TWO

Mrica Otherwise
JANET ROITMAN

Cameroon, 1993. Two Decades Past. Crisis. rai la crise.

When 1 traveled through Cameroon in the early 1990s, people every-
where lamented, "J'ai la crise." Literally translated as "I have the crisis," this
beleaguered statement was intoned in the same way that someone would
say, "I have a cold" or "I have the flu." At the time, it seemed clear that
one could only conclude that Cameroonians were living in times of crisis
(Mbembe and Roitrnan 1995). That is to say that crisis, for those living in
Cameroon some two decades ago, was more than a set of statistics. La crise
was a condition and, as lived experience, had become an imperative, or a
figure, of rationality.
Doubtless, the lived experience of what is deemed "crisis" cannot be
reduced to a statistical event or an ensemble of socioeconomic indicators.
Such representations disregard the ways in which crisis becomes a device
for understanding how to act effectively in situations that belie, for the ac-
tors, a sense of possibility. But still we must ask, if crisis designates some-
thing more than a socioeconomic indicator or a historical conjuncture,
what is the status of that term? How did crisis, habitually a signifier for a
criticaL decisive moment, come to be construed as an experiential or his-
torical condition?!
The mere idea of crisis as a condition-raj la crise~suggests an ongoing
state of affairs. Although crisis typically refers to a historical conjuncture
(ei, war, economic recession, famine)-or to a moment in history, a turn-
ing point-it has been taken to be the defining characteristic of the African

1. Achille Mbembe and I did not ask this question in our 1995 publication, which is the
subject of Roiunan (2014), where I rdIect upon the status of 'crisis' in social science theory
and narrative in an effon to consider what is at stake with crisis in and of itself.
 Africa Otherwise / 25
24/ Chapter Two

continent for some twenty years now. Can one speak of a state of endur- edge. Crisis serves particular narrative constructions and, ~a~icular .~th
claims. Most typically in social science writing today, cnSIS IS mobIlIZed
ing crisis? Is this not an oxymoron? In effect, how can one think about
to mark out a "moment of truth." Such moments of truth are sometimes
Africa-or think "Africa" as an object of knowledge-otherwise than under
defined as tuming points in history, when decisions are made or events
the sign of crisis? This is a crucial question.
are decided, thus establishing a particular teleology. They also are some-
Needless to say, this is not a particularly African question. The geogra-
times defined as instances when "the real" is made bare, such as when a
phy of crisis has come to be world geography, CNN-style: crisis in Afghani-
so-called financial bubble is seemingly burst, thus divulging alleged "false
stan, crisis in Darfur, crisis in Iraq, crisis in Mumbai, crisis on Main Street.
value" based on speculation and revealing "true value," or the so-called
:n~ ~i~gularity of political events is abstracted by a generic logic, making
fundamentals of the economy. As a category denoting a moment of truth
crISIS a term that seems self-explanatory. 2 In a reversal of this typical man-
in these ways, and despite presumptions that crisis does not imply, in itself,
ner of starting with a case ("Africa") and then proceeding on to generaliza-
a definite direction of change, the term "crisis" signifies a diagnostic of the
tions (colonialism, postcolonialism, neoliberalism), I begin with a general
present; it implies a certain telos-that is, it is inevitably, though most of-
problem in order to take us to Africa. The problem is not Africa per se but
ten implicitly, directed toward a norm. Evoking crisis entails reference to a
rather the concept of crisis.
norm because it requires a comparative state f<?"r judgment: crisis compared
Crisis is an omnipresent sign in almost all forms of narrative today; it
to what? That question evokes the significance of crisis as an axiological
is mobilized as the defining category of our contemporary situation. The
problem, or the questioning of the epistemological or ethical grounds of
recent "crisis bibliography" in the social sciences and popular press is vast. 3
As I argue elsewhere (Roitrnan 2014), crisis serves as the noun formation certain domains of life and thought.
.'j

of contemporary historical narrative; it is the place from which one claims

access to and knowledge of history. In considering the status of crisis in Judging Time?
such narrative forms, my aim is not to theorize the term "crisis" or to corne
When we take crisis to signify a generalized condition-as opposed to a
up with a working definition of it. Rather than essentialize it so as to make
critical, decisive moment-we assume that a meaningful world is in crisis.
better use of it, the point is to understand the kinds of work the term "cri_
But what does it take to posit the very idea that meaning can be in a state of
sis" is or is not doing in the construction of narrative forms. Likewise, the
crisis? Moreover, what does it take to envisage a society as breaking down?
point is not to demonstrate that crisis signifies something new in contem-
Such visions can only arise in counterdistinetion to imagined alternative
porary narrative accounts, nor is it to demonstrate how contemporary us-
societies. Without them, we could not make such a judgment: the affirma-
ages of the term "crisis" are wrong and hence argue for a true or more cor-
tion "this society is breaking down" requires a comparison, a comparative
rect meaning. 4
When one speaks of "the crisis in Africa" or when Cameroonians say, state of affairs.
As is well known, the etymology of the term "crisis" speaks to that re-
"J'ai Ia crise," one can only ask, "But what exactly is in crisis?n And that ques-
quirement of judgment. The complex details of its sema.ntic hist~ry ca~
tion leads us to consider how crisis is constituted as an object of knowl-
be found in many places and go -beyond the scope of thIS text. Bnefly, 1t
is worth noting t}1at its 'etymology originates with the ancient Greek t~~
2. For a fascinating screen-based visual arts project on the term "crisis" in the news me- krino (to cut, to select, to decide, to judge), which suggested a defimuve
dia that aims to visualize how the replication of the term generates-and does not merely
refleet-a ~articula~ situation, see Katie. Levitt's "Poetical Crisis" (hnp://katielevin.wordpress
decision. With significance in the domains of law, medicine- and theology,
.com), which uses llve news feeds, data processing. and typographical imagery. by the fifth and fourth centuries BC, the medical signification prevailed.
3. Referencing this bibliography, which spans topics from humanitarianism to finance to Associated with the Hippocratic school (Corpus Hippocratum) as part of a
the environment and so forth would take up an inordinate amount of space, as would the no-
medical grammar, "crisis" denoted the turning point of a disease .or a criti-
tation of re~nt co~fer~ces dedicated to "explaining the crisis, " which have been impulsively
staged by uruve£Slties, thmk tanks, and periodicals. cal phase in which life or death was at stake and called for an irrevocable
0:
. ~. For ~ .r~ew the term ."crisis:" d. ~ett (~008), who shows how crisis has been pos-
ited m ~a1U m relation to a Wider dlSCUrslve field m which the notion of "decline" is depen-
decision. Sigrlificantly, crisis was not the disease or illness per sei it was the
condition that called for decisive judgment between alternatives.
dent on Ideas of progress held to obtain outside of Haiti, most notably in the Global North.
 26 / Chapter Two
Africa Otherwise / 27
.In the social sciences, d esplte
' WI'despread usage ofthe t g. • H

