Timothy Longman

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Timothy Paul Longman (born February 10, 1964) is a professor of political science and international relations at Boston University. [1] A protege of Alison Des Forges, he is recognized as one of the top authorities on the Rwandan genocide and its legacies.

Contents

Career

Longman was born in Illinois and graduated from El Dorado High School in El Dorado, Kansas. He earned his undergraduate degree in religion and political science at Phillips University in Enid, Oklahoma. He received his PhD in Political Science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, with a certificate in African studies. At UW, Longman studied with M. Crawford Young, Aili M. Tripp, Murray Edelman, and Jan Vansina, among others. His dissertation focused on the involvement of Christian churches in the 1994 Rwandan genocide. After completing his PhD, he served as the head of the field office of Human Rights Watch and the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) in Rwanda, conducting research for and helping to write the report, Leave None to Tell the Story. [2] From 1996 to 2009, he taught at Vassar College, before moving to Boston University. [3] Longman served as director of the African Studies Center, Boston University from 2009 to 2017. In 2017, he became the director of BU's Institute on Culture, Religion, and World Affairs (CURA). He has previously held research and teaching appointments at the Human Rights Center at University of California, Berkeley; the International Human Rights Exchange at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa; the National University of Rwanda; Drake University; and Columbia University.

In addition to his teaching positions, Longman has served as an expert witness in a dozen trials related to the Rwandan genocide held in the United States, Canada, Finland, Sweden, and the United Kingdom, as well as testifying in the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in Arusha, Tanzania. [4] He has also served as a consultant for Human Rights Watch, the International Center for Transitional Justice, and USAID in Rwanda, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Uganda. Longman has served on the Executive Committee of the African Studies Association.

Publications

Human Rights Watch Reports

Longman is listed as a researcher and contributing author to Leave None to Tell the Story, the report on the 1994 Rwandan genocide of the Tutsi written primarily by Alison Des Forges. He wrote the chapters on the genocide in the commune of Nyakizu, one of the three local-case studies in the book. [5] Leave None to Tell the Story is widely recognized as the definitive account of the Rwandan genocide and was awarded the 2000 Raphael Lemkin Book Award from the Institute for the Study of Genocide for the best book "that focuses on explanations of genocide, crimes against humanity, state mass killings and gross violations of human rights, and strategies to prevent such crimes and violations." [6]

While he was directing the HRW/FIDH field office in 1995–96, he researched and wrote a report on attacks against ethnic Tutsi in the Democratic Republic of Congo (then called Zaire). [7] He also participated in the research and publication of "Shattered Lives," a report that focused on sexual violence during the 1994 genocide. [8] This report was instrumental in pushing the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda to bring charges of sexual assault against genocide perpetrators, with the case against Jean-Paul Akayesu setting the precedent that sexual violence could be considered a genocide crime. [9] Longman also wrote reports for Human Rights Watch on attacks on civilians in the two Congolese wars. [10] [11] In 1997, Longman conducted research in Burundi with journalist Molly Bingham on attacks against civilians in the civil war there. [12]

Publications on Religion in the 1994 Rwanda Genocide

Much of Longman's published work focuses on religion in Rwanda, which is an overwhelmingly Christian country. Longman's first book, Christianity and Genocide in Rwanda , analyzes the involvement of Rwanda's Christian churches in the 1994 genocide. [13] In the book, Longman explores the history of Christianity in Rwanda and argues that churches in the country maintained a close relationship with political power and practiced ethnic discrimination from their foundation. He notes that in the early 1990s some voices in the Christian churches were promoting democracy, fighting for human rights, and opposing ethnic violence, but that the most church leaders strongly supported the regime that ultimately carried out genocide. Longman writes that church support helped make the genocide possible by giving it moral support. “Christians could kill without obvious qualms of conscience, even in the church, because Christianity as they had always known it had been a religion defined by struggles for power, and ethnicity had always been at the base of those struggles” [14]

