Beauty banned: navigating aesthetic citizenship in Rwandan borderlands

ABSTRACT

This article contributes to the discourse on aesthetic citizenship within the context of recent policy shifts in Rwanda. Drawing on ethnographic research conducted in 2019, I examine two recent import bans of beauty products affecting second-hand fashion and skin-whitening cosmetics, which have had significant implications for the everyday aesthetic practices of Rwandan sex workers. While both initiatives were ostensibly progressive, with the rejection of donated clothing from the West and the prohibition of hazardous cosmetics, these policies have had profound consequences for those whose livelihoods rely on aesthetic labour as a means of social currency. Utilizing the concept of ‘aesthetic citizenship’, I examine how post-genocide Rwanda has expanded its pursuit of creating a harmonious state to include regulations with aesthetic ramifications. Against this backdrop, I demonstrate that by challenging the state-upheld notions of appearance, my sex-worker interlocutors expanded their aesthetic belonging and consumption beyond Rwanda, navigating their aesthetic desires in its borderlands.

KEYWORDS:

• Aesthetic citizenship
• Rwanda
• sex work
• second-hand fashion
• skin whitening

Introduction

In 1994, Rwanda became infamous for the Genocide against the Tutsi, considered one of the most brutal genocides in recent history, during which nearly a million people lost their lives (Kimonyo 2016, 1). Despite its violent history, more recently Rwanda has earned a reputation as the ‘African miracle’. It has achieved significant economic growth and social development, and counts as a leader in environmental and gender-equity policymaking in Sub-Saharan Africa (Kimonyo 2019; Berry 2018). To reunite people across formerly entrenched ethnic lines, the post-genocide government has embarked on a state-building programme called Ubumwe, which roughly translates as ‘peace and unity making’ (Purdeková 2018). While colonial rule, particularly under Belgian administration (1916–1961), enforced a racist policy, the Hamitic Hypothesis, which relied on aesthetic markers to distinguish between Hutus and Tutsis, present-day Rwandan authorities have constructed a unified vision and ethnicity of Rwandan national belonging known as Banyarwanda.¹ This vision has been implemented via public rituals and civic duties that citizens are strongly encouraged to take an active part in (Purdeková and Mwambari 2022). Moreover, Rwanda, often recognized as ‘Africa’s cleanest country’, exemplifies state-coordinated coherence through a meticulous aesthetic order in public spaces. This commitment to cleanliness and orderliness is reflected in the behaviour and appearance of its ‘model citizens’, those who embody the image of a harmonious nation (Sundberg 2016; Mullikin et al. 2022).

This article seeks to contribute to the debate on aesthetic citizenship from the perspective of post-genocide Rwanda and against the backdrop of recent policy changes within the country. Thus, drawing on ethnographic research in Rwanda in 2019, I will look at two recent ‘bans’ that had significant repercussions on the everyday aesthetic acts of my research participants. Firstly, as far back as 2016, the Rwandan government announced that it would progressively limit the importation of European- and American-donated second-hand clothing, and three years later a tariff increase for these goods was indeed in full force (Wolff 2021). Due to the significantly increased taxes imposed on second-hand clothing, importing them became financially unviable for many, which prompted local communities to refer to the policy colloquially as a ‘ban’, a term I will also use. Secondly, in 2019, Rwanda enforced a pre-existing law prohibiting the sale and importation of skin-bleaching products containing hydroquinone or mercury (Garcia 2019).² While both initiatives were ostensibly forward-looking, the rejection of second-hand donated clothing from the West being aimed at supporting the national textile industry and the prohibition of hazardous cosmetics representing a stance against the colonial idealization of lighter skin colours, these policies had a significant impact on the politics of the body.

