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Reinventing Order in the Congo: How People Respond to State Failure in Kinshasa | 
 enlarge | Creator: Theodore Trefon
Publisher: Zed Books
Category: Book
List Price: $36.95
Buy New: $29.46
You Save: $7.49 (20%)
New (13) Used (9) from $13.19
Rating:  3 reviews
Sales Rank: 946165
Media: Paperback
Pages: 224
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.8
Dimensions (in): 8.4 x 5.4 x 0.6
ISBN: 1842774913
Dewey Decimal Number: 330.9675112
EAN: 9781842774915
ASIN: 1842774913
Publication Date: March 16, 2005
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
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Product Description
The populations of many Third World mega-cities have far outstripped any apparent economic basis for their size and survival. In this volume Congolese and Western social scientists cover most aspects of urban life in Kinshasa--how ordinary people hustle for a modest living; the famous "bargaining" system ordinary Kinois have developed; and how they access food, water supplies, health and education. The NGOization of service provision is analyzed, as is the quite rare incidence of urban riots. Equally interesting are the studies of popular discourses (including street rumor, witchcraft, and attitudes to big men, like musicians and preachers). The studies are full of the most startling facts and the wonderfully evocative phrases coined by ordinary Kinois as they confront the huge obstacle course that is urban life. Concrete, readable, intensely interesting, and always illuminating, this book is a model of how to do urban sociology in the developing world today.
Book Description
The populations of many Third World mega-cities have far outstripped any apparent economic basis for their size and survival. In this volume Congolese and Western social scientists cover most aspects of urban life in Kinshasa--how ordinary people hustle for a modest living; the famous "bargaining" system ordinary Kinois have developed; and how they access food, water supplies, health and education. The NGOization of service provision is analyzed, as is the quite rare incidence of urban riots. Equally interesting are the studies of popular discourses (including street rumor, witchcraft, and attitudes to big men, like musicians and preachers).
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| Customer Reviews:
 Exciting new approach to the study of failed states July 6, 2005
Rosemary Cairns (Uzice, Serbia)
5 out of 6 found this review helpful
Since the term "failed state" was coined in 1992 by Helman and Ratner, many articles have been written about states that don't work. After September 11th, US, Canadian and European national security policies set out commitments to work in failed states on the grounds that lack of order and security in such states presented a threat to international security. The increased emphasis on peacebuilding which has resulted (and is most evident in Iraq and Afghanistan) has led to extensive discussion about how best to rebuild failed or collapsed states. But most books and articles have focused on the "big picture" - on lack of governance of the state, rather than on how the people of that state manage to live within the chaos that surrounds them.
This book, which looks at the capital city of what most observers regard as a "collapsed" state, brings a welcome new perspective. As Margaret Wheatley showed us some years ago, even within organizational chaos, there is order, if you know how to look for it. In this case, the order can be found at the local level, within Kinshasa, the capital of the huge and resource-rich Democratic Republic of Congo. This book shows how the Kinois, as Kinshasa's residents call themselves, manage to create order within their own lives. For example, in a setting where many people eat only once every two days, starvation is not at the levels that would otherwise be expected, because people have developed their own social systems and structures for obtaining and distributing food. And as in many such states, women play a key role in this alternative system.
Looking within failed states for order is an exciting new approach in this field, both in scholarly terms and in terms of offering new ideas for how peacebuilding can be designed to work effectively in failed states. The international community spends a great deal of money in trying to rebuild failing and failed states. This book offers a new perspective that will be valuable for both policy-makers and peacebuilders alike, in showing us peoples' great creativity and capacity to create order even when governance structures collapse around them.
 For the love of Congo July 6, 2005
Margaret C. Szumowski (West Springfield, MA United States)
3 out of 7 found this review helpful
Theodore Trefon is an excellent editor for Reinventing Order in the Congo: How People Respond to State Failure in Kinshasa. I found myself mesmerized by the book, the sorrows of the people, their efforts to survive. Reading the book,I could hardly recognize the city that I loved in the 70's, so exuberant, dancing at the Cafe de la Paix! Trefon clearly has an understanding of the people who have suffered so many wars, so many Grosse Legumes, so many losses. Nevertheless, there is a strength to the people, hoping to find a bit of something to eat,to find a bit of humor, to make something out of their difficult days. How have they survived Leopold, Mobutu, and all the others, with strength. Hustling to stay alive, listening to their bits of hope, we realize that they are stronger than we. As Theodore Trefon and others tell their stories,you will be unable to lift your eyes from the text, and the power of these citizens who still manage some dignity and pride despite all wars, and degradation. Let Congo rise again.
Incredible--fascinating book December 30, 2007
CJ Garvin (St. Louis, MO USA)
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
This is a sociological study of the people living in Kinshasa, Zaire. You will enter another world of perception, such as the first world and second world of the witch-children, the child-soldiers, of cannibalism, the mire of sex and sorcery. It is broken down into individual essays by leading sociologists regarding the economy, survival on the streets, witchcraft, prostitution, matriarchal system ect...
It is hair-raising and unbelievable at times. If you plan on going to the DRC, this book could save your life.
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