of locally rooted and small-scale armed groups, some of which count no more than ten to twenty fighters. The strong local rootedness of these smaller- scale armed groups, and the ongoing conflicts and competition between the civilian networks of which they are a part, have created both the incentives and the possibilities for local authorities and other local elites to draw upon armed actors to reinforce their power position. Consequently, as we argue in this chapter, militarized politics has become accessible to a broadening range of actors. Hence, it has become âdemocratizedâ in the sense of drawing in more, but lower-level politico-military entrepreneurs, reflecting how violence as a strategy has become more accessible
Paths of authority, roads of resistance : ambiguous rural infrastructure and slippery stabilization in eastern DR Congo
This article uses the concept of the âinfrastructural frontierâ to trace the linkages between externally financed road building projects and the constitution of eastern DR Congo as a liminal political space at the material edge of the state. This frontier space has two core features: first, the patchy quality of its road infrastructure, which is perpetually rebuilt only to disintegrate again. Second, the transient nature of configurations of authority and control, leading to âcirculation strugglesâ along roads that are never fully functional. These features contribute to the collapse of a clear-cut dichotomy between the presence and the absence of transport infrastructure, but also between spaces of control and spaces of resistance. The constitution of eastern Congo as an infrastructural frontier, we argue, is importantly related to its âsubversive soilsâ, whose clayish, sticky substance accelerates road degradation and compounds power projection. The resulting patchiness of both durable road infrastructure and central state control generates a âfrontier effectâ: it invites perpetual external donor interventions to build roads, but these projects never fundamentally upend the infrastructural and political state of affairs. In fact, as we demonstrate, these projects have become crucial to its very constitution. These observations point to the dual temporality of eastern Congoâs âperpetualâ infrastructural frontier, where the short-term volatility of circulation struggles is both a product of and reproduces its frontier-ness over the longue durĂ©e. Our contribution thus demonstrates the intricate relations between the temporal, material and political qualities of frontier spaces