Gino Vlavonou
Biographic Data
| ID | 136265 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Gino Vlavonou |
| GIVEN NAMES | Gino |
| FAMILY NAME | Vlavonou |
| SIGNATURE | VLAVONOU G |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Ottawa |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-9969-0384 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 15 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 19 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 14 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2014 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2024 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
A day without Global North researchers
What happens when researchers based in the Global North are suddenly unable to access research sites, especially those in the Global South? In 2020, COVID-related public health measures and travel restrictions made clear how dependent certain categories of researchers in the North are on easy access to research sites in the South. The space opened up by their pandemic-imposed retreat and the solutions devised in response have provoked both challe…
Radical Autochthony? Proprietary Political Discourse Among Elites and Peasants in the Anti-Balaka Armed Movement in the Central African Republic
Since at least the colonial era, the Central African Republic (CAR) has been a hotbed of rural rebellion and protest. This article explores the political discourses of members of the Anti-Balaka, a diffuse protest movement and armed rebellion, comparing discourses to see how they vary in relation to demographic categories: urban and rural, elites and peasants. Lombard and Vlavonou find that rural peasants demand a moral economy of interpersonal r…
Belonging, Identity, and Conflict in the Central African Republic
"Political conflict in many parts of the world has been shaped by notions of who rightfully belongs to a place. The concept of autochthony—that a true, original people are born of a land and belong to it above all others—has animated struggles across postcolonial Africa. But is this sense of rootedness from time immemorial necessary to assertions of original being and thus political supremacy? Belonging, Identity, and Conflict in the Central Afri…
Pragmatic Peacekeeping in a Multipolar Era
As UN peacekeeping continues to move through a period of change and rupture, we conceptualise this turn as ‘pragmatic’ and take interest in its normative dimensions. In this introduction to a Special Issue, we take stock of scholarship on this pragmatic turn, arguing that it can be enriched through deeper engagement with theories of norms and practices, drawing especially on pragmatist approaches in the field of International Relations. We also a…
Negotiating Positionality as a Student and Researcher in Africa
This article takes a reflexive look at the dilemmas and challenges of accessing a predominantly male circle of political and nongovernmental elites in the Central African Republic from the perspective of a young Black African male student researcher. It focuses on questions of positionality, arguing that certain African social norms regarding seniority and hierarchy can affect data generation, specifically access and interactions within interview…
A State of (Dis)unity and Uncertain Belonging
This article examines how existing in a larger socio-political environment of contested national belonging shapes Muslims’ experiences in the Central African Republic ( car ). We draw on data gathered between 2017 and 2019 from various archival sources and in-depth interviews with Muslim religious leaders and non-Muslims in car ’s capital, Bangui. We argue that through claims to autochthony a dual logic of exclusion co-occurs which shapes how Mus…
Field Research in Africa
Reflexive tension
Through two crossed auto-ethnographic works, this paper explores the ‘reflexive tension’ coming with the African identities in diasporic contexts and in Western academic training. As the authors have been socialized in their junior scholar careers in the literature of international relations, they revisit the aforementioned literature in light of the decolonizing literature about IR curriculum and the postcolonial literature. This article argues …
Building the Kingdom of God in the Central African Republic
In the Central African Republic, despite the persistence of political violence as a means of acquiring power, new trajectories for success have emerged; however, they have received scant attention from scholars. This article seeks to shed light on these trajectories by exploring the case of a religious entrepreneur associated with the Grace Brethren Churches (Église Évangelique des Frères). Based on field research conducted in Bangui from May to …
Building the Kingdom of God in the Central African Republic
In the Central African Republic, despite the persistence of political violence as a means of acquiring power, new trajectories for success have emerged; however, they have received scant attention from scholars. This article seeks to shed light on these trajectories by exploring the case of a religious entrepreneur associated with the Grace Brethren Churches (Église Évangelique des Frères). Based on field research conducted in Bangui from May to …
The Apsa and (Complex) International Security Regime Theory
Regional and subregional organizations have assumed a larger role in maintaining peace and security, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa. The African Peace and Security Architecture of the African Union (APSA) increasingly participates militarily in various peacekeeping operations. Policy-focused analyses of the APSA not only characterize it as an international regime but also assume the benefits of this regime. However, this depiction of the APSA…
State of rebellion
In 2012 violence in the CAR rebellion spiked and drew international attention to this little-known part of the world. This book builds on thirteen years of engagement with the CAR and Lombard demonstrates a deep understanding of the country’s complex dynamics. The book adopts an ethnographic approach and successfully challenges our understandings of the state. It makes an important and thoughtful contribution not only to the literature on the CAR…
Adaptation “De Facto” ou Retour à l’Envoyer L’Aide Déliée en Débat