In this article, I delve into the intricate relationship between the politics of the body, citizenship, and statehood in Rwanda. Grounded in the concept of ‘aesthetic citizenship’ (Liebelt 2019), and emphasizing the Biopolitics of Beauty (Jarrín 2017) in what follows, I argue that post-genocide Rwanda has extended its pursuit of a harmonious state into regulations that have aesthetic effects. I will do so by outlining how recent policies, including the bans just mentioned, disproportionately affect those in the lowest socioeconomic strata, among them trans- and cis-gender female sex workers. Thus, I will show how these forbidden objects are essential not only for my interlocutors’ livelihoods, but also for their social and spatial mobility. Departing from the prevailing focus on the sex work-trafficking debate, this paper redirects attention to the state-led regulation of cosmetic products and fashion, showcasing its profound influence on body-centric services and individuals engaged in precarious bodily labour, such as sex workers (Mears 2014).

Before probing the theoretical framework and presenting my research, I provide a brief overview of my methodological background and research setting. In the subsequent sections of this article, I will first give a brief historical look into how ethnicity was shaped and constructed by colonial policies that relied on aesthetic markers and people’s identification. By shedding light on the colonial means of using body politics to separate Rwandan society, I aim to showcase how aesthetic markers have long been part of the making of citizens. In the second part, I will look at present-day Rwanda and analyse how the project of harmonizing society over the old ethnic lines, although necessary, has yet focused on body politics (such as the bans) through the imagination and realization of what a united nation should look and appear like. I therefore argue that aesthetic body politics (or the aesthetic making of citizens) from the top down have gendered and class-specific consequences on those relying on aesthetic means to pursue their livelihoods and to gain access to social capital. As people’s desires have become more globally influenced (Appadurai 1990), their need for aesthetic embellishment, for instance, cannot be entirely controlled or dictated by the state. In my article, while recognizing the crucial role of looks and appearance in shaping one’s embodiment of citizenship, it is also evident that my interlocutors challenge this notion by symbolically and materially exploring their aesthetic belonging and acts of consumption beyond the confines of Rwanda’s state borders.

Methodology and background

This article is based on twelve months of immersive ethnographic fieldwork conducted in 2019, originally undertaken for doctoral research in Kigali, the capital of Rwanda, and Gisenyi and Goma, situated on the border between Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). I conducted interviews and interacted with over thirty Rwandan cis- and transgender female sex workers between 22 and 45 years old, as well as numerous representatives from non-governmental organizations (NGOs), health clinics, border officials, and relevant civil-society activists and leaders across the three field sites. In my fieldwork I employed ethnographic methods, including in-depth interviews, life-story narratives, and various visual methods such as auto-photography diary-keeping, visual workshops, and art-based participatory approaches (Pink 2015; Plambech 2016; Vastapuu 2018). Later, I employed an intersectional and interdisciplinary approach to analyse my findings. In this article, I primarily draw on everyday communication, interviews, participant observation, and some auto-photography-elicited interviews conducted with my closest interlocutors.

All the sex workers I collaborated with resided in Kigali, with most of them living in the densely populated urban neighbourhood of Nyamirambo. However, they regularly travelled to neighbouring countries to engage in transnational sex work. Additionally, some of the women were involved in small-scale, previously legal but now illegal trading activities, importing second-hand clothing, shoes, cosmetics, jewellery, and groceries upon returning to Rwanda. The most frequently visited city for their work was Goma, the capital of the Eastern Province of North Kivu in the DRC, accessible via a six-hour bus ride from Kigali. Other popular destinations included Kampala in Uganda, Bukavu and Uvira in the Eastern Province of Congo, Dar es Salaam in Tanzania, Bujumbura in Burundi, and Nairobi in Kenya. Having grown up during and after the 1994 Rwandan genocide against Tutsis, my interlocutors had reduced access to education and vocational training. Marginalized and impoverished for various reasons, including teenage pregnancies, drug use, and identifying as gender non-conforming and/or belonging to sexual minorities, sex work and smuggling were the most profitable options to meet their material needs and desires. It is worth noting that during my research all interlocutors were self-operating adults, and some have since left sex work for other jobs.