note a historical event, only Reinha K erm cnSIS. to de- ing of millennial expectations," because it became the basis for claims that
histo of th t rt oselleck has elaborated a conceptual one can interpret the entire course of history via a diagnosis of time.
He d~crib e e~ ~1988. [1?59]; 2002; 2004 [1979]; 2006 [1972-97]) 5
es a deaslVe shIft In the semantics of ., ,. . Koselleck's account of this semantic shift is part of his oeuvre on the
Hippocratic medical grammar and Ch' . ~SIS transpmng between emergence ofthe European concept of history and the ways in which its as-
did not replace the other in th I bnstla~ exegesIs. Notsurprisingly, one sociated historico-political concepts (e.g., progress) thematize time,9 Prior
. e e a oratIon of Christian theolo .h
refierence to the New Testament d I '. gy, WIt to the achievement of this shift, crisis did not have a time; it was not his-
krisis was paired WI·th '. . -1' . an a ongslde ArIstotelian legal language. torically dated, and it did not signify historical dates. 1o By the eighteenth
JuuIClum and came to ' 'fy' d
which Koselleck charact . Slgnl ]U gment before God, century, the term "crisis" attained the status of a historical concept, which
.
fi catIon " . enzes as possibly being the unsurpassabl . .
of Q1SlS In the co f. e SlgID- means that it signified temporal spans. But it is now equally apprehended
358-59) Th h ur:'e 0 Its conceptual history (2002: 237' 2006' as a temporal category itself: it denotes time (war, revolution, a time of
. roug out the hIstory f'ts . ,.
involved the e1ab tl' f ~ I conceptual dIsplacements-which crisis), and it denotes history itself (World War II, the French Revolution,
ora on 0 semantlc webs as d '
ment of substitutions and which I h d 'oppose to a lInear develop- Rwandan Genocide). Through this process of temporalization, the term
"crisis entailed a
H
'" ave rastlcally abbreviated 6_the term "crisis" comes to signify a historically unique transition phase, which
of time. PrognOSIS, whIch Increasingly came to imply a Prognosis
would mark a fundamental transformation ofsocial relations, as in the case
KoseIIeck's conceptual history of c ' , 'II of the French Revolution or Mantist capitalist crisis, both of which signify
the eighteenth ' nSls I ustrates how, over the COurse of a fundamental break with the past. Yet it also comes to signify an epoch
th gh century, a spatIal metaphor came to be a historical
rou the temporalization of history What d . h concept insofar as this alleged break with the past defines new time; hence we refer,
"th . oes e mean b th· 7 B post hoc, to tIthe medieval era, "the Renaissance,!' or tIthe Industrial Age."
e temporalization of history;" KoseIJeck fi th Y IS, Y H

