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Rwanda's Imidugudu programme and earlier experiences with villagisation and resettlement in East Africa

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 February 2002

Mathijs van Leeuwen
Mathijs van Leeuwen
Affiliation:
The author of this paper is affiliated to Wageningen Disaster Studies, a section of Rural Development Sociology at Wageningen University, the Netherlands. The paper is based on research including six months fieldwork in Rwanda between August 1998 and March 1999. I am grateful to the Joint Reintegration Programming Unit (JRPU), the International Rescue Committee (IRC), ZOA Refugee Care, and Gerrit Noordam of the Netherlands Embassy in Kigali, that facilitated the research in Rwanda. I am also grateful for mental support and valuable comments from Georg Frerks and Thea Hilhorst, Wageningen Disaster Studies. Correspondence regarding this paper may be addressed to: Wageningen Disaster Studies, P.O. Box 8130, 6700 EW Wageningen. Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

Despite earlier, negative experiences in East Africa, in early 1997 the government of Rwanda embarked on an ambitious programme for villagisation and resettlement. While the Rwanda authorities present the programme as entirely different from its predecessors, a review of those and of the implementation of villagisation and resettlement in Rwanda shows that this statement cannot hold. Nevertheless, the programme gets considerable support from international agencies. This article investigates how international agencies have accepted and upheld the ‘narrative of difference’ of the Rwandan authorities. It argues that, notwithstanding the claims of the government, lessons from the experiences with villagisation in Mozambique, Ethiopia and Tanzania are relevant for the Rwanda case and should be taken into account.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Modern African Studies , Volume 39 , Issue 4 , December 2001 , pp. 623 - 644
Copyright
© 2001 Cambridge University Press

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