In many years of international travelling, Rwandan sex workers had developed a somewhat lucrative, although unsteady income, which allowed them to afford fashionable clothing, cosmetics and smartphones. They had established an international network of friends, colleagues, clients and traders outside Rwanda, enabling them to communicate in multiple languages and enhance their business negotiation skills, thus making them ‘cosmopolitan entrepreneurs’ or ‘tactile cosmopolitans’ (Freemantle 2010; Landau and Rumford 2014). The income they earned from their border-crossing activities supported their families in Kigali and beyond. Furthermore, second-hand fashion and skin-whitening cosmetics were vital elements of their everyday beautification, being used to attract clients, gain access to clubs and hotels, and present a smart appearance when crossing borders. With the ban on second-hand clothes and skin-whitening creams, their situation presented obstacles but also afforded the opportunity for lucrative smuggling. Smuggling involved risks that could be navigated by paying bribes or using sex as a form of payment to customs officials. Due to these risks, the value of these objects increased considerably in Rwanda. Being able to acquire and control access to these goods, which remained unavailable on official Rwandan markets, allowed cross-border sex workers to enhance their aesthetic expressions, thus increasing their social and cultural capital among their home community in Kigali, as the following account will show.

Aesthetic citizenship and the national politics of beauty

Fashion and aesthetic enhancements have long served and been analysed as means through which individuals assert their social and cultural agency (Bourdieu 1984; Lebaron 2014). In post-colonial Africa, scholarly accounts have explored splurging on high-end, prominently labelled clothing as performances and projections of an image of success and modernity, as well as a means for exploring identity practices (e.g. Lowe 2013; Masquelier 2013; Tranberg-Hansen 2000). Upward social mobility through consumerism and conspicuous displays of wealth have been scrutinized as a classed project, where fantasies and desires transcend local imaginaries (Newell 2012). What is more, to showcase and offer material gifts and goods among community and kin has anchored reciprocity within cosmopolitan consumption and practices (see, for example, Appadurai 1990; Brah 1996; Taylor 1992). On the other hand, ‘aesthetic labour’ (Mears 2014), including the use of cosmetics, particular ways of dressing up and aesthetic body modification, has been recognized as a distinctly gendered form of labour, often considered necessary in intimate body-centred services such as sex work (ibid.). By meticulously crafting a desired aesthetic appearance, sex workers can secure access to higher-end work venues, such as hotels and bars, and elevate their social interactions with a wealthier clientele (Hofmann 2013). Thus, the attainment of social agency through the classed consumption of aesthetic products and services can be seen as aesthetic manoeuvring, where one seeks both physical and social mobility through their appurtenance and embellishment. This was particularly evident among my sex-worker interlocutors who travelled across Rwanda’s borders to obtain materials for aesthetic consumption.

While the concept of aesthetic labour has shed light on individuals’ acquisition of social, cultural, and economic capital in the Bordieuan sense, my emphasis here is on the aesthetic acts that are the result of everyday practices in Rwandan society, where appearances are closely monitored and restricted by state-practiced body politics. In her research on beauty practices in urban Turkey, Claudia Liebelt (2019) has coined the notion of aesthetic citizenship to emphasize the pivotal role of aesthetic self-fashioning and seemingly mundane bodily practices, drawing on a perspective of citizenship as a product of ‘everyday acts’ through which individuals constitute their rights and sense of belonging (Liebelt 2019, 687). Moreover, Carmen Jarrín’s (2017) research on the biopolitics of beauty in Brazil offers insights into how state-produced norms intersect with class, race, sex, and gender. While Jarrín’s examination of cosmetic enhancements reveals how these serve as a pathway to upward social mobility, Liebelt’s work emphasizes the changing power dynamics through aesthetic choices, leading to a constant reconfiguration of taste and style hierarchies. Liebelt and Jarrín both challenge Bourdieu’s perspective of social capital as a one-way street where lower-class individuals merely imitate the elite’s taste. Instead, they demonstrate that beauty and aesthetic styles circulate in intricate ways, transcending national and transnational boundaries, and creating a dynamic and unpredictable exchange of affective encounters. As Jarrín (2017, 78) states, ‘beauty can be understood as an affective quality – a visceral sensation that cannot be located in individual subjects, but which accumulates in and sticks to subjects only as it moves between and through bodies, producing value’.