since the late eighteenth cen~ tim re ers to e process by which, Through the invocation of the term "crisis" as a historically unique tran-
medium in which histories take ~Iace~ r = t~ b~ no longer figured as a sition phase, which marks off an epoch, historical experience is likewise
as having a historical quality I th' tl~e Itself became conceived generalized as a logical recurrence, And we, as narrators of our own his-
, n 0 er words hIstOry I
time; instead, time itself is now an ct' ' no onger OCcurs in tory, recognize moments Of crisis in terms of epistemological rupture, or
ciple (~002: 165-67; 2004 [1979]: 2~6I;~~:~;:~rmati:e (~istOrical) pri~­ a problem of meaning or legitimacy, The role of the historian (as witness)
that thIS temporalization of hi t . s pOInt In a sentence, IS is thus to judge events as both significant and logical. And yet, at the same
of the Last lud ent. r s ory tr~nsPIred through the temporalization time, history itself is posited as serving the ultimate form of judgment. This
. gm. p ophecy was dIsplaced by Prognosis 7 Wh'l h
ecy InVolves symbols of what is alread 1m .' I e prop - is exemplified, in a trivial manner, by the expression "time will teU" but is
constant sim T tud . Y own and entaIls expectation in best understood in terms of an expectation for world-immanent justice.
lIe, prognOSIS, to the contrary;
sis served th' ., , generates novel events. S Cri-
IS transpOSItIOn from prophecy to Prognosis, or the "channel_
9. Bya European concept of history, I refer to the project ofBegriffsgeschichte, devoted to the.
s. For shon articles that offer encyclo edia-s I . study of the fundamental concepts that partake of, and give rise to, both a specific concept of
(1973); Stam (1971); Bejin and Morin (i976) ~e entnes on the ~ncept of crisis, d. Masur 'history" and a distinctly historical consciousness. Koselleck's extensive writing on this subject
Koselleck's bi~li~phy (d. notably 2006). . e numerous texts m German are found in and on the ultimate question of the emergence of Neuzeit (the modem age, modernity) as a
6. The vanous semantic options" are set fi rth " historical concept has been commented on at length. For brief reviews, d. Tribe (1989) and
Koselleck (2002: 240-44; 2006: 371-72) It is i: as dlstIner but not mutually exclusive in Richter (1990). The main body of Koselleck's work in English includes Koselleck (1988 [origi-
conceptual history, and contrary to a hist ' f'd ponant to note that for Koselleck's brand of nal German 1959]; 2002; 2004 [original German 1979]).
inner, core meaning that undergoes ory o. I eas, concepts cannot be defined; they have no
. permutations Instead . . 10. Whill! serving, throughout the seventeenth century, as a catchword with a range of po-
o f meamng. which bring definition . . ' . ' concepts COnsIst of semantic webs litical applications related to the body politic, constitutional order, and military simations,
. s Into a WIder relatIonal n th
sta bl e umts ofsense (cf. Koselleck 2004 [1979J: 75-92 exus, us prodUcing relatively by the late eighteenth century, its religious connotation was exacerbated, though in a 'post-
7. For another aCCOunt of this tem rali' ). theological mode" or as a philosophy of history (Koselleck 2006: 370). Through its semantic
8. Although th . po UUon, see Lovejoy (1976-(1936]).
. e Last Judgment IS yet to come, the An " . history, crisis, as a concept, sheds its apocalyptic meaning: "it turns into a structural category
future hIstorical time already present as.L Ch" nun~ation makes thiS cosmic event of of Christianly understood history pure and simple; eschatology is, so to speak, historically mo-
th . u,e nSUan consaence ( . eI b
e Important references in Koselleck 2006' 36 fi a pomt a orated upon in nopolized" (2002: 242), Read also Koselleck (2004 [1979)), especially chapter 13, and ci. Blu-
. 0, ootnote 10).
menberg (1997 (1979)).
 28 I Chapter Two
Africa Otherwise I 29
which many; from Sch'll K
' 1 er to oselleck have noted' th fu d
condition of d ' IS e n amental this specific way of positing that there is a distinction to be made between
~o ern reason (see Koselleck 2002: 241; 2006' 371) 11 I .
assumed-as IS often the case-that histo . . . . tIS historical events and knowledge of those events-is consumed with the
justice And tho . d ' ry, as an actmg subJect, enforces puzzle of the inevitable inadequacy of such lmowledge. We thus discern
. IS JU gment IS effected, retrospectively; through acts d
rors. Judging time (sorting change from stasis ' '.. an er- historical significance in terms of dissonance between politics and moral-
jUdging history (diagnosing demise or improve~::;c~~~n~mt~rvals) and ity, between theory and practice, between Imowledge and human interests,
losers) is ~ matter of Prognosis. What are the criteria byn~~~:~:e~sa~d
between technology and humanity-in brief, in terms of ethical failures.
such markings as failure and error? The term "c . . " tho J tIfy In the social sciences generally, crisis is posited so as to establish the
