International Constructions of National Memories: The Aims and Effects of Foreign Donors' Support for Genocide Remembrance in Rwanda

The Performance of International Diplomacy at Kigali Memorial Centre, Rwanda

“…These include papers on: the contribution of Rwandese survivor groups to memorial management (Ibreck 2010;Jessee 2017b); the influence of non-Rwandan developmental organisations (Ibreck 2013); the politics, affects, and effects of the ongoing exhumation, identification, internment, rearrangement, and cleaning of the human remains at the memorials (Jessee 2012;Major 2015); the role of the memorials in communicating a single authorised narrative (Jessee 2017a); the role of the memorials in peacebuilding, including the contrast between memorial narratives and civilian memories (King 2010); the location of the memorials within an international post-conflict heritage-healing complex (Giblin 2013a); and the investigation of the memorials as a form of dark, difficult, or uncomfortable tourism (Robb 2009;Mckinney 2012;Friedrich and Johnston 2013), including the effect of the memorials on tourists as analysed through online tourist photographs of human remains at the sites (Bolin 2012). In terms of memorial performativity, Bolin's (2012) study is of interest.…”

“…The memorial research was undertaken as part of a larger project that considered the role of heritage in postconflict development in western Great Lakes Africa, specifically Rwanda and Uganda. In Rwanda, the research was carried out with the permission of the Institute of National Museums of Rwanda (INMR) and the National Commission for the Fight Against Genocide (CNLG), government organisations that have historically managed the memorials in collaboration with survivor groups (Giblin 2013a;Ibreck 2010Ibreck , 2013. To understand the post-conflict heritage effects of the memorials, the research employed participant observation, interviews with visitors and staff, and photographic recording and analysis of all available visitor books, amassing records of thousands of entries made over the past decade (Giblin 2013a).…”

“…Over the past decade, Rwanda's genocide memorials and memorialisation events have received increasing academic attention (Cook 2006;Caplan 2007;Guyer 2009;Robb 2009;Brandsetter 2010;Ibreck 2010Ibreck , 2013King 2010;Tadjo 2010;Sodaro 2011;Bolin 2012;McKinney 2012;Jessee 2012Jessee , 2017aJessee , 2017bGiblin 2013a, Forthcoming;Meirheinrich 2013;Eltringham 2014Eltringham , 2015Jinks 2014;Major 2015). However, the linked performance of memorialisation and international diplomacy at the KMC has not been explored academically, despite clear examples of international diplomacy taking place at the KMC (see McKinney 2012).…”

The Holocaust Template – Memorial Museums in Hungary, Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina

“…It might seem at first glance that the case of Srebrenica does not belong to the comparison. Yet, the Srebrenica-Potočari memorial developed its new permanent exhibition from 2017 in cooperation with experts from the Westerbork concentration camp memorial (Memorijalni Centar Srebrenica-Potočari 2018) -comparable to the Kigali Memorial Museum in Rwanda which invited a UK-based NGO that specializes on Holocaust exhibitions to curate its permanent exhibition (Brandstetter 2010;Ibreck 2013). And the Genocide museum in Sarajevo begins its exhibition with an equalization of Bosniaks and Jewish Holocaust victims.…”

Local agency, development assistance and the legacies of rebellion in Burundi and Rwanda

“…Murigande was the Rwandan Foreign Affairs Minister when he wrote this piece.26 Jonathan Fisher calls this the ability of the RPF to provide a 'donor support rationale' Fisher (2013)Thomson (2011).28 There has been extensive international support for the Rwandan government's project of memorialization(Ibreck 2013).29 The reconstruction of ethnic and political identities has been carried out by a number of institutions, including a fund for survivors, a National Unity and Reconciliation Commission, and a National Human Rights Commission. Solidarity camps were set up to re-educate Rwandans about their past.…”