Is David Yau Yau Really a Rebel?
"...it is quite possible that we may be mislabeling a terrorist, a warlord or a plain psychopath with an army as a rebel." 20 May 2013 R. Mou Run Who is a rebel? The question has been lingering on my head since defecting SPLA generals have been labelled long before we had an established post-CPA government. Then, it made SPLA defectors rebels against rebels and that is absurd indeed. Now people are calling David Yau Yau and his motley crew a rebel group making it timely to ask what makes a particular enemy of the government (Yau Yau for example) a rebel and not others (the opposition parties for example). A rebel, both in popular dictionaries and political science literature, has particular characteristics. In popular usage, the Oxford English Dictionary defines a rebel as “a person who rises in opposition or armed resistance against an established government or leader… a person who resists authority, control, or convention.” At first glance this definition makes rebels of opposition parties as well as armed guerrillas. However, there are implicit factors in this definition that political scientists explicate. In political science literature, rebellion is defined as a political expression, by a specified political community, when all other means of civil debate has lost its ability for persuasion. Of course, political scientists still debate what a “political community” is or what constitutes a “ civil debate” or “persuasion” but those are secondary matters. The key point here is that rebellion should come as a last. Hence, political parties and other civil society groups that consistently oppose the government without resorting to violence are not rebels. Rebels, furthermore, should be firmly aligned with the political group they represent and their political objective must be clear both to the people they represent and to the wider world, including the government they seek to overthrow. Given these two definitions, we can easily determine if David Yau Yau is a rebel or something else by answering the following definitional questions: <!--[if !supportLists]-->1. <!--[endif]-->Who does David Yau Yau represent? <!--[if !supportLists]-->2. <!--[endif]-->What grievances does the group Yau Yau represents have? <!--[if !supportLists]-->3. <!--[endif]-->Has this group attempted all other means of civil debate to seek a better outcome? <!--[if !supportLists]-->4. <!--[endif]-->What are the explicit political goals David Yau Yau is pursuing on behalf of this group? <!--[if !supportLists]-->5. <!--[endif]-->The truth test: Does Yau Yau really represent the group (if identified in question 1), if so are the grievances (if listed at question 2) true, if so why (if listed at question three) has civil debate failed)? These five criteria establish, for analytical purposes, whether we are dealing with a rebel. If these five criteria are not met, it is quite possible that we may be mislabeling a terrorist, a warlord or a plain psychopath with an army as a rebel. Posted in: Opinions -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "South Sudan Info - The Kob" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
