Violent History

Giacomo Macola is Associate Professor of African History at “La Sapienza” University of Rome. He is a corresponding member of the Académie Royale des Sciences d’Outre-Mer.

Giacomo Macola fills a gap in scholarly literature on Central Africa: linking pre-colonial, colonial and the present times, he unravels the long-term mechanisms producing (extreme) violence in this troubled region. - Guy Vanthemsche, Vrije Universiteit Brussel

• Maps Abbreviations Preface to the English Edition AcknowledgementsIntroductionChapter 1. The “Ancien Régime” 1.1 The “equatorial tradition” 1.2 The Luba kingdom 1.3 The Lunda “commonwealth”Chapter 2. Traders, Raiders and Warlords in the Nineteenth Century 2.1 Long-distance trade networks 2.2 Msiri’s warlord state 2.3 Tippu Tip and the Arab-Swahili of eastern CongoChapter 3. The État Indépendant du Congo and the Occupation of the Congo Basin 3.1 The “système domanial” 3.2 The Force Publique 3.3 Van Kerckhoven, the Congo–Arab War and Ngongo Luteta 3.4 Mukanda Bantu and Clément BrasseurChapter 4. “Red Rubber” 4.1 The rubber companies 4.2 “Collaborators”: from the waungwana to Lupaka 4.3 A genocide in Congo? 4.4 The Congo reform movementChapter 5. The Belgian Congo 5.1 Administrative structures 5.2 The mining sector 5.3 Forced crops and forced labour 5.4 The Pende revolt and the “weapons of the weak” 5.5 The “creation of tribalism” 5.6 Belgian paternalismChapter 6. Decolonisation and Secession 6.1 A “precipitous decolonisation” 6.2 The secession of Katanga between neo-colonialism and the Cold War 6.3 The Katangese ideology 6.4 The return of warlordismChapter 7. The Rebellions of 1963–1965 7.1 From Pierre Mulele to the Simba 7.2 Internal weaknesses 7.3 Western interventionChapter 8. Mobutu’s Kleptocracy 8.1 “Mobutism”, “neo-patrimonialism” and “clientelism” 8.2 E economic and military crisis 8.3 Mobutu and the Cold War 8.4 The failure of the democratic transition 8.5 The collapse of the state and the new warlordsChapter 9. The Congo and the “Great African War” 9.1 The repercussions of the Rwandan genocide and the “First Congo War” 9.2 Mzee Kabila’s Congo 9.3 The “Second Congo War” 9.4 The war economy 9.5 Military fragmentation and Mayi-MayiEpilogue. An Uneasy PresentNotesBibliography Archives Published primary sources Secondary sourcesIndex