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Presenting a DIGICOLJUST research output at the ECAS 2023 Conference

On 31 May, Benoît Henriet was at the 9th European Conference on African Studies in Cologne to present a chapter that he is currently writing with Renaud Juste. This work in progress is extensively based on the archives of the Conseils de Guerre, and shed light on their epistemic potential in the study of revolt and indigenous agency in colonial Congo.

A vignette taken out of the proceedings of the Conseils de Guerre of the Kwango in 1931, used as introduction to the presentation.

In this paper, Henriet and Juste attempt to shed light on how the 1931 Kwango revolt both exposed and reconfigured social hierarchies and collective solidarities in Southwest Belgian Congo. The murder and dismemberment of Belgian public servant Maximilien Balot by a group of Congolese adepts of the Tupelepele millenarian movement on 31 May 1931, marked the highest point of the long-broiling discontent of local communities against their social, economic and political standing. In response to this unprecedented event, the colonial authorities put an extensive region under a state of emergency, in order to quell the allegedly fast-spreading rebellion. In this legal state of exception, which lasted between June and September 1931, civilian courts were replaced by court-martials, which were in charge of pursuing those believed to be the adepts and leaders of the movement.

The proceedings of these courts, which have never been used by historians until today, shed light on the profound transformations of the flows of power, hierarchies and solidarity entailed by the ongoing revolt. For instance, both menial objects and symbolically charged body parts garnered new meanings, values and uses. Henriet and Juste endeavour to investigate how everyday objects such as trunks, administrative documents and handkerchiefs, as well as the body parts of Balot, were enmeshed in new discursive frameworks, new value scales, and were given new meanings. As highlighted in the vignette they used in the presentation’s introduction, the parallel uses and distribution of human remains and fiscal tokens sketch out the contours of a transgressive economy, which help us better understand what revolting meant for the involved parties. In a time of uncertainty, new frameworks were devised for power in its many forms to flow in new directions, which are made visible in the mobilisation of these items in new transactional arrangements.  

The presentation was part of the panel ‘Structures of Violence: punishment in Africa from the colonial era to the present’, organised by Prof. Stacey Hynd (University of Exeter) and April Jackson (University of Leicester). Stay tuned for more information soon on the published outcome of this research!


OpenEdition suggests that you cite this post as follows:
Benoît Henriet (June 9, 2023). Presenting a DIGICOLJUST research output at the ECAS 2023 Conference. DIGICOLJUST. Retrieved April 28, 2025 from https://doi.org/10.58079/nmez


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