Resources and Rape

Congo's (toxic) Discursive Complex

Bibliographic Data

ID2098293
AuthorsAnn Laudati, Charlotte Mertens (0000-0002-3260-6731)
Year2019
Volume62
Issue4
Pages57-82
Publication date2019-12-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueAfrican Studies Review (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0002-0206 • E-ISSN: 1555-2462
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/asr.2018.126
OpenAlexW2936567899
LanguageEN
Citations received7
References cited30

In the last decade, the rapes (of women) in, and the metaphoric raping (of natural resources) of, the Democratic Republic of Congo have received unprecedented attention from media, donors, and advocacy groups. Beginning in the early 2000s, these two narratives (the involvement of armed groups and state forces in illegal resource exploitation and the widespread prevalence of sexual violence in eastern DRC) merged to form a direct cause-consequence relationship, in which rape is framed as a tool for accessing mineral wealth. Through an analysis of media articles and reports of human rights organizations, this study traces the making of this rape-resources narrative, juxtaposing it with wider academic debates and critical scholarship. The narrative effectively focuses attention on a narrow set of actors and spaces in Congo's conflicts, highlighting each of those actors/spaces in particular ways while obscuring the role of others. Because of this, key dynamics are missing from the narrative, such as historical context, gendered conflict dynamics, and armed group/civilian activity and mobilization, which are critical to understanding the scale and scope of violence in the region more broadly and the perpetration of instances of rape more specifically. The unraveling of the rape-resources narrative reveals its toxicity in limiting effective interventions and in closing down alternative narratives

Context (archaeology · Criminology · Democracy · Geography · Narrative · Political science · Politics · Scholarship · Sexual violence · Sociology · Cambodian History and Society · Gender Studies · Gender, Security, and Conflict · Law · Peacebuilding and International Security