The center cannot hold : decolonial possibility in the collapse of a Tanzanian NGO

In The Center Cannot Hold Jenna N. Hanchey examines the decolonial potential emerging from processes of ruination and collapse. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork in rural Tanzania at an internationally funded NGO as it underwent dissolution, Hanchey traces the conflicts between local leadership and Western paternalism as well as the unstable subjectivity of Western volunteers—including the author—who are unable to withstand the contradictions of playing the dual roles of decolonializing ally and white savior. She argues that Western institutional and mental structures must be allowed to fall apart to make possible the emergence of decolonial justice. Hanchey shows how, through ruination, privileged subjects come to critical awareness through repeated encounters with their own complicity, providing an opportunity to delink from and oppose epistemologies of coloniality. After things fall apart, Hanchey posits, the creation of decolonial futures depends on the labor required to imagine impossible futures into being. "The Center Cannot Hold is an ethnographic study of an internationally-funded NGO in rural Tanzania that theorizes the decolonial potential of collapse and ruin. As Jenna N. Hanchey herself became involved in the struggles between British neocolonial leaders and managers working to transition the NGO to Tanzanian control, she sees her own internal contradictions as researcher, white savior and decolonial ally, just as she observes (and at times participates) as the NGO collapses under the incoherent aims of development and domination. Hanchey's analysis is structured around three key processes: Through haunted reflexivity, Western subjects come to recognize their own complicity in colonial violence, but also find their own inability to fully account for all of their modes of participation, leading to an unending (neo)colonial haunting. At the organizational level, liquid agency emerges from fluid epistemologies to find the cracks in the "solid" logics of NGO structures and precipitate agentic potential for change. In the collapse of both subjective coherence in Western volunteers and researchers and organizational structure of NGOs, falling apart opens space for decolonial dreamwork, a process of imagining and empowering impossible futures"-- Provided by publisher In The Center Cannot Hold Jenna N. Hanchey examines thedecolonial potential emerging from processes of ruination andcollapse. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork in rural Tanzania at aninternationally funded NGO as it underwent dissolution, Hancheytraces the conflicts between local leadership and Westernpaternalism as well as the unstable subjectivity of Westernvolunteers-including the author-who are unable to withstand thecontradictions of playing the dual roles of decolonializing allyand white savior. She argues that Western institutional and mentalstructures must be allowed to fall apart to make possible theemergence of decolonial justice. Hanchey shows how, throughruination, privileged subjects come to critical awareness throughrepeated encounters with their own complicity, providing anopportunity to delink from and oppose epistemologies ofcoloniality. After things fall apart, Hanchey posits, the creationof decolonial futures depends on the labor required to imagineimpossible futures into being Contents Acknowledgments Introduction Part I 1 Doctors with(out) Burdens 2 All of Us Phantasmic Saviors 3 Haunted Reflexivity Part II 4 Water in the Cracks 5 Fluid (Re)mapping 6 Things Fall Apart Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index Drawing on fieldwork at an NGO in rural Tanzania, Jenna N. Hanchey explores the how the processes of ruination in Western institutions hold the potential for decolonial renewal.