Publications on Post-Genocide Rwanda

Longman has also published extensively on efforts to rebuild post-genocide Rwanda, most notably in his 2017 book, Memory and Justice in Post-Genocide Rwanda. [15] In this book, Longman looks at the many transitional justice programs that the post-genocide government has implemented, including the grassroots gacaca courts, and how the Rwandan population has responded. He concludes that transitional justice programs in Rwanda have done more to help the Rwandan Patriotic Front government to consolidate its power than to promote justice and reconciliation. The book is based on research conducted when Longman was affiliated with the Human Rights Center at the University of California, Berkeley, that was funded by the MacArthur Foundation, the United States Institute of Peace, the Sandler Foundation, and the Hewlett Foundation. The book received honorable mention for the Melville J. Herskovits Prize and the Bethwell Ogot Book Prize from the African Studies Association and was named the 2017 best book in African politics by the African Politics Conference Group. [16]

Related Research Articles

Human occupation of Rwanda is thought to have begun shortly after the last ice age. By the 11th century, the inhabitants had organized into a number of kingdoms. In the 19th century, Mwami (king) Rwabugiri of the Kingdom of Rwanda conducted a decades-long process of military conquest and administrative consolidation that resulted in the kingdom coming to control most of what is now Rwanda. The colonial powers, Germany and Belgium, allied with the Rwandan court.

The Hutu, also known as the Abahutu, are a Bantu ethnic group which is native to the African Great Lakes region. They mainly live in Rwanda, Burundi, and Uganda where they form one of the principal ethnic groups alongside the Tutsi and the Great Lakes Twa.

The Tutsi, also called Watusi, Watutsi or Abatutsi, are an ethnic group of the African Great Lakes region. They are a Bantu-speaking ethnic group and the second largest of three main ethnic groups in Rwanda and Burundi.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda</span> 1994 court of the United Nations Security Council

The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda was an international court established in November 1994 by the United Nations Security Council in Resolution 955 in order to adjudicate people charged for the Rwandan genocide and other serious violations of international law in Rwanda, or by Rwandan citizens in nearby states, between 1 January and 31 December 1994. The court eventually convicted 61 individuals and acquitted 14.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cyprien Ntaryamira</span> 5th President of Burundi (1955–1994)

Cyprien Ntaryamira was a Burundian politician who served as President of Burundi from 5 February 1994 until his death two months later. A Hutu born in Burundi, Ntaryamira studied there before fleeing to Rwanda to avoid ethnic violence and complete his education. Active in a Burundian student movement, he cofounded the socialist Burundi Workers' Party and earned an agricultural degree. In 1983, he returned to Burundi and worked agricultural jobs, though he was briefly detained as a political prisoner. In 1986 he cofounded the Front for Democracy in Burundi (FRODEBU), and in 1993 FRODEBU won Burundi's general elections. He subsequently became the Minister of Agriculture and Animal Husbandry on 10 July, but in October Tutsi soldiers killed the president and other top officials in an attempted coup.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rwandan genocide</span> 1994 genocide of Tutsis in Rwanda

The Rwandan genocide, also known as the genocide against the Tutsi, occurred between 7 April and 19 July 1994 during the Rwandan Civil War. During this period of around 100 days, members of the Tutsi minority ethnic group, as well as some moderate Hutu and Twa, were killed by armed Hutu militias. Although the Constitution of Rwanda states that more than 1 million people perished in the genocide, the demographic evidence suggests that the real number killed was likely lower. The most widely accepted scholarly estimates are around 500,000 to 662,000 Tutsi deaths.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Burundian Civil War</span> Inter-ethnic conflict within Burundi from 1993 to 2005

The Burundian Civil War was a civil war in Burundi lasting from 1993 to 2005. The civil war was the result of longstanding ethnic divisions between the Hutu and the Tutsi ethnic groups. The conflict began following the first multi-party elections in the country since its independence from Belgium in 1962, and is seen as formally ending with the swearing-in of President Pierre Nkurunziza in August 2005. Children were widely used by both sides in the war. The estimated death toll stands at 300,000.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bibliography of the Rwandan genocide</span>

