The Congo Security Catch-22

This year's Kent State Symposium on Democracy focused on gender-based violence against women and the devastating impact Rwanda has had on the people of the Kivus. This is perhaps representative of a trend by activists and academics whereby problems in the Kivus dominate the debates about state-building challenges.

Security and politics in the Kivus - and relations with their neighbours - appear to be isolated from the broader national political debate. While there can be no solution to security challenges in the Kivus without improved govenrnance at the macro level, there can be no improved governance without security in the Kivus. Symposium participants concurred this is a Catch-22 that will take many, many years to resolve.

Theodore Trefon, Thomas Turner, René Lemarchand at KSU (27 April)