d . "h' " nSlS serves IS manner of grounds for questioning the terms of normativityY In doing so, one as-
. enotmg IStOry. It raises the issue of the burden of f.c .
m history th at h proo lor meanmg sumes that if the grounds for truth are necessarily contingent and partial,
- f c events ave significance. And it raises the issue of the bur-
d en a f proo lor the m . ,Fh' . truth is nonetheless performed in moments of crisis because these are
. If " "eamng OJ IStOry Itself-that we can qualify histo instances when the contingency of these truth claims are made bare and
Itse as an epoch as a tum" . ry
idea th h' . '. . mg pomt, as entailing failure or justice. The the limits of intelligibility are potentially transgressed. Examples can be
th at IS~Ory IS Just or u~Just for cenain populations is underwritten by
given from the ranks of critical theory,14 the sociology of critique,lS or post-
e assumptIon that there IS a possibility for world-immanent' .
opposed to' transcendentall derived' . Justice (as structuralism. To take a contemporary exa!?ple of the latter genre, episte-
"God" or "th ". Y JustIce). If a transcendental, such as mological crisis is defined by Judith Butler as a "crisis over what constitutes
. e planets, IS not deemed responsible for the quality of
1Ives or for the nature of our thelimits ofintelligibility" (1993: 138).
that I events, we nonetheless mobilize other referents Many scholars, including myself (Rohman 2005), have taken crisis to
serve as a non oeus from which t . 'fy
nature of ev .. . . a Slgnl contingency or to qualify the be the starting point for narration_ Following the work of Michel Foucault,
for the Prod::~~:;;::~~~:~;~.C:: a nonlocus, or an enabling blind spot, we assume that ifwe start with the disciplinary concepts or techniques that
allow us to think of ourselves as subjects-that enable us to tell the truth
about ourselves-then limits to ways of knowing necessarily entail epis-
Times of Crisis? temological crises. For Butler, then, subject formation transpires through
The very notion that one could' d h' . . crisis-that is, crisis, or the disclosure of epistemological limits, occasions
If . JU ge Istoncal time (that it presents it- critique and potentially gives rise to countemormativities that speak the
se to u~ as an entIty to be judged and that it can be deemed ood or
~:~c; ~17~or a suc~ess) and that history is defined by a tele~logy of
unspeakable (1999; 2004: 307-8; see Boland 2007; Lyotard 1988). For
Foucault, crisis signifies a discursive impasse and the potential for a new
. a. ere are wmners and losers, errors and victories) con'ures an
~aordmanly self-conscious mode of being. This critical histori~l
SClOusness-or this specific way of 1m . th _ con- 13. This tefers to the coconstitutive relationship between the cognate terms "critique' and
owmg e world as "history" and "crisis: explored most distinctly by Koselleck (1988 [1959])_ Fm commentary on Koselleck's
Critique and Crisis, whidt is relevant to this dtaptet, see Edwatds (2006), among the extensive
n. With reference to a host of witnesses of th· . secondary literature.
Robespierre, Rousseau Diderot Th p . e Impendmg or attested crisis, induding 14. Although certain authol'S associated with the Frankfurt Sdtool argued that state capital-
, ,omas ame, Burke Herde Fdt S· .
Comte, Lorenz von Stein,Sdtleiermadte Sdtl eI d I; I te, amt-SImon, Auguste ism had developed mechimisms to avoid crises, fm most othel'S, the teleology or dialectics of
"That the crisis in whidt one current! /inr,d eg, an Marx and Engels, Koselleck declares, social contradictions,the pmblem of "lost meaning" m alienation, and the gmunds fm critical
-. y s oneself could be the I • .
OSlOn, after whidt history would look
.
. I d-ffi'
entlfe Y I erem In the fu
as" great, and umque de-
tho teason remained the fundamental sources of crises for modem so~iety. The bibliogtaphy is
IS taken up more and more frequent! the less ture:- IS _semantic option lengt,hy: see the extensive works of Friedrich Pollock, Max Horkheimer, Theodm Adorno, Her-
approadting with the Last Judgment ~ th. the ~b~olute en~ of history IS believed to be bert Marcuse. Claus Offe, Hannah Arendt. and Jiirgen Habermas.
principle of belief. It is expected o.wo'r'~' IS extenht,.lt IS a question of recasting a theological 15. Cf. Boltanski and Thevenot (1991), whose sociology of critique reptesents a non-
~ <..-Immanent /Story itse/P' (2002· 2 3
2002: 243-44; 2006: 370-97). ~ . 4, my emphasis; see Foucauldian approadt that similarly (and productively) inquires into the limits of intelligibil-
12. The point that crisis is a blind spot for th . - . ity as a prime mover in history. Evidently, because it is structurally necessary for capitalism, cri-
Roitman (2014). e production of knowledge is developed in sis is construed as productive in Marxist-inspired analyses, as well: see, for example, the works
of Giovanni Arrighi and David Harvey. -
 Africa Otherwise I 31
30 / !=hapter1\vo

