Re-imagining Rwanda by Johan Pottier

The tragic conflict in Rwanda and the Great Lakes in 1994-1996 attracted the horrified attention of the world’s media. Journalists, diplomats, and aid workers struggled to find a way to make sense of the bloodshed. Johan Pottier’s troubling study shows that the post-genocide regime in Rwanda was able to impose a simple yet persuasive account of Central Africa’s crises upon international commentators new to the region, and he explains the ideological underpinnings of this official narrative.