Aiding Violence
The Development Enterprise in Rwanda
Peter Uvin
Hardback: 978 1 56549 084 0
Price: $69.95  

Paperback: 978 1 56549 083 3
Price: $26.00  

Publisher: Kumarian Press
September 1998 , 288 pp., 6" x 9"
* Winner of the African Studies Association’s 1999 Herskovits Award
* A boldly critical look at structural violence relating to the 1994 Rwanda genocide

Aiding Violence expresses outrage at the contradiction of massive genocide in a country considered by Western aid agencies to be a model of development. Focusing on the 1990s dynamics of militarization and polarization that resulted in genocide, Uvin reveals how aid enterprises reacted, or failed to react, to those dynamics. By outlining the profound structural basis on which the genocidal edifice was built, the book exposes practices of inequality, exclusion, and humiliation throughout Rwanda.

Table of Contents:
Part I. Background; 1) Rwanda before Independence: A Contested History; 2) After Independence: Strategies for Elite Consolidation; 3) The Image of Rwanda in the Development Community; Part II. Crisis, Elite Manipulation, and Violence in the 1990s; 4) Political and Economic Crises and the Radicalization of Society; 5) Under the Volcano: The Development Community in the 1990s; Part III. The Condition of Structural Violence; 6) From Structural to Acute Violence; 7) Aid and Structural Violence; Part IV. Two Issues: The Role of Civil Society and Ecological Resource Scarcity; 8) And Where Was Civil Society?; 9) The Role of Ecological Resources Scarcity; Part V. Conclusions; 10) Why Did People Participate in Genocide? A Theoretically Informed Synthesis; 11) Development Aid: Conclusions and Paths for Reflection


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Reviews & Endorsements:
"A very well researched, well-thought through, astonishing, most upsetting book about the 1994 Rwanda genocide. This book should be obligatory for anybody, African as well as non-African, concerned with the continent."
- Johan Galtung, Director, TRANSCEND
"This book should be read by everyone involved in development. For those with some knowledge of Rwanda, reading it is nothing short of a cathartic experience. Much of what Peter Uvin has distilled so carefully and passionately from the Rwandan experience is also painfully relevant for other parts of the world."
- Development in Practice