form of historical subject. For both, crisis is productive; it is the means to a:

d .ally for those doing
that point aside, for ethnographers today, fo~;:~mergent. As I argued
ch' Africa crisis is a means to accoun
transgress and is necessary for change or transformation. 16 resear ~n.. th~ place from which one claims access to and knowledge of
This way of taking crisis as fundamental to epistemological and histori- above, cnSIS IS ., . taken to be an instance when the contingency
cal change is endemic to thinking about Africa-to thinking "Africa." To 't
h IS And because cnSlS IS . 1 Id'
ory. . bly grants access to a sooa war .
take a recent intervention, the contributors to a special issue of Ethnos, de- of truth cl~i:ns are m;:::::~t~:es::::r of our social world becomes in
voted to "Crisis and Chronicity" (Vigh 2008), posit crisis as the point from "When cnSlS beco~ d substituted by multiple contestations and
which ethnography begins: crisis is the means to access both "the social" other words questJo ned an ld' . fact plural
. . the recognition that our wor IS III
and "experience." In his provocative introductory essay, Hen:rik Vigh pro- interpretatJons leadlllg to th 1" (Vigh 2008' 16). This claim
. lar' social rather an natura .
poses a move from "placing a given instance of crisis in context" to "seeing rather th an smgu. .. . + d W'ith the pragmatic sociology
, th ch to cntJque assooaLe
crisis as a context, n by which he means "a terrain of action and meaning reIterates e approa Th' t (1991) which takes re-
. b L Boltanski and Laurent eveno , ..
rather than an aberration" (8). Vigh and his coauthors take crisis to be an praeuced y uc . 'fi' d the formation of cntique.
. . cial to practices of JUStl catlon an .
"ongoing experience," a state of affairs or an enduring condition (see also tlexIVlty as cru . , , 't is not necessarily or inevitably
Greenhouse 2002). This notion of crisis as an ongoing or permanent state But social reflexivity is inherent to praxts, I
. . 18
of affairs-what is denoted as "times of crisis"-is conceptually fraught. As contingent on criSIS. "C . by definition, involve conditions
Vigh notes, the very notion of constant crisis implodes the concept of cri- Carol Greenhouse states, Ilses, .' 'th the
sis, since one ends with an oxymoronic "ordered disorder." He welcomes in which peopl~ (in~lUding th:li:~:':e~:~lgi::~n:::;:i:i;lav~i-
this implosion of the concept (while nevertheless retaining the term) as a elements of theIr sooal and p 'tJ' "(2002' 9) Followlllg
d d' tions and 'opportUlll es . .'
means of "freeing the concept from its temporal confines" (2008: 9). To ety of unexpecte iS~p. fi t "conditions that make outcomes
unleash the concept of crisis from time would dearly be an unprecedented Habermas, she takes criSiS to re er 0 inte retations of
d' ct bl "19 In this sense, crisis seems to allow for rp .
form of freedom (see Roitman 2014), but the claim seems to entirely dis- unpre I a, e. . d t artake of linear causality or an Ideology
regard the conceptual history of the term and Koselleck's point that crisis is historical situatJons ~at ~dn~o~ (2008) and Vigh (2008) maintain, cri-
necessarily a temporal concept. of progress. As Pedersen a J . f time' a chaotic succession
The programmatic statements set forth in several edited volumes sis situations abolish. a co~erent progresslO: : ha~e "'progressless' mo-
s dly
(Greenhouse, Mertz, and Warren 2002; Hoffman and Oliver-Smith 2002; of changes disrupts lllleanty. We thus supp b t d While that feat
. "(V'gh 2002' 17) which nonetheless can e narra e .
Vigh 2008) take crisis as a point of departure for ethnographic insights pro- t10n 1 ., ffi 't here to note that the term
. d more thought, su ce 1
duced by social scientists as well as a point ofdeparture for the "production of narratJon eserves .. .. h'ch while committed to nar-
of social rules, norms and meaning" (Vigh 2008: 12) generated by local "crisis" suits contemporary dlSpOSltlons, WI,
people. This approach is in keeping with a long-standing tradition of social rativity, renounce linearity and causality.
science theory for which crisis serves as a mediation between theory and
practice (ct. Benhabib 1986; Habermas 1975; 1984-87; 1987).17 Leaving A Politics of Crisis?
.' ists have much to learn from critiques ofhistoriogra-
010
16. In keeping with this, because reason has no end other than itself, the decisive duty of Af:c~ls~~r~;73;~978). Of-course, most scholars now reject any ~rm
critique is essentially to produce crisis; to engage in the permanent critique of one's self, to be
in critical relation to normative life, is a form of ethics and a virtue (Foucault 1997: 303-19;
~f~ist~ricism (or the validity of claims to knowledge of the facts a out
\,
1985). Similarly, Simon Critchley (1999: 12) sees crisis as necessary for politics, or for produc-
ing a "critical consciousness of the present." Indeed, philosophy would have no purpose in a . analytical optic able to
here sodal instability and volatility prevail, and that It gra)nts us an .
world without crisis: "The real crisis would be a situation where crisis was not recognized." If w . 11' ch social processes" (2008: 15 . .
the grounds for truth are necessarily contingent or partial, and if philosophy thus has no intrin- engage anthropologlca y m su k B d Lau (2003) regarding social praxIS
sic object, its authority only possibly emerges as such in moments of crisis, which he defines as 18. Vigh refers to Giddens (1984) and Becrefl' on~s. ~\ecentralyetdoes not posit crisis as
., . F proach that takes exJvny LO
the "time when philosophy happens.' and rouumzauon. or an ap .. th k of Michel Calion.
17. Vigh claims, "The interesting thing about the perspective of 'crisis as context' is that a means to produce the social.a~d/~rhIstory, see r~ ~:bennas text.
19. Her reference is to Legttlmatton CrulS, an ea Y
it leads us to realize that new configurations are sought (and) established, even in situations
 32 / Chapter TWo
Africa Otherwise /33
the past as well as the grounds for claims to '.
philosophy of history (or confidence in the tel aUlth~nt~tIve accounts) or a "Risk," "catastrophe," "disaster," "emergenqr," "crisis," "trauma, "shock" H

events), Daniel Parroch' . ,eo oglCa nature of time and -these are now rapidly proliferating nouns (often used as adjectives) in a
la sums up the sItuatIon succinctly:
great deal of scholarship today. Some of this work explores the very emer-
gence of such critical situations. For example, a typical and pervasive ques-
From a, philosophical point of view, during the last quarter of the cent
have wItnessed perhaps not "the end of H' t " b my we tion guiding current research is, how did "the camp" come to define a fun-

:osoPh~e:d~f history, if by that we mean ~:s:~nic:~~~e:::t:~se~~to::~; damental aspect of the nexus between national and international politics
in the management of human life? Some of this work considers "the poli-
n unYle mg confidence in a teleology oftime Wheth 't b th "
eschatology f d' , , e r l e e Chnstlan tics of crisis," taking crisis to be a contested term. Either way, it is typically
o a para ISlacal community; the Enl'gh . ,
irreversible r I tenment belIef m the assumed that although it is contested and an object of various forms of
th C P,ogr~s,S of humanity towards happiness and "perfect health'" politics, "crisis" is an ontological state, or at least a condition of human
,e ommumst VISIon of a pacified, classless society; or even the recent uto'
pIa of a world of perfectly transparent communicati ,-
history and human affairs, Crises happen, and crises are propagated; they
ligious or secular) of a "becomi " ,on-all are versIOns (re- then become sites of contestation, with political and social consequences.
coIleetJ' , , ng (un devemr) that is oriented toward a Crisis-be it disputed, contested, or authored-has a particular status in
ve Imagmcuy What remai 't
, . ' ns, I seems, for these majestic manners of history.
orgamzmg shared time is a pointed attention to events Th I '
in their often i . ' e atter consntute, One particularly compelling exposition of the politics of crisis is Pe-
which ' rruPtiV~ nature, the elements of a network, the signification of ter Redfield's (200S) thoughtful article on the ethical dilemmas associated
IS not preordained and which b .
I . . must e reconstItuted patiently; like a with the genre of humanitarian action pursued by the French organization
puzz e or a pamtmg that has no model (2008' 5 6 I '
. , - ,my trans atlOn) Doctors without Borders, or Medecins¥ sans frontieres (MSF). Redfield dis-
Recourse to "mom ts" rth cusses MSF's "global form of medical humanitarianism and the conditions
indeed characterize th:nconsti't etI.postlcolonial moment") and events does of life in crisis to which it responds, thus taking up the "bare life" pos-
H