The debate on aid effectiveness has been going on for some time especially in an environment of budgetary pressure on the various economies of CAD (Comité d’Aide au Développement) countries. This article questions the place of untied aid in development aid policies towards the African continent and gains in efficiency. If it is clear that the disbursement of Official Development Assistance has not reached its targets, it has adapted and evolved. …
An Uncertain Transition
This paper examines the transition in the Central African Republic (CAR) after its first multiparty election in 1993. With the election of Faustin-Archange Touadéra on March 1, 2016, reflecting on the past twenty years is relevant to understand the challenges the new president faces. This article focuses on the insecurity of elites as having no ontological core to explain why the governing elite in the CAR relies on a neopatrimonial style of gove…
Understanding the ‘failure’ of the Séléka rebellion
This paper examines the downfall of the Séléka rebellion, which staged a coup in the Central African Republic in March 2013. The coup plunged the country into violence and chaos, and there has been an uneasy quest for peace ever since. This article explains why the leader of the rebellion lost control over his troops and was finally pushed by regional actors to leave power. The article concludes that the Séléka rebellion was already fragile and, …
Pragmatic Peacekeeping in a Multipolar Era
As UN peacekeeping continues to move through a period of change and rupture, we conceptualise this turn as ‘pragmatic’ and take interest in its normative dimensions. In this introduction to a Special Issue, we take stock of scholarship on this pragmatic turn, arguing that it can be enriched through deeper engagement with theories of norms and practices, drawing especially on pragmatist approaches in the field of International Relations. We also a…
An Uncertain Transition
This paper examines the transition in the Central African Republic (CAR) after its first multiparty election in 1993. With the election of Faustin-Archange Touadéra on March 1, 2016, reflecting on the past twenty years is relevant to understand the challenges the new president faces. This article focuses on the insecurity of elites as having no ontological core to explain why the governing elite in the CAR relies on a neopatrimonial style of gove…
Negotiating Positionality as a Student and Researcher in Africa
This article takes a reflexive look at the dilemmas and challenges of accessing a predominantly male circle of political and nongovernmental elites in the Central African Republic from the perspective of a young Black African male student researcher. It focuses on questions of positionality, arguing that certain African social norms regarding seniority and hierarchy can affect data generation, specifically access and interactions within interview…
A State of (Dis)unity and Uncertain Belonging
This article examines how existing in a larger socio-political environment of contested national belonging shapes Muslims’ experiences in the Central African Republic ( car ). We draw on data gathered between 2017 and 2019 from various archival sources and in-depth interviews with Muslim religious leaders and non-Muslims in car ’s capital, Bangui. We argue that through claims to autochthony a dual logic of exclusion co-occurs which shapes how Mus…
Building the Kingdom of God in the Central African Republic
In the Central African Republic, despite the persistence of political violence as a means of acquiring power, new trajectories for success have emerged; however, they have received scant attention from scholars. This article seeks to shed light on these trajectories by exploring the case of a religious entrepreneur associated with the Grace Brethren Churches (Église Évangelique des Frères). Based on field research conducted in Bangui from May to …
Radical Autochthony? Proprietary Political Discourse Among Elites and Peasants in the Anti-Balaka Armed Movement in the Central African Republic
Since at least the colonial era, the Central African Republic (CAR) has been a hotbed of rural rebellion and protest. This article explores the political discourses of members of the Anti-Balaka, a diffuse protest movement and armed rebellion, comparing discourses to see how they vary in relation to demographic categories: urban and rural, elites and peasants. Lombard and Vlavonou find that rural peasants demand a moral economy of interpersonal r…
Adaptation “De Facto” ou Retour à l’Envoyer L’Aide Déliée en Débat
The debate on aid effectiveness has been going on for some time especially in an environment of budgetary pressure on the various economies of CAD (Comité d’Aide au Développement) countries. This article questions the place of untied aid in development aid policies towards the African continent and gains in efficiency. If it is clear that the disbursement of Official Development Assistance has not reached its targets, it has adapted and evolved. …
Understanding the ‘failure’ of the Séléka rebellion
This paper examines the downfall of the Séléka rebellion, which staged a coup in the Central African Republic in March 2013. The coup plunged the country into violence and chaos, and there has been an uneasy quest for peace ever since. This article explains why the leader of the rebellion lost control over his troops and was finally pushed by regional actors to leave power. The article concludes that the Séléka rebellion was already fragile and, …
Understanding the ‘failure’ of the Séléka rebellion
This paper examines the downfall of the Séléka rebellion, which staged a coup in the Central African Republic in March 2013. The coup plunged the country into violence and chaos, and there has been an uneasy quest for peace ever since. This article explains why the leader of the rebellion lost control over his troops and was finally pushed by regional actors to leave power. The article concludes that the Séléka rebellion was already fragile and, …
Adaptation “De Facto” ou Retour à l’Envoyer L’Aide Déliée en Débat
The debate on aid effectiveness has been going on for some time especially in an environment of budgetary pressure on the various economies of CAD (Comité d’Aide au Développement) countries. This article questions the place of untied aid in development aid policies towards the African continent and gains in efficiency. If it is clear that the disbursement of Official Development Assistance has not reached its targets, it has adapted and evolved. …