This is a bibliography for primary sources, books and articles on the personal and general accounts, and the accountabilities, of the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Great Lakes refugee crisis</span> 1990s refugee crisis in Central Africa

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">1993 ethnic violence in Burundi</span> 1993 killings of mostly Tutsis in Burundi

Mass killings of Tutsis were conducted by the majority-Hutu populace in Burundi from 21 October to December 1993, under an eruption of ethnic animosity and riots following the assassination of Burundian President Melchior Ndadaye in an attempted coup d'état. The massacres took place in all provinces apart from Makamba and Bururi, and were primarily undertaken by Hutu peasants. At many points throughout, Tutsis took vengeance and initiated massacres in response.

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Alison Des Forges was an American historian and human rights activist who specialized in the African Great Lakes region, particularly the 1994 Rwandan genocide. At the time of her death, she was a senior advisor for the African continent at Human Rights Watch. She died in a plane crash on 12 February 2009.

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Gersony Report is the name given to the 1994 findings made by a team under Robert Gersony, which was under contract to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and identified a pattern of massacres by the Rwandan Patriotic Front rebels during and after their military victory in the civil war in post-genocide Rwanda. The findings were suppressed by the United Nations and involved governments for political reasons, and its existence was denied. No final written report was ever completed, though purported early written documentation has been leaked. The validity of Gersony's purported findings continue to be disputed.

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Laurien Ntezimana is a Rwandan Catholic theologian, sociologist and peace activist known for protecting Tutsi during the Rwandan genocide of 1994.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Burundi–Rwanda relations</span> Bilateral relations

Relations between Burundi and Rwanda have existed for at least as long as the states themselves. Before contact with Europeans, Rwanda and Burundi were kingdoms competing to gain control over nearby territory. In the 1880s, the two kingdoms were placed under colonial authority, first by Germany, and then by Belgium after 1919.

References

  1. ↑ "Timothy P. Longman | Political Science". www.bu.edu.
  2. ↑ Alison Des Forges, Leave None to Tell the Story: Genocide in Rwanda , New York: Human Rights Watch, 1999.
  3. ↑ "Curriculum Vita, Timothy Paul Longman" (PDF). 2017.
  4. ↑ Susan Seligson (January 3, 2013). "CAS Prof a Valued Witness in Rwanda Trials". BU Today.
  5. ↑ John S. Freidman (May 2, 2011). "Genocide Trial in Kansas". The Nation .
  6. ↑ "The Lemkin Book Award". Institute for the Study of Genocide.
  7. ↑ Timothy Longman, "Zaire: Forced to Flee: Violences against the Tutsis in Zaire," Vol. 8, no. 2 (A), New York: Human Rights Watch, July 1996
  8. ↑ Binaifer Nowrojee and Janet Fleischmann (September 1996). "Shattered Lives: Sexual Violence during the Rwandan Genocide and its Aftermath" (PDF). HRW. New York.
  9. ↑ Shayna Rogers, "Sexual Violence or Rape as a Constituent Act of Genocide: Lessons from the Ad Hoc Tribunals and a Prescription for the International Criminal Court," George Washington International Law Review, 2016.
  10. ↑ Timothy Longman and Alison Des Forges (1997). "Attacked by All Sides: Civilians and the War in Eastern Zaire". Human Rights Watch. New York.
  11. ↑ Timothy Longman (2000). "Eastern Congo Ravaged". Human Rights Watch. New York.
  12. ↑ Timothy Longman and Molly Bingham (1998). "Proxy Targets: War Against the Civilian Population of Burundi". Human Rights Watch. New York.
  13. ↑ Timothy Longman, Christianity and Genocide in Rwanda, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010.
  14. ↑ Longman, Christianity and Genocide in Rwanda, p. 164.
  15. ↑ Timothy Longman, Memory and Justice in Post-Genocide Rwanda, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2017.
  16. ↑ "Longman Wins Best Book in African Politics at ASA Meeting | the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies".
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