Rwanda: Progress or Powder Keg?

Issue Date July 2015
Volume 26
Issue 3
Page Numbers 19-33
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While post-genocide Rwanda’s decent technocratic governance has led to strong economic recovery and good public service provision, its political governance is deeply flawed and may destroy these achievements. The ruling RPF has solidly established hegemony by eliminating the political opposition and autonomous civil society, massively violating human rights, and killing well over hundred thousand of its own citizens, abusing the legal and justice systems, and deploying skillful information management. This article addresses the way in which this hegemonic project was conducted, how this relates to regime achievements in the economic sphere, and how tradeoffs between political and technocratic governance have kept the international community at bay.

About the Author

Filip Reyntjens is professor of law and politics at the Institute of Development Policy and Management (IOB) at the University of Antwerp. His latest book is Aid and Authoritarianism in Africa (2016, coedited with Tobias Hagmann).

View all work by Filip Reyntjens