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Lehrende: Dr. Dany Tiwa
Veranstaltungsart:
Seminar
Anzeige im Stundenplan:
Profilseminar D3
Semesterwochenstunden:
2
Credits:
6,0
Unterrichtssprache:
Englisch
Min. | Max. Teilnehmerzahl:
10 | 20
Weitere Informationen:
M.A. Internationale Kriminologie: Profilmodul Spezielle Kriminologien
M.A. Internationale Kriminologie und ggf. weitere M.A.-Studiengänge: Wahlbereich
Kommentare/ Inhalte:
While the support for vigilantism has significantly fallen in advanced democracies, lynchings remain tolerated throughout much of the developing world. Why do individuals or groups support vigilantism as a means of conflict resolution or crime control? This seminar will engage with the most influential explanations of lynching and lynching-like punishments in social sciences. Their explicative value will be assessed in light with recently collected data from Africa’s most populous country Nigeria, where the practice is known as ‘jungle justice’. Overall, the seminar is problematized as follow:
The dictionary definition of a jungle is straightforward. It refers to a wild and overgrown environment. In a figurative sense, the word is often used in negative to describe non-ruled or poorly ruled environments. From a criminological and/or a sociological standpoint, it is implicit in the concept of the jungle that the politics of law and order are bluntly that of the most powerful and that justice is not something one can expect to obtain unless powerful enough to claim it by his own means. In this sense, the ideal of justice is antithetical with the very idea of the jungle. If that is the case, how then are we to understand the concept of “jungle justice” that Nigerians have coined in reference to lynching and lynching-like punishments that people mete out on suspected criminals in their neighbourhoods? Does it mean that despite been intellectually and theoretically antithetical, justice can still flourish in the jungle? What does the justice in or of the jungle look like? What are its moral, ethical, political, economic, and cultural underpinnings? What are its technologies and what does it aim at achieving? How does it relate to the state and its order? Besides justice, what are Nigerians referring to when they describe their country as a jungle? What does the idea of the jungle tell us about the trajectory of postcolonial Nigeria?
Planning
The seminar will be taught in a total of 12 sessions of 2 hours each and will unfold as follow:
Sessions 1 & 2
In criminology, those who violently take the law into their own hands one way or the other are vigilantes (Buur & Jensen, 2004, p. 142). The problem with such a broad formulation is that it oversimplifies a complex phenomenon. People can and do take the law into their own hands in a variety of ways and for a variety of reasons. They can do it individually or collectively, privately or publicly, clandestinely or spectacularly. In addition, the levels of violence they resort to can vary from a few whippings to a deadly assault by a large crowd. Often, the same vigilantes are celebrated as heroes by some and treated as villains by others. More interestingly, vigilantes are sometimes supported—openly or secretively—, merely tolerated, or violently fought by the state. Because of such a level of complexity, vigilantism has been an essentially contested concept (see Gallie, 1994/1955).
In these sessions, we will locate mob justice within the broader concept of vigilantism. We will see how it relates to other forms of self-help such as street justice and how it departs from other forms of collective violence such as hate crimes. Besides, I will provide a general introduction to the seminar. This introduction will give you a complete overview of mob justice from geographical (where does mob justice occur?), historical (What do we know about mob justice in the past), and theoretical (how can we explain mob justice?) perspectives. I will also introduce the Nigerian case, including the typical victims and perpetrators, the repertoires of violence, the triggers, the rationalizations, the social reaction etc.
Mandatory readings
Michael j. Pfeifer (2017) Global Lynching and Collective Violence: Asia, Africa, and the Middle East, University of Illinois Press. (2017) [only the introduction]
Les Johnston (1996) “What is vigilantism?” British Journal of Criminology, 36(2), pp. 220-236
Sessions 3&4
While vigilantes across the world may claim that they are concerned with fighting crime that the State has failed to address (Berg & Wendt 2011), many of those who studied vigilantism in Nigeria have doubted that fighting crime is what motivates the thousands of young men who have formed vigilante groups in the country since the late 90s. This suspicion has arisen from them working hand in hand with and often for corrupt politicians, from their tendency to fight among themselves as well as against external competitors over lucrative turfs, and for the quality of their membership, often made up of thugs, hoodlums, and other dreaded individuals that populate Nigerian cities.
In these sessions, we will delve into Nigerian ethnic militias, a particular form of vigilantism that intersects with ethnic identities and involves supernatural power claims. We will try to understand how they emerged, why they became very popular and why some of them lost popular support and legitimacy at some point in their history. We will also look at their ambivalent relationship with the State authority and power.
