In the hills of Kigali, I learned from current and former officials and community leaders reflecting on how reconciliation is possible where history, trauma, and politics work to expand divisions. Although this was the first roundtable conversation and series of interviews in a much larger Libertas Council project on the subject, here are some initial observations.
Acknowledgement Matters
Distinct from an apology or accountability, Rwandan leaders highlighted the importance of acknowledgment in reconciliation. Acknowledgement does not require an acceptance of responsibility or an apportionment of blame. It demands that history is history. That something happened. It was real. For Rwanda, it means acknowledging the brutal killing of an estimated one million Tutsis over one hundred days between April and July 1994. Acknowledgment that harm happened is essential.
But even in the Rwandan context, with an international consensus that the genocide occurred, I learned that acknowledgement itself is a constant fight. There are those who campaign to negate the agreed upon history through both denial and minimization. The argument is that genocide against the Tutsis never really occurred, it was just armed conflict between groups, civil war, or the devastation has been exaggerated. In one powerful moment while learning from survivors of the Rwandan genocide, leaders explained why they left many of the slain corpses in place instead of providing a proper burial so that the international community, historians, and naysayers would have to acknowledge the ugly truth. Genocide happened.
Without an agreed upon set of basic facts, reconciliation will remain evasive. With acknowledgement, communities can contend with the difficult issues of responsibility, accountability, restoration, and healing.
Reconciliation is a Process
Another consistent theme among the Rwanda leaders was that reconciliation is a process not an event. Reconciliation is an ongoing effort that requires constant cultivation. The genocide against the Tutsis occurred 31 years ago and was not an isolated incident. There had been successive rounds of killing Tutsis for decades and schools embedded anti-Tutsi sentiment in their curriculum. Just as the genocide occurred in a prolonged context, reconciliation is a process.
Currently, reconciliation requires a fresh assessment of how to reintegrate genocide’s perpetrators whose prison sentences are ending. The Rwandan government is not only releasing them back into the communities they once harmed, but they are not returning to the country they once knew. Since the genocide in 1994, the internet, mobile phones, sustained peace and prosperity have transformed Rwandan communities throughout the country. Meaningful reconciliation must now support the reintegration of perpetrators, helping them find employment and a place in a modern society.
Fear, Hate, and Hope
There was a consensus among the Rwandan leaders that the genocide masterminds used fear more than hate to mobilize neighbors to turn against each other. It was less about hatred or overt animosity, and more about the fear of the Tutsi taking over the country and its sectors. They pushed what leaders described as a “compliant population” into a “kill or be killed” fallacy. This provided a permission structure for seemingly non-radicalized people to wield machetes and clubs against women, men, and children whom they had known for years.
The foundation for the work of reconciliation cannot be hatred for the perpetrators, but instead a tangible hope that drives out fear. The answer to murderous dehumanization is not the dehumanization of offenders. Finding common ground and calling people to see the inherent value of both the fallen and the culpable is the hopeful foundation of reconciliation.
