(Re)Building the Social Contract After Violence: Perspectives from CAR

• In Event: Short- and Long-Term Implications of Violence for State/Society Relations

Abstract

How do personal encounters with violence, law and the state shape citizens’ confidence in and attitudes towards state institutions in the aftermath of conflict? Using ethnographic, interview-based and survey data from four conflict-affected sous-préfectures in the Central African Republic, we demonstrate that negative first-hand experiences with military and police during the war erode citizens’ trust in the institutions of the state but do not tend to disrupt citizens’ perceptions of the state's authority to arbitrate or enforce the law. Individuals from diverse demographic backgrounds imbue state institutions with the right to perform their governance and law-enforcement duties, even after experiencing deep injustices. This article advances existing comparative research on attitudes towards the state, which tends to conflate trust and legitimacy, and overlook the distinction between de facto performance and de jure perceptions of authority.

Author

• Milli Lake, London School of Economics