Suchergebnisse

ABSTRACTAcademic work on transitional justice has tended to focus on the most obvious and institutionalized sites where ideas about justice and transition are discussed or contested, such as truth commissions or international tribunals. Yet, there are many other sites where such ideas are framed, circulated or challenged, including sites outside transitional countries. Drawing on the case of Mauritania, where the repatriation of refugees has played a highly symbolic role during the latest 'democratic' transition, this article explores the specific roles played by refugee aid and past experiences of refugee life in shaping the terms of new beginnings in this country. As places of intense politicization of memory and appropriation of transnational discourses on human rights violations and transitional justice, refugee camps enhance the construction of new imagined communities based on a feeling of victimhood and abnormality and the construction of hegemonic narratives over the 'just order' to be aspired to for the future. The article outlines how such hegemonic ideas on justice and transition are shaped by humanitarian actors and the refugee elite, while at the same time being contested by subaltern groups through the production of alternative accounts of past injustices and through mundane practices.

Each year, the executive committee of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees adopts by consensus Conclusions on the International Protection of Refugees. These are regarded as universal standards in the area of asylum and are part of the multiple international recommendations that shape what some today refer to as a transnational legal order. The Conclusions contribute to specifying what attitude states should adopt towards the populations living on their territory. Drawing upon an ethnographic approach, this article analyzes the manner in which these global norms are constructed upstream within networks of transnational experts and multilateral forums. Who are the actors who participate in their definition and on the basis of what frameworks of action and reflection? How are they subsequently negotiated by diplomats occupying fundamentally divergent stances and representations? How, finally, are universality and consensus socially constructed? Adapted from the source document.

Cet article s'interroge sur les reconfigurations sociopolitiques impliquées par le rapatriement des Mauritaniens réfugiés au Sénégal depuis 1989 et sur la dangereuse résurgence des discours sur l'autochtonie qu'il suscite, sur fond de forte racialisation des rapports sociaux. Il analyse également comment le thème de la « réconciliation nationale » fait l'objet de diverses réappropriations stratégiques aux échelles nationale comme locale tout en réactualisant des oppositions souvent anciennes au sein de l'ensemble dit « négro-mauritanien ». Enfin, soulignant le caractère transnational des stratégies et modes de vie locaux, il questionne plus largement la pertinence de la notion de « rapatriement », envisagée par le droit international comme la solution durable la plus appropriée aux situations d'exil.

L'inadéquation de l'assistance alimentaire, les effets pervers des politiques humanitaires, mais aussi les dysfonctionnements des administrations des pays d'accueil limitent souvent les possibilités d'intégration des réfugiés et les contraignent à trouver d'autres solutions pour assurer leur survie économique et sociale. à partir de l'exemple du commerce transfrontalier informel pratiqué par les jeunes réfugiés peuls mauritaniens, nous montrerons comment ces réfugiés ont réactualisé des réseaux économiques et des alliances interethniques anciens afin de contourner les obstacles qui se sont posés à leur intégration économique au Sénégal.

The integration of refugees into the political economy of their host states is often hampered by insufficient humanitarian aid, the unintended consequences of humanitarian interventions, and the effects of dysfunctional local administrations. Refugees are thus often obligated to seek out alternative means to assure their economic survival and social integration. This paper examines the case of informal border trade practiced by young Mauritanian refugees who are members of the Peul ethnic group. The author shows how these refugees remobilize longstanding economic networks and interethnic alliances so as to overcome obstacles to their economic integration in Senegal. (Pol afr/DÜI)