ABSTRACT
This case study1 critiques the conceptual architecture of a United Nations peace-building project called the Human Rights Committee (HRC). Committees were designed for implementation in Angola’s war-torn provinces as peace loomed uncertainly in early 2001. The case study assesses the information available in April 2001,2 and on this basis forecasts how the Committee was set to affect lives and livelihoods, if it were to operate as planned. In the sections below, the study compares three “snapshots” of the small semi-urban city of Uige, capital of Angola’s Northern Uige province. These “snapshots” are: the formal political institutions; the informal landscapes; and how these were imagined in the documents and processes of the Human Rights Committee.
