Blog 8: Categorizing Political Violence in the Rwandan Genocide

           

Currently in the social sciences there is a struggle to create accurate and effective definitions. However it is difficult to find a definition that everyone agrees on and can look to. Political violence is one of these disputed definitions. Because it is so disputed it has a plethora of definitions. Different authors define political violence differently, which can cause problems when trying to explain and understand concepts related to political violence. Samuels defines political science as “the use of force by state or non-state actors to achieve political ends” (Samuels 258). Yet Business Dictionary gives us a very different definition, “Armed revolution, civil strife, terrorism, war, and other such causes that can result in injury or loss of property.” These different definitions can lead to confusion and mixed results when analyzing what political violence is.

            One example of political violence is the Rwandan genocide. The Rwandan genocide in 1994 was promulgated by the Hutus against the Tutsis. The Tutsis had long been the minority that was in power over the Hutus. The Hutu’s resented the Tutsis power over them, and chose to rise up against the Tutsi’s after the Hutu President was killed in 1994. This led to the mass genocide of the Tutsi’s by the Hutus with over 800,00 Rwandans killed in less than 100 days (BBC News 2008). It is hard to fit this massacre of people into either of the above definitions of political violence.

The Rwanda genocide doesn’t fit very well into either of the above definitions of political violence. The Rwanda genocide started because of ethnic tensions between the Hutus and Tutsis. The Hutus and Tutsis have a long history of political violence. But the catalyst that brought the genocide was the death of the Hutu president. It was rumored that the Tutsi’s had killed him. However, the Hutus goal wasn’t “achieve political ends.” Rather, they were simply angry at what had happened and wanted revenge. The second definition is a little better, because it includes civil strife and injuries in political violence. However it is so broad that it is hard to narrow and focus to help explain the Rwanda genocide. People who look at that definition would not draw the link from political violence to the Rwandan genocide because there are so many different variables.

However, if someone said political violence under the category of genocide, then it would make more logical sense. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum defines genocide as “violent crimes committed against groups with the intent to destroy the existence of the group.” This definition makes more sense if we used the two definitions with each other. For example, we could do a definition of “the use of force (state or non-state) with the intent to destroy the existence of another group.” This definition would explain political violence and its relation to genocide. The other definitions failed to make this link, especially because the Hutus weren’t striving for political changes, just to eradicate their worse enemies. This definition is more clear and concise, and is relevant to genocidal political violence.

In conclusion, the definitions that we have now are ineffective when trying to explain political violence from genocide, especially when looking at the Rwandan genocide. However, this can be changed by creating a definition that explains the situation better. I created a new definition that would be more effective, especially in cases of genocide, where they are not always pushing for a certain political change, rather just to get revenge.   

REFERENCES:

BBC News. 2008. Rwanda: How the genocide happened. http://news.bbc.co.uk

/2/hi/1288230.stm 10007043 (accessed November 9, 2012).

Business Dictionary. 2012. Political violence. http://www.businessdictionary.com/

definition/political-violence.html#ixzz2BiA5TNn4 10007043 (accessed November 9, 2012).

Samuels, David. 2013. Comparative politics. New York: Pearson Education. Print.

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. 2012. What is genocide? http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007043 (accessed November 9, 2012).