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Periodical article Periodical article Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:Disagreement: Dissent Politics and the War in Sierra Leone
Author:Hoffman, DannyISNI
Year:2006
Periodical:Africa Today
Volume:52
Issue:3
Period:Spring
Pages:3-22
Language:English
Geographic term:Sierra Leone
Subjects:civil wars
political philosophy
Politics and Government
Military, Defense and Arms
External link:http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/africa_today/v052/52.3hoffman.pdf
Abstract:Observers often characterize the civil war in Sierra Leone as a crisis of youth. This article analyses this crisis of youth in light of a larger theoretical interrogation of the contemporary political landscape. Drawing on the political theorist Jacques Rancière's notion of politics as dissensus, the author suggests that the war in Sierra Leone must be seen as a violent, ongoing, post-Cold War political project. This violence is a quest for recognition as political speakers. The author begins by laying out the events of the decade-long war in Sierra Leone. He then outlines the theoretical framework through which Rancière addresses those who propose that we are witnessing the end of politics. By tracing some of the ways that combatants have been accounted for in the literature on Sierra Leone, the author investigates how Rancière's thought might be useful in furthering an understanding of the problems of violence and post-Cold War politics in an African postcolony. Finally, he turns to an arena in which the question of political speech and the authenticity of discourse have come to the fore in Sierra Leone: the Special Court for war crimes and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum. [ASC Leiden abstract]
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