As I will go on to show, these observations prove particularly valuable for my research with Rwandan sex workers, and for understanding the impacts of the implementation of the bans on skin-bleaching cosmetics and second-hand clothes in 2019. By examining how my interlocutors asserted agency and navigated daily life through beauty and fashion, I first seek to contextualize their endeavours within the prevailing order in post-genocide Rwanda, especially the state’s attempt to cultivate harmonious model citizens. Moreover, I will illustrate how marginalized and gendered bodies, such as sex workers, appropriate fashion and beauty as a way to construct alternative belongings and indeed, a form of aesthetic citizenship. Before delving into my interlocutors’ experiences and manoeuvrings against the newly enacted bans, in order to understand the aesthetic dynamics at play in Rwanda, I will provide a brief overview of the colonial history of ethnic division in the country and how the post-genocide state envisages itself overcoming these divisions.

Colonial divisions and imagining a new nation

In pre-colonial Rwanda, there were three predominant social classes: the pastoral Tutsis, the primarily agricultural Hutus, and the Twas, often classed as forest-dwellers (Rennie 1972; Newbury 1988; Watkins 2017). While these classifications, which are rooted in socio-economic roles and cultural practices, were dynamic and subject to changes in economic status or social mobility, colonial rule (by Germany 1894–1918 and Belgium 1918–1962) planted the seeds of ethnic fragmentation that promoted Tutsis, and particularly a small aristocratic group within the Tutsi community, as an elite minority and depicted Hutus and Twas as subordinate classes (Maquet 1961; Jessee 2017). In line with prevailing race theories in Europe, the Belgian administration propagated the Hamitic hypothesis to classify Rwandan races. Based on people’s physical characteristics such as skull sizes, height, and bone structure (nose and hip width), Tutsis were positioned as a non-indigenous ‘Hamitic’ race, purportedly descended from Caucasoid peoples in Egypt and therefore deemed close relatives of white Europeans (Baines 2003, 481). In contrast, Hutus were classified as indigenous and consequently inferior ‘negroids’ of the Bantu group (Mamdani 2001, 99–102). This ethno-racial divide was further institutionalized with the introduction of ethnic identity cards in 1926, accompanied by the unequal distribution of political and economic resources, which concentrated wealth and power in the Tutsi monarchy. Consequently, over the colonial period, the classifications of Hutu and Tutsi became increasingly rigid, firmly anchored in their alleged physical attributes (Kimonyo 2016; Berry 2018; Purdeková and Mwambari 2022). The period preceding and following Rwanda’s independence in 1962 saw violent conflicts between the purported ethnic groups (Taylor 1999; Malkki 1995). When an exclusionist Hutu regime ascended to power, they rejected Tutsi superiority by perpetuating colonial narratives, which depicted Tutsis as alien and Hutus as indigenous (Baines 2003). Similarly, the old ethnicity cards were reintroduced during the 1994 genocide, reintroducing aesthetic markers to differentiate between Hutus and Tutsis (Baines 2003, 481).

Understandably, due to the significant role played by the ethnic classification in fostering divisions, the post-genocide government led by President Paul Kagame and his party, the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), have embraced an idealized vision of the country’s pre-colonial history for its alleged absence of ethnicities (Purdeková and Mwambari 2022). Numerous pre-colonial rituals, ceremonies, and rites of passage have been reintroduced as cultural practices in the construction of the Banyarwandan identity, which is aimed at de-ethnicizing Tutsi and Hutu identification (Melvin 2020, 105). Some of the most famous examples are post-genocide reconciliation Gacaca courts,³ Umuganda community work gatherings,⁴ and Itorero youth camps.⁵ The Rwandan state program called Vision 2020, launched in 2000, formalized these cultural participations as obligatory civic duties for all Rwandan citizens. While the aim of promoting peace and harmony in a post-genocide society has been unquestionably crucial, historians have raised questions about the historical accuracy and scale of these rituals in their current form (Sundberg 2016). Furthermore, the obligatory participation into monthly and biweekly communal gatherings such as Umuganda have also been viewed as means of exerting social control and silencing dissenting voices. According to Sundberg (2016), revived pre-colonial cultural rituals and civic duties are part of the training for ‘model citizenship’ and serve as prerequisites for social acceptance within Rwandan society. While there exists a significant body of literature that has examined the sophisticated strategies employed by the Rwandan government to exercise power over its citizens through cultural practices (see, for example, Purdeková 2018; Sundberg 2016; Jessee 2017; Melvin 2020), less attention has been devoted to the exploration of the role of everyday aesthetics in this process. In the following section, I will examine aesthetics as a state-led form of power in public spaces before going on to analyse its extension into the daily lives of my Rwandan interlocutors.

