Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: The Role of Marginalized Groups in Post-Conflict Reconstruction

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University of Chicago graduate student, Joshua Walker, under the direction of Dr. Jean Comaroff, will undertake doctoral research on how social order may be maintained through new socio-cultural forms that arise as a result of sustained crisis. The research will focus on marginalized youth and their role in the rebuilding of social order in Mbujimayi, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Life in the DRC has been dramatically transformed by the post-1970s economic and conflicts that have engulfed the country to differing degrees over the past 13 years. Street children and diamond miners in Mbujimayi are emblematic of a multifaceted crisis, which has weakened the patterns of trust and forms of interdependence that Mbujimayi residents call "solidarity." Yet as marginalized youth, they paradoxically appear to be a source of societal renewal. Preliminary research indicates that street children and artisanal miners create relationships which appear to be characterized by the kind of solidarity that seems increasingly rare in other segments of Congolese society.The researcher will conduct extensive ethnographic research on the kinds of social and cultural organization street children and artisanal miners create among one another and their implications for the remaking of social order. Structured and semi-structured interviews, the collection of life histories, and sustained observation of practices will be undertaken with groups of miners and street children. To gather data on perceptions of these two groups of marginalized youth, the researcher will also interview other city residents and monitor and analyze portrayals of these young people in local media.This research will contribute to post-conflict policy making by investigating systematically the ways in which the rebuilding of the socio-cultural fabric is ongoing outside and in dialogue with formal reconstruction efforts. It also will address broader theories of the creation of social order during and after periods of sustained civil crisis. This project also contributes to the education of a social scientist.