u ve e ements of cOntem '

ence narratives bein a refl . , porary soaal sci- tulate of Giorgio Agamben, or the ways in which, through a specific form
"cri ' " fi ' g ectlon of strategIes for avoiding teleOlogy And of humanitarian ethicS and action, "a lower threshold possibility of life"
SIS gures as a part of that constellation of .,'
widespread use is in part concepts; Its mcreasingly is delimited and perpetUated (329-30), For Redfield, this "stabilization of
, , a symptom of such stratePies An '
institutions, situations and . , 0·' entire array of crisis" is revelatory: it indicates an ethical dilemma,21
, processes-the natIOn state h "
war, migration, empire, citizenship finance ca ital- ,uman.ltananism, To gain insight into this dilemma, Redfield takes crisis both in the
with reference to "states of excePti~n " "t P f -have been mterpreted Greek Hippocratic sense, as demanding a definitive response, and as a his-
' sates 0 emergenr ,," and" .." toriographic term, as a narrative device that establishes certain events as
as th e fu ndamental conditions ofth . -J' cnSIS
elf emergence.20
moments of truth (335), Crisis is used to denote a state of affairs (war,
famine). It is likewise invoked to conjure "the real" insofar as it establishes
, .20. Vigh (2008) refers to Walter Benjamin's 'state of •. , physical and ethical situations (bare life, the camp) as well as claims for
SIS, See also Fassin and Pandolfi (2010) B ,emergency III hiS definition of ·cri.
on th e concepts and techniques that w
' ut see CollIer and I.ak if (200 )
I b d ,0
,
8 , who, In their work
"self-authorizing" action. This double signification is expressed in the fol-
situations' for US civil defense er~ e a orate on In the theorization of "emergency lowing: "Once a state of crisis has been established, then action (especially
programs III the 1950s and th '
consensus around the doctrine and'd I f t h . . e concomitant production of a technical, expert action) acquires a self-authorizing status, by virtue of cir-
I ea 0 e natIOnal seeu 'ty "
ate referencing of 'states of excepu' • fi '. n state, note the inappropri_
. on or Sltuallons that did
exception to extant legality Alon 'd t h '
.
not necessanly entail sovereign
cumstance, In ethic'al terms, if one has a capacity to act, then not acting
, gSI e epasslOnforS h 'd d
Giddens and Beck, who daim that . k h b c mt tan Agamben is the influence of takes on new significance" (337). This ethics of action is elaborated accord-
, ns as ecome a primary d f '
lIon and an ultrareBexive phase of d ' Th mo e 0 soaopolitical organiza- ing to the imperative to bear witness, which one might surmise, and as was
flexivityH are the defining fearu e fmo ermty.. ey argue that "manufactured risk" and "re-
' , r s a a new, or second" mod . h' . ,
athl ellc title of "reflexive risk-moderrt'tyN (cf G'dd ' emlty, W ICh IS gtven the rather
Beck 1992; 1999; 2008). I , I ens 1992; 1993; Giddens and Griffiths 2006; 21. A similar point is made by Alex de Waal (1997), probably the first author to define a
"humanitarian mode of power, in his book Famine Crimes.
N
 34/ Chapter Two
Africa Otherwise / 35
noted above, is a historically Christian ethical imperative that entails the
judgment of history and immanent justice. the "crisis" that conjures humanitarianism is conceivably less the impos-
sibility of representation produced in historical experience-such as the
The "self-authorizing" action of so-called humanitarianism that en-
inability to utter, to speak, to narrate, to write-than it is a nonlocus from
sues from the immediacy of the crisis frame is eventually and necessar-
which to signify contingency. This presupposition is highly reminiscent of
ily narrated in terms of "history." Redfield asks, "For how else are we to
what LaCapra (2004) discerns in Agarnben's writing on Auschwitz and his
evaluate action, if not through its eventual incorporation into a historical
treatment of the problem of bearing witness: "In Agamben one often has
frame?"22 He sets that frame to the measure of time by noting how these
the sense that he begins with the presupposition of the aporia or paradox,
exc~ptional, immediate actions have historical effects, the refugee camp
which itself may at times lose its force and its insistence in that it does not
haVIng become one of the most enduring features of our contemporary
come about through the breakdown or experienceci impasse in speaking, .
political landscapes. But there is a concurrent measure of judgment and ac-
writing, or trying to communicate but instead seems to be postulated at the
tion. The "ethic of refusal" that characterizes MSF-style humanitarianism_
outset. In other words, a prepackaged form seems to seek its somewhat ar-
the refusal of national politics, of the will of certain sovereign states, and
bitrary content. And the paradox and the aporia become predictable com-
of "the apparent futility of the way the world is"23-involves an appeal to
ponents of a fixated methodology" (176). The presuppos~tion of a form~a
"conscience," or to the historical form of Christian conscience denoted by
Koselleck. paradox, an aporia, a crisis-establishes the slate on which the act of wIt-
nessing potentially can occur. 25
The obligation to witness is an equally relevant register for MSF. Red-
field (2006) explores this ethics of witnessing (temoignage) and advocacy
through his argument that MSF, as part of an international community of Africa Otherwise?
nongovernmental organizations, is implicated in processes that serve to de-
Today it goes without saying that the African continent is designated and
fine secular moral truth today. The production of those truths and their
conjured under the sign of crisis. This is not a diagnostic of a continent. It
inscription in history transpires through the act of witnessing, which is pos-
. is a diagnostic of history as such. In the same way that our contempo~a~
ited as a collective moral duty in the organization's charter. 24 Without theo-
history is qualified in terms of humanitarian crisis, en:,ironmental ~s~s,
logical justification for human suffering, this form of witnessing seeks to
financial crisis, and so on, and is thus given ontolOgical status as hIS-
inscribe human drama in a form ofsecular, historical narrative. And as Red-
tory" through these terms, "Africa" is posited as an ontological category of
field demonstrates, although there are ongoing discussions about the ap-
thought under the sign of crisis.
propriate ways and means of witnessing within the organization, it seems