Aesthetics as social control

Rwanda’s dedication to fostering social harmony extends beyond its cultural and social fabrications and is evident in an impressive aesthetics of public spaces. Kigali is frequently acclaimed as ‘Africa’s Singapore’ due to its impeccable order and hygiene. Consequently, recent scholarly discourse has acknowledged the significance of post-genocide aesthetic planning and urban design as a method of exerting control over social life. This involves regulating public spaces and ultimately shaping the construction of public morality (see, for example, Sundberg 2016; Purdeková 2018; Goodfellow and Smith 2013; Finn 2017). Mullikin et al. (2022) argue that the country’s preoccupation with creating aesthetically clean and highly modern spaces has assumed a pivotal role in the ongoing state-building endeavours within the country. They suggest that, although Rwanda’s political landscape cannot be entirely disentangled from the tragic 1994 genocide, the millennial state has transitioned into a new phase that demands an interpretation that extends beyond the confines of the mass atrocities. While Vision 2020 emphasized the need to build a united culture over ethnic lines, the latest Vision 2050 launched in 2015⁶ envisages detaching Rwanda from foreign donations and promoting it as a high-income country (ibid.). The visual manifestations of modern architecture (largely constructed by Chinese entities) serve as symbolic representations of Rwanda’s progress and commitment to good governance in the eyes of international observers and investors. Moreover, Rwanda’s self-presentation as a ‘highly modern state’ extends its influence into the everyday lives of Rwandans, engendering a sense of the government’s omnipresence (Purdeková 2018), while the pursuit of standardization and uniformity in aesthetic reorganization plays a crucial role in fostering a cohesive ‘Rwandan’ identity (Sundberg 2016; Mullikin et al. 2022). From urban spaces to citizens, this visual conformity serves as a powerful means to project Rwanda’s aesthetic citizenship. As Mullikin et al. (2022, 49) argue:

In addition to an aesthetics of physical space, there is also an aesthetics of public comportment that attempts to circumscribe proper citizenship and collective organizing. Attempts to control how people appear in public, what they wear, and how tidy their homes look, is part of everyday life in Rwanda. Through this form of biopolitical control, individuals internalize the discourse of ‘being modern’, which often equates to ‘aesthetically proper’.

Consequently, the process of state formation in post-2000 Rwanda is more nuanced and contingent than traditional theories of strong-state governance suggest. Rather than being imposed solely from the top-down, government policies operate within spaces of ‘negotiated stability’ where interactions between citizens perform the state (Mullikin et al. 2022, 45) and aesthetic practices reflect their properness and morality. By this, I mean that model citizenship is embodied beyond merely social duty, extending to how one presents oneself in public. This is not, of course, unique to Rwanda, as Liebelt and Jarrín have demonstrated in their studies. However, the interplay of aesthetic power with surveillance is a particularly vital notion in the context of Rwanda. While stringent security and order may provide a sense of safety in a post-conflict setting, many human rights organizations report annually the arbitrary detention of individuals deemed ‘undesirable’ for reasons of public order, including street vendors, sex workers, beggars, and the homeless.⁷ Although sex work is not criminalized in Rwanda, the National Policy against Delinquency⁸ views prostitution as a disruptive form of behaviour against the public order, leading to the perception that selling sex in public spaces is illegal and often results in arbitrary arrests and removals to so-called rehabilitation centres.⁹ Sex workers whom I interviewed often referred to their occupation as ‘illegal’ on the basis of their everyday experiences. Moreover, sex work was highly stigmatized, with public debates focusing on the perceived deviancy of sex workers and the challenge they posed to Rwandan culture, public morality and gender equality (an assumption based on sex work being practiced predominantly by women in Rwanda).