Mandatory reading
Ray Abrahams (1998) Vigilant Citizens. Vigilantism and the State, Cambridge, Polity Press [introduction only]
Recommended reading
David Pratten (2008) "The Politics of Protection: perspectives on vigilantism in Nigeria" Africa 78 (1), pp. 1-15
· Daniel Jordan Smith (2004) “The Bakassi Boys: Vigilantism, Violence, and Political Imagination in Nigeria” Cultural Anthropology, 19 (3) pp.429-455
· Yvan Guichaoua (2009) “Self-determination group or extra-legal governance agency? The multifaceted nature of the Oodua People’s Congress in Nigeria” Journal of International Development, 21 (4), pp.520-533
· William Reno (2002) "The politics of insurgency in collapsing states" Development and Change 33(5): 837±858 (2002)
Sessions 5&6
These sessions will look more closely at the dynamics of mob justice as a form of informal social control. We will seek to understand how the conflicts that trigger it collectivize and what role violence plays in the process. Specifically, the sessions will provide answers to the following two sets of questions: first, considering that mob justice incidents characteristically start with an interpersonal conflict between two people—e.g., a pickpocket and its victim—, what drives passers-by to join the conflict? What is or are their motivation(s)? As for those who merely stand by and look, why don’t they join the collective punishment/frenzy? Do they support it or do they not? Second, how do perpetrators and supporters determine both the suspect’s guilt and the appropriate punishment they deserve? How do they frame, justify, or rationalize the violence they resort to? What are the functions of mob justice violence, if any, with respect to social order and stability in the communities in which mob justice occurs frequently?
Mandatory readings
· Sarah-Jane Cooper-Knock (2014) “Policing in intimate crowds: Moving beyond 'the mob' in South Africa” African Affairs, 113, n°453, pp. 563-582
· Hélène Risor (2010) “Twenty Hanging Dolls and a Lynching: Defacing Dangerousness and Enacting Citizenship in El Alto, Bolivia” Public Culture,22, n°3, pp 465-485
Sessions 7& 8
These sessions and the next four will be dedicated to students presentations. Students will be invited to choose a country case for their presentations and essays. If necessary, groups will be formed.
During these sessions, students will present the result of their research and readings on the trends and manifestations of mob justice in other parts of Africa. Countries they might work on include but are not limited to, South Africa, Mozambique, Kenya, Ghana, Cameroon, Democratic Republic of Congo etc. Presentations and subsequent essays should highlight how these countries compare to or differ from Nigeria and discuss how mob justice is to be understood there.
Presentation 1 + Discussions
Presentation 2 + Discussions
Final comments by the lecturer
Presentation 3 + Discussions
Presentation 4 + Discussions
Final comments by the lecturer
Recommended readings
· Buur & Jensen (2004) “Introduction: Vigilantism and the Policing of Everyday life in South Africa”, African Studies, 63:2, 139-152
· Rogers T.E. Orock (2014) “Crime, in/security and mob justice: the micropolitics of sovereignty in Cameroon”, Social Dynamics, 40 (2), pp.408-428
· Rush Smith (2015) "Rejecting rights. Vigilantism and Violence in Post-apartheid South Africa" African Affairs, 114/456, 341–360
· Gail Jennifer Super (2016) “Volatile Sovereignty: Governing Crime through the Community in Khayelitsha” Law & Society Review, 50 (2), pp. 450-483
Sessions 9&10
During these sessions, students will present the result of their research and readings on the trends and manifestations of mob justice in Latin America. Countries they might work on include but are not limited to, Guatemala, Brazil, Peru, Mexico, Ecuador etc. Presentations and subsequent essays should highlight how these countries compare with Nigeria and discuss how mob justice is to be understood there.
Presentation 5 + Discussions
Presentation 6 + Discussions
Final comments by the lecturer
Presentation 7 + Discussions
Presentation 8 + Discussi
Lernziel:
Objectives
At the end of this seminar, students will be able:
Ø To grasp the nuances and complexities of the notions of ‘justice’, ‘crime’ and ‘punishment’ in contexts of extreme marginality.
Ø To locate the roots of lynching in Nigeria in both recent societal changes and in past dynamics especially those that occurred following the encounter with the Europeans.
Students will know:
Ø Some of the main features of mob justice such as the typical victims, perpetrators, offenses punished, repertoires of violence etc.
Ø The causes and factors contributing to mob justice in many countries of the Global South.
Ø The consequences and implications for ideals and notions such as ‘justice’, ‘human rights’, ‘state monopoly of violence’, ‘policing’, ‘sovereignty’ etc.
Ø How scholars explain mob justice.
Ø The conditions under which the use of corporal punishment in the form of beatings and other forms of inflicting pain comes to be seen as both necessary and legitimate by individuals and communities affected by crime.
Vorgehen:
This seminar will be taught in English and will be a mix of short presentations by the lecturer, group discussions, and student presentations (Zoom-sessions). A variety a material including professional and amateur videos, newspaper articles, cartoons etc. will be used to convey key messages.
Literatur:
See comment/content
Zusätzliche Hinweise zu Prüfungen:
Examination
Students will be required to write about 3500 words-long essays on the topics they presented on during the seminar. These essays will count for 50% of the overall grade.
Presentations and participation (in the online classroom and in the openolat forum) will each count for 25% of the final grade.
The deadline for submitting essays will be agreed upon on during the first session.
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