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

在Jean Comaroff博士的指导下，芝加哥大学的研究生Joshua Walker将进行博士研究，研究如何通过持续危机产生的新社会文化形式来维持社会秩序。该研究将侧重于边缘化青年及其在重建刚果民主共和国Mbujimayi社会秩序中的作用。20世纪70年代后的经济和冲突在过去13年里不同程度地席卷了这个国家，使刚果民主共和国的生活发生了巨大变化。姆布吉马伊的街头儿童和钻石矿工象征着一场多方面的危机，这种危机削弱了信任模式和相互依赖的形式，而姆布吉马伊居民称之为“团结”。然而，作为被边缘化的青年，他们似乎自相矛盾地成为社会更新的源泉。初步研究表明，街头儿童和手工矿工之间的关系似乎具有团结的特点，而这种团结在刚果社会的其他阶层中似乎越来越罕见。研究人员将对街头儿童和手工矿工彼此建立的各种社会和文化组织及其对重建社会秩序的影响进行广泛的民族志研究。将对矿工和街头儿童群体进行有组织和半有组织的面谈、收集生活史和持续观察各种做法。为了收集对这两个边缘化青年群体的看法数据，研究人员还将采访其他城市居民，并监测和分析当地媒体对这些年轻人的描述。这项研究将有助于冲突后的政策制定，系统地调查社会文化结构的重建是如何在外部进行的，并与正式的重建工作进行对话。它还将讨论在持续的国内危机期间和之后建立社会秩序的更广泛的理论。这个项目也有助于培养社会科学家。

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.