Africa is elicited as a category in terms of pathology: we have weak states,
nonetheless that the very possibility ofrepresentation itself is left unquestioned.
failed states, crisis states. Failed states are defined, quite tautologically, as
The very impossibility of bearing witness-what is now often signified
failures of state infrastructures and capacities (Beissinger and Young 2002;
as the "unsayability" of Auschwitz-is an unexamined problem for this
Debiel and Lambach 2007; Migdal 1988; Rotberg 2003; Zartman 19.95;
self-proclaimed secular ethics. Also unexamined are the ways in which wit-
among many others; but see Bilgin and Morton 2002). As has been noted,
nessing is purported to redeem meaning (of events, of suffering) for his-
this view is concerned with the integrity of a rational-legal bureaucracy
tory (see LaCapra 2004: 175-76). But perhaps this latter point is irrelevant:
and is normative insofar as it presupposes the Weberian definition of the
rational-legal state (Bayart 1993; Hibou 2004). But recent attention to~e
22. This is the question that LaCapra (2004: 157) puts to Agamben with regard to the lat- proliferation of nonstate actors on the continent has only exac~rbated ~iS
ter's notion of a "threshold of indistinction." See his trenchant evaluation ofso-called bare life failed states or crisis states appraisal, giving rise to interpretatIOns of hfe
and the problem of witnessing. I thank Vasiliki Touhouliotis for calling my attention to the
relevance of LaCapra's critique.
23. Orbinski quoted in Redfield (2006: 7).
24. 1b..is coll~ctive duty is .not without dissenters or at least discussion about the binding 25. For LaCapra, this presupposition of crisis is to be contrasted to an anthropolo~cal or
nature of the ethics of WItneSSing and the guidelines for such ethical action (d. Redfield 2006: historical approach "that doos not begin with, ar became fixated on, breakdown ar Q{XmIl but IS open
9-10). and alert to such breakdown or aporia when it occurs in the witness's attempt to recount trau·
matic experience" (2004: 174, my emphasis).
 36 / Chapter Two
Africa Otherwise / 37
in Africa in tenns of legitimacy crises, fragmented or partial sovereignties,
side stalls where one habitually could purchase the three main soft drinks:
and "no-war-no-peace" zones (Arnaut and Hojbjerg 2008; Krasner 2001;
Coke, Sprite, and (my personal favorite) bright-orange Fanta-all made in
Richards 2005). Africa is thereby qualified as being in a condition of crisis,
Nigeria with high doses of glucose syrup. These familiar brands had been
a pennanent time of crisis. Crisis signifies the paradox (no-war-no-peace)
replaced by a very pale, yellow drink consisting of murky water, a spoonful
that serves a fixated methodology for delineating the emergent (new sover-
eigns, new assemblages). of sugar, and some lemon juice-an insipid substitute for the high-energy
Nigerian originals. This new drink was called l'anti"cnse: anticrisis.
Despite the fact that much of this work disavows the detenninism im-
Anticrisis was the remedy to economic hardship in an economic sense:
plicit in the dialectic of social contradictions, crisis is mobilized to show
it was the cheap alternative. Yet anticrisis was also taken to be a remedy in
how conflict and disorder generate new normativities. 26 The conceptual
the sense of a medicine or a potion that one drinks so as to become imc
concern for delineating the emergent is not objectionable in itself. The
mune to disease, bullets, or even love. Made on ,the streets and at home,
point is perhaps not to renounce crisis as a concept but at least to reflect
the anticrisis drink was part of the region's unregulated trade. Many an an-
upon its entailments. The point is to ask questions about our assumption
thropologist would surely take anticrisis to be an instance of the infonnal
that crisis has a status in history and our assumption that crisis is the status
of a particular history. market, an ingenious mode of bricolage, and a savvy local manner of re-
sponding to the wrath bf global markets. These views are valid. However,
As I have argued herein, inspired by Reinhart KoseIleck, "crisis" is a tenn
anticrisis was equally a symptom of the ways in which crisis did not denote
that is bound up in the predicament of signifying human history. Crisis al-
epistemological rupture-that is, while a point of resistance, anti-crise was
lows for paradox: it is the enabling blind spot for the production of knowl-
also a clear demonstration that the grounds for resistance are typically de-
edge. It is a distinction that, at least since the late eighteenth century and
vised on the basis of prevailing epistemologies. It was a response, an anti-
like all latencies, is seen not as an enabling paradox but rather as an error
dote, and thus the profession or seeming acknowledgement of-and acces-
or defonnation-a discrepancy between the world and knowledge of the
27 sion to-a particular condition.
world. But if we take crisis to be a blind spot or distinction that makes
Were we, then, in "times of anticrisis"? This question brings us back
certain things visible and others invisible, it is merely an a priori. Crisis is
to the matter, raised· above, of what is expected of history. Doubtless, the
claimed, but it remains a latency; it is never itself explained because it al-
world could be otherwise; we can envisage amendments that would ad-
lows for the further reduction of "crisis" to other elements, such as capital-
dress poverty and well-being. But the movements or publics that emerge
ism, the economy, politics, culture, and subjectivity. In that sense, crisis is
around these issues must be acknowledged as such-that is, as effective
not a condition to be observed (loss of meaning, alienation, faulty knowl-
publics or as movements with legitimate claims. Hence they can never con-
edge); it is an observation that produces meaning.
stitute an alternative politics, being inevitably inscribed in, for example,
the language of rights and sovereignty.28 Without a nonfoundational foun-
Futures? dation for political action, we can only have crisis and anticrisis, not cri-
sis and something else. How would that something else obtain? Thinking
When I returned to Cameroon some time after having published "Figures
Africa "otherwise" militates against the demand for an imagined or pre-
of the Subject in Times of Crisis," a new beverage had appeared at the road-
scribed future-or against a moral demand for a difference between past

