Sublime N. Mabiala
Job Title
PhD title: Pro Deo et Patria, Unfolding the Hybrid Governance and Political Participation of Religious Institutions in the Democratic Republic of Congo
Research interests
Research interests
Religion and Politics, Christianity and State, Hybrid governance, Ethics and Social Reconstruction, FBOs and Development, Epistemology of Hope, G/Localization, Religion and Transnationalism, North-South Partnership, Post-conflict environments, the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Background
Thesis’ summary
Developed around the central question "How and why the political participation of Religious Institutions as hybrid governance actors has changed in the D.R. Congo during the past recent years?". My Ph.D. thesis explores and unfolds the complexities, challenges and potentialities of the hybridity of governance and political participation between Religious Institutions and the State. Drawing from empirical fieldwork conducted in the DRC, it investigated the historical and contemporary interlinkages between the State and two major Religious Institutions chosen as case studies. This qualitative and interpretive inquiry examined how and why both entities have "co-existed, overlapped and intertwined" in re-inventing political order, and in public services' delivery mainly in the sectors of education and health assistance in the Central African country (labelled by the UNDP as a weak/fragile state) from 2016 onwards. For this purpose, it deployed an interdisciplinary methodological and analytical framework that includes history, theo-political anthropology, sociology of religion, political science, peace studies, and development studies.