Abstract
Throughout the socialist experiment between 1974 and 1992, the Mozambique Liberation Front (Frelimo) ran a network of internment camps officially known as reeducation centers. Established in remote rural sites to mentally decolonize wayward members of urban society and putative enemies of the socialist revolution, the camps became a dumping ground for unwanted citizens accused of all kinds of wrongdoing.
Although the Frelimo leaders envisioned a pedagogical institution that would undo the damage of colonialism by transforming reeducatees into new social beings, the gap between the idea of rehabilitation and the reality of detention was abysmally wide.
Austerity – the order of the day throughout the fifteen years of socialist experiment in Mozambique – conditioned and defined the organic functioning of reeducation camps. Unlike internment camps elsewhere, Mozambique’s camps were not strictly regimented. The carceral regime that emerged not only set Mozambique’s reeducation centers apart from camps elsewhere, they were also far from the technocratic moralism and panoptic ambitions of the ruling party.
Throughout the socialist experiment between 1974 and 1992, the Mozambique Liberation Front (Frelimo) ran a network of internment camps officially known as reeducation centers. Established in remote rural sites to mentally decolonize wayward members of urban society and putative enemies of the socialist revolution, the camps became a dumping ground for unwanted citizens accused of all kinds of wrongdoing.
Although the Frelimo leaders envisioned a pedagogical institution that would undo the damage of colonialism by transforming reeducatees into new social beings, the gap between the idea of rehabilitation and the reality of detention was abysmally wide.
Austerity – the order of the day throughout the fifteen years of socialist experiment in Mozambique – conditioned and defined the organic functioning of reeducation camps. Unlike internment camps elsewhere, Mozambique’s camps were not strictly regimented. The carceral regime that emerged not only set Mozambique’s reeducation centers apart from camps elsewhere, they were also far from the technocratic moralism and panoptic ambitions of the ruling party.
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