As Amira, a 29-year-old sex worker, stated, sex workers who appear ‘cheap and dirty’ are targeted by the police and may be sent to rehabilitation centres, while those who present themselves as more affluent are not molested. ‘If you look like a VIP, you can go to the hotels, and nobody can catch you … as long as you don’t cause trouble’, she explained. Inayah, a former sex worker, also acknowledged the importance of aesthetic presentation, noting that:

Sex workers from the streets don’t know how to talk to people outside of their culture, they only speak with the same local people, like the motor taxi drivers. They wear short skirts. They know that, when you put on a short dress, that is when you get easy money.

From this, the interplay between aesthetics and social control, enforced by the police, clearly comes into view. Moreover, Amira’s quote demonstrates the normative perception of what is desired to be on display in public and what not. By embodying a particular class status and styling and dressing up the way they do, sex workers can affect different responses and, within the limits of their own resources, wage considerable power over their mobilities. Thus, how individuals navigate the ‘highly modern’ urban space of Kigali, which is closely monitored by the police and other fellow citizens, directly influences residents’ self-fashioning, as well as society’s expectations in terms of proper appearance, morality and behaviour in public settings. Similar to Liebelt’s work on present-day Istanbul, in Kigali a ‘visual economy of recognition’ (Ahmed 2000, quoted in Liebelt 2019, 699) exists that, in addition to the scrutiny of one’s own body, inspects others as ‘potential intruders into one’s own space’ (ibid.). By actively participating in the surveillance and regulation of urban space, the model citizen in Kigali likewise contributes to maintaining the boundaries and integrity of the national community. Moreover, in the context of high-modernist, post-genocide Rwanda, where the state promotes cultural harmony and morality through public aesthetics, those who deviate from social norms in terms of appearance, as well as sex and gender roles, become targets of the state apparatus. While these cultural practices and civic duties have been employed to promote peace and unity in a society marked by the 1994 genocide, the state has assumed a panoptical role by expanding its presence through cultivating a modern public aesthetics. My argument here is that this extends to the bodies of its citizens, particularly within the highly visible and controlled urban spaces of the capital. With this in mind, I will now examine the implications of the two import bans that clearly form part of the state’s expansion of aesthetic practices. Thus, from the perspective of the state, donated second-hand fashion and skin-whitening are not considered to have any part to play in the modern, progressive embellishment of Rwanda’s citizens.

Class, style and state: forbidden second-hand fashion

When the Rwandan government enforced the import tariff on second-hand clothes in 2019, it was celebrated by many as taking a stance in the long-standing debate on their problematic role as ‘donations to Africa’. For long, environmentalists have raised concerns about the Global North dumping its waste and unwanted garments in Africa, while others have criticized multinational corporations for benefiting from the trade, questioning their moral discourses. Yet, despite the valid accusations of corporations exploiting charity for their own gain within the global market system, due to the limited alternatives that cater to the purchasing power of local populations, second-hand clothing has remained one of the most accessible fashion choices for many in Sub-Saharan African countries (Tranberg-Hansen 2000; Wolff 2021). To protect the emerging textile industry, the Rwandan government introduced the label ‘Made in Rwanda’ to promote local businesses and encourage domestic garment purchases. However, this led to a loss of income for second-hand fashion vendors, and lower-income residents struggled to afford the higher costs of ‘Made in Rwanda’ garments compared with second-hand attire. In response to the outcry of Rwandan citizens, government officials emphasized the aesthetics of a clean, hygienic and modern Rwanda, urging people to align with the progressive perspective, mirroring the modern and harmonious nature of the urban spaces. For example, an official of Rwanda’s Ministry of Trade and Industry explained the ban on second-hand clothes as follows: ‘It is also about protecting our people in terms of hygiene. If Rwanda produces its own clothes, our people won’t have to wear T-shirts or jeans used by someone else. People need to shift to [this] kind of mindset’ (quoted in Gambino 2017). This quote emphasizes that the style and dress of Rwandan people contribute to the country’s forward-looking vision, thus highlighting the significance of aesthetic propriety within the citizen body. As mentioned earlier, second-hand fashion has been a cost-effective alternative for decades, allowing the vast majority of the lower economic class in the country to engage in affordable clothing exchange. When questioned about the impact of the ban on those whose employment was in the second-hand clothing trade, President Kagame stated: ‘As far as I am concerned, making the choice is simple […] We might suffer consequences. Even when confronted with difficult choices, there is always a way’ (quoted in ibid.). The president’s perspective resonates with Finn’s (2017) observation that, as state policies rapidly advance towards their ambiguous vision, ordinary people have been left grappling to ‘chase after’ a development at a pace they cannot keep up with.

