The power of rumour(s) in international interventions: MINUSMA's management of Mali's rumour mill

Title data

Sandor, Adam:
The power of rumour(s) in international interventions: MINUSMA's management of Mali's rumour mill.
In: International Affairs. Vol. 96 (2020) Issue 4 . - pp. 913-934.
ISSN 1468-2346
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/ia/iiaa092

Official URL:

Abstract in another language

The work of international interventions, whether grandiose or commonplace in scale, requires credible, verified information. Nevertheless, in settings of armed conflict that interventions aim to transform, information is more often than not improvised, unofficial, fragmented and based on multiple competing imaginaries. Interventions, therefore, are significantly influenced by rumours: the circulation of information and stories based on uncertain accounts of questionable provenance. Research on international intervention has neglected the place and power of rumour. To address this lacuna, this article examines the impact of rumour on the intervention logics and practices of the United Nations Multilateral Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA). It argues that rumours evince an epistemological force that generates constitutive effects among different sets of conflict actors in Mali. To address the impacts of rumours, different divisions within the intervention pursue practices of investigation, correction and officialization. Nevertheless, by enacting these practices, political tensions emerge that reveal contradictory intervention logics within MINUSMA, and foster conflictual relations between the intervention and different conflict actors in the country, thereby decreasing how Malians perceive MINUSMA's legitimacy.

Further data

Item Type:	Article in a journal
Refereed:	Yes
Institutions of the University:	Faculties > Faculty of Cultural Studies Faculties > Faculty of Cultural Studies > Chair Sociology of Africa Faculties > Faculty of Cultural Studies > Chair Sociology of Africa > Chair Sociology of Africa - Univ.-Prof. Dr. Jana Hönke Faculties
Result of work at the UBT:	Yes
DDC Subjects:	300 Social sciences 300 Social sciences > 300 Social sciences, sociology and anthropology 300 Social sciences > 320 Political science
Date Deposited:	08 Nov 2022 08:28
Last Modified:	08 Nov 2022 10:54
URI:	https://eref.uni-bayreuth.de/id/eprint/72719