26. This view is reminiscent of the ethnographies of Gluckman and Balandier, who de-
28.' Political legitimacy is generated out of the exile of moral innocence, out of hypocrisy,
scribed how custom and social order were produced out of social conflict-a point made by Ar-
as Kosclleck (1988 [1959]) argued for the private, secret masonic lodges. In Niklas. Lu~mann's
n~ut and Hojbjerg (2008: 12) with reference to Fischer (1999) and repeated to me by Michael
Gtlsenan (personal communication, May 2011). words "The secret of alternative movements is that they cannot offer any alternauves (1990:
141). 'rn related manner, Luhmann argues that because critique, as a ':~fl~v~ meth.od fo~
27. I follow Luhmann's definition: "The distinction that is operatively used in observation
formulating values and norms," is fully institutionalized, terms such as Jusuce and truth
but not observable is the observer's blind spotH (2002: 190). Cf. Rasch's introductory remarks
retain only symbolic functions (1982: 119). In that sense, the dichotomies that structure all
(2002: 104-5) on this notion of blind spot. My own formulation is very much influenced by
Luhmann and Rasch. sodal theory ensure the unity of allegedly rival approaches; transformation can only ensue by
accounting for that unity.
 38/ Chapter Two
and future 29 Thinking Alii "th ."
. . '. . ~a 0 erwlse means making apparent the wa
III ~~lch we discern hlstoncal significance in tenus of dissonance betwe::
po Illes and morality, between theo.ry and practice, between knowl d
and human interests, between technology and humanity-in b . :. ~e
THREE
tenus of ethical failures. And thinking Africa "otherwl'se" . ne , In
. d fl . reqUIres un h ur-
ne" ~e eCllon about how to displace the very commitment to significan
~W~~" . ~

Making the term "crisis," as a blind spot, visible means asking questions
~b~ut h~w we produce significance for ourselves-about how we produce
hIstory. ?ne s~ch question might be, what kind of narrative could be
produ~ed III whIch meaning is not everywhere a problem, in which the
future IS .not a moral demand, and in which the problem is not attributin
moral faIlure?30 This is the crucial question for"otherwise. n
The Form of Crisis and the Affect
of Modernization
BRIAN LARKIN
g
A crisis is a moment of categorizati0t.J:, an appellation given to events in
the world that combines, orders, and fixes those events into the bounded
system that can be called "crisis." Every crisis is thus a speech act, a perfor-
mative event issued by those seeking to interrupt the raw flow of reality to
impose distinctions. It is a conceptual)echnology, a means of categorizing,
periodizing, and standardizing. It is reflexive, a way people frame and nar-
rativize events in the world.

Crisis and Narrative

Crisis is a concept deeply marked by narrativity, which encodes into its
essence movement, fluidity, and change. This is because crisis follows the
classic structure of narratology established by Vladimir Propp (1968),
Tzvet:an Todorov (1977), Gerard Genette (1983), and the Russian formal-
ists: a state of equilibrium is defined in which everything is in balance,
equilibrium is disrupted by an event or crisis, equilibrium is restored or al-
tered, and a state of balance is once again achieved. According to Todorov,
"Every narrative is movement between two states of equilibrium which are
similar but not identicaL At the beginning there is always a balanced situa-
tion ... then something comes along to break the calm and creates imbal-
ance" (1977: 88), before balance is restored. Crisis, similarly, is a moment
29. I refer to the ethical dilemma noted by Redfield with regard to M.<"-· S F '
but th· raI d d . """Clm am Tonllere.s
of emergency-a point of extremity-that stands in contrast to the periods
ethics :in:o eman for a d~fference' has been a subject of philosophical sperulation and of stability that came before it and will succeed it and from which the crisis
. ~nt. Th~ lIterature IS vast; see. for recent commentary; Critchley (2007)
30. In hIS reflectIve essay on Hu I' c·' .• he . can be made visible as a crisis. HIn times of crisis" is the saying we have that
sser s TlSlS OJ t European Scienas (1970 [1954]) 1
~Odd ~2004: 19) notes similar questions, though with the aim. following Husser! t' ~mes captures this segmentation, for th~ time of crisis supposes the existence of
at saence Itself would not be possible without a human understanding f th • ~d ow other, noncrisis ridden, temporal states.
problem or experienced as a failure. 0 e wor as a
Narratology is famously structured on a split between events that
 African Futures
Essays on Crisis, Emergence, and Possibility

EDITED BY BRIAN GOLDSTONE

AND JUAN OBARRIO

The University of Chicago Press

Chicago and London