@article{Solhjell_2017, title={Statsdannelse og vann i Kongo}, volume={75}, url={https://tidsskriftet-ip.no/index.php/intpol/article/view/500}, DOI={10.23865/ip.v75.500}, abstractNote={<p>There is an abundance of political science literature characterizing specificities about the "African state" and politics in pathological categorization, adding to an already pervasive negative description of these states. While this tendency to think of the non-West as an extension of Europe both conceptually and its own experience of what is the life of "states" has already been recognized (see Chakrabarty <a href="file:///C:/Users/stieglit/Downloads/500-5511-2-PB.html#CIT0007_500">2000</a>), I argue that we should instead look how statehood is performed on an everyday basis in Africa as a counterpoint to abstract and decontextualized models of statehood. In this respect, I propose an interpretive and relational way of seeing the state as practices created, sustained and challenged through the people living and performing the experience of statehood. By analyzing how social actors – state institutions, private companies and citizens – are accessing, enjoying and interpreting the meaning of water as a public good in the city of Bukavu in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, I demonstrate how they call the state into being. The practices and expectations related to water leads to a considerable and enduring pressure on the de facto state.</p>}, number={1}, journal={Internasjonal Politikk}, author={Solhjell, Randi}, year={2017}, month={mai} }