Paper short abstract:

This contribution aims to show the forms of governmentality aroused by the control of humanitarian resource by the state in northern Cameroon ant its consequences on humanitarian goals.

Paper long abstract:

For the Cameroonian government, one of the problems posed by the provision of food to refugees and displaced people in the border areas of northern Cameroon in improvised camps consists in preventing the food allowances they receive from being recycled in the clandestine channels of trafficking for the benefit of the insurgents of Boko Haram. Indeed, in this configuration, the products of the humanitarian intervention constitute an important resource on which the insurrectionary and counter-insurgency strategies crystallize. For the State, control of access to the humanitarian resource justifies a number of measures, including the scrupulous identification of beneficiaries, the rationing of quantities and the systematic repression of any movement of this resource. To achieve this, the State deploys various strategies, mobilizes various actors and practices. We will first show who are these actors and the forms of governmentality aroused by the tensions surrounding the specific issue of control of this resource by the State. Secondly, we will see that these modalities of securing the humanitarian resource tend to transform it into a resource for legitimizing the systems of power mobilized by the State in the counterinsurgency to the detriment of humanitarian goals.