An Uncertain Transition
This paper examines the transition in the Central African Republic (CAR) after its first multiparty election in 1993. With the election of Faustin-Archange Touadéra on March 1, 2016, reflecting on the past twenty years is relevant to understand the challenges the new president faces. This article focuses on the insecurity of elites as having no ontological core to explain why the governing elite in the CAR relies on a neopatrimonial style of gove…
State of rebellion
In 2012 violence in the CAR rebellion spiked and drew international attention to this little-known part of the world. This book builds on thirteen years of engagement with the CAR and Lombard demonstrates a deep understanding of the country’s complex dynamics. The book adopts an ethnographic approach and successfully challenges our understandings of the state. It makes an important and thoughtful contribution not only to the literature on the CAR…
The Apsa and (Complex) International Security Regime Theory
Regional and subregional organizations have assumed a larger role in maintaining peace and security, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa. The African Peace and Security Architecture of the African Union (APSA) increasingly participates militarily in various peacekeeping operations. Policy-focused analyses of the APSA not only characterize it as an international regime but also assume the benefits of this regime. However, this depiction of the APSA…
Building the Kingdom of God in the Central African Republic
In the Central African Republic, despite the persistence of political violence as a means of acquiring power, new trajectories for success have emerged; however, they have received scant attention from scholars. This article seeks to shed light on these trajectories by exploring the case of a religious entrepreneur associated with the Grace Brethren Churches (Église Évangelique des Frères). Based on field research conducted in Bangui from May to …
Field Research in Africa
Reflexive tension
Through two crossed auto-ethnographic works, this paper explores the ‘reflexive tension’ coming with the African identities in diasporic contexts and in Western academic training. As the authors have been socialized in their junior scholar careers in the literature of international relations, they revisit the aforementioned literature in light of the decolonizing literature about IR curriculum and the postcolonial literature. This article argues …
Building the Kingdom of God in the Central African Republic
In the Central African Republic, despite the persistence of political violence as a means of acquiring power, new trajectories for success have emerged; however, they have received scant attention from scholars. This article seeks to shed light on these trajectories by exploring the case of a religious entrepreneur associated with the Grace Brethren Churches (Église Évangelique des Frères). Based on field research conducted in Bangui from May to …
Negotiating Positionality as a Student and Researcher in Africa
This article takes a reflexive look at the dilemmas and challenges of accessing a predominantly male circle of political and nongovernmental elites in the Central African Republic from the perspective of a young Black African male student researcher. It focuses on questions of positionality, arguing that certain African social norms regarding seniority and hierarchy can affect data generation, specifically access and interactions within interview…
A State of (Dis)unity and Uncertain Belonging
This article examines how existing in a larger socio-political environment of contested national belonging shapes Muslims’ experiences in the Central African Republic ( car ). We draw on data gathered between 2017 and 2019 from various archival sources and in-depth interviews with Muslim religious leaders and non-Muslims in car ’s capital, Bangui. We argue that through claims to autochthony a dual logic of exclusion co-occurs which shapes how Mus…
Belonging, Identity, and Conflict in the Central African Republic
"Political conflict in many parts of the world has been shaped by notions of who rightfully belongs to a place. The concept of autochthony—that a true, original people are born of a land and belong to it above all others—has animated struggles across postcolonial Africa. But is this sense of rootedness from time immemorial necessary to assertions of original being and thus political supremacy? Belonging, Identity, and Conflict in the Central Afri…
Pragmatic Peacekeeping in a Multipolar Era
As UN peacekeeping continues to move through a period of change and rupture, we conceptualise this turn as ‘pragmatic’ and take interest in its normative dimensions. In this introduction to a Special Issue, we take stock of scholarship on this pragmatic turn, arguing that it can be enriched through deeper engagement with theories of norms and practices, drawing especially on pragmatist approaches in the field of International Relations. We also a…
A day without Global North researchers
What happens when researchers based in the Global North are suddenly unable to access research sites, especially those in the Global South? In 2020, COVID-related public health measures and travel restrictions made clear how dependent certain categories of researchers in the North are on easy access to research sites in the South. The space opened up by their pandemic-imposed retreat and the solutions devised in response have provoked both challe…
Radical Autochthony? Proprietary Political Discourse Among Elites and Peasants in the Anti-Balaka Armed Movement in the Central African Republic
Since at least the colonial era, the Central African Republic (CAR) has been a hotbed of rural rebellion and protest. This article explores the political discourses of members of the Anti-Balaka, a diffuse protest movement and armed rebellion, comparing discourses to see how they vary in relation to demographic categories: urban and rural, elites and peasants. Lombard and Vlavonou find that rural peasants demand a moral economy of interpersonal r…
Political science (14 works) · Sociology (11 works) · Law (10 works) · Politics (8 works) · Law (7 works) · Political economy (6 works) · Economics (5 works) · History (5 works) · African Studies and Geopolitics (4 works) · Elite (4 works)