“We raise up the voice of the voiceless”: Voice, Rights, and Resistance amongst Congolese Human Rights Defenders in Uganda

Abstract

Amongst Uganda’s Congolese refugee population are a number of human rights defenders who actively resist the construction of refugees as dispossessed and displaced humanitarian aid recipients. Upon fleeing the complex and violent conflicts of the Democratic Republic of Congo, rather than supplicate to a humanitarian regime saturated with the language of human rights, these young men draw on human rights to “raise up the voice of the voiceless.” This article explores how defenders draw on human rights to understand, articulate, and resist the constraints of forced displacement into a humanitarian regime.