Individualism, Rights and Development: The Voices of Burundian Youth
Public Lecture by Professor Peter Uvin, Provost
Amherst College
Gordon Hal
Friday, 23 October 2013, 4-6 pm
PERI African Policy Program Lecturer Series
Co-sponsored by:
The Economics Department History and Development Workshop
The Five College African Studies Council
How do Burundians view development and governance? Professor Peter Uvin
provides some unexpected insights from a year of field work in a country coming
out of war.
The Speaker:
Professor Peter Uvin is the award-winning author of Aiding Violence: The Development
Enterprise in Rwanda (1998), followed up more recently by Human Rights and Development
(2004) and Life After Violence: A People's Story of Burundi (2009). His talk will draw mostly on
the latter but also on the earlier books and his extensive academic research on the subject.
Brief description of Life After Violence: A People's Story of Burundi (2009) by Peter Uvin:
Burundi recently emerged from twelve years of civil war. In this book, ordinary Burundians, farmers, artisans,
traders, mothers, soldiers and students talk about the past and the future, war and peace, their hopes for a better
life and their relationships with each other and the state. Young men, in particular, often seen as the cause of
violence, talk about the difficulties of living up to standards of masculinity in an impoverished and war-torn
society. Weaving a rich tapestry, Peter Uvin pitches the ideas and aspirations of people on the ground against the
assumptions often made by the international development and peace-building agencies. This groundbreaking
book on conflict and society in Africa will have profound repercussions for development across the world.
Enjoy some Burundian traditional dance:
Women Burundian drummers; Muri beza - Ishaka dance group; Menya uyabumbatire – Ishaka
Dance Group