Among my interlocutors, who belonged to the lower economic strata, Cheryl, a single mother in her early thirties, was one who relied on the second-hand clothing trade. She had accumulated a reasonably large clientele and was able to rent a small boutique in the centre of Kigali from engaging in a decade-long career in cross-border sex work and importing second-hand fashion from Goma. Her enterprise provided a modest, but stable living for herself and her family. Cheryl usually travelled to Goma on Fridays and returned to Kigali on Sundays, while her mother stayed home with her three children. During the week she worked in the shop. When the second-hand clothes ban was introduced, she was determined not to give up her secondary livelihood, as it would mean losing the networks of traders and buyers she had cultivated over the years. From one day to another, her role shifted from being a trader to becoming a smuggler, requiring her to navigate border crossings carefully to avoid being caught. ‘I cannot count with my fingers how many times they took my stuff and made me pay fines’, she complained. Sometimes Cheryl resorted to collaborating with local smugglers to transport her purchases from Congo to Rwanda. However, trusting the reliability of other smugglers was challenging, as there was always the risk of their disappearing with the goods and the money. In addition, the danger of encountering immigration officials or military personnel who demanded monetary bribes, or worse, sexual favours on the Congolese side heightened the risks and uncertainties of the smuggling trade for Cheryl and many other traders.

Access to second-hand clothing was important not only for the livelihoods of some sex workers, it also served as a marker of aesthetic distinction and a sign of trendiness and cosmopolitanism. For my transgender interlocutors, accessing and dressing in these clothes was crucial for their ability to move physically unmolested in public spaces, especially due to the fact that trans bodies faced increased scrutiny in comparison to my cis-gender women interlocutors, in particular when crossing international borders. Although smuggling second-hand clothes was not a viable option for queer and trans sex workers due to heightened border inspections, dressing in them was indeed essential. Queem, who had worked as a cross-border sex worker in East Africa for nearly two decades, explained: As a trans, I often experience some comments and questions due to my physical appearance. They see my name on the passport and look at me and then ask if I’m gay… I may say yes or no. … If it’s in public, I don’t tell them the truth. In everyday life in Kigali, Queem usually wore black kajal and bright nail polish and tied their long, bleached braids into a bun over the head. Queem dressed in a way that felt safe, taking into account that the feeling of safety varied spatially. At home and in LGBTQI+ friendly bars and clubs they would normally wear tightly cropped tops and skinny jeans and accessorise their looks with a scarf or a stylish purse. In contrast, when crossing the border, Queem would rather wear ‘nice, smart-looking clothes, like collared shirts and canvas shoes’, commonly bought second-hand. Like other trans people, when confronted with bureaucratic practices such as the checking of travel documents Queem was often reminded of a gender category they did not identify with. To navigate the border surveillance, one’s gender and class presentation played a crucial role in being able to pass. It was through carefully chosen outfits – often including branded second-hand clothes – that they enhanced their aesthetic performances, allowing them to navigate the biometric surveillance at the border more effectively. As Queem aptly pointed out: ‘They still guess I am not like everyone else, but still, it’s better to look more like a man’.

At the local level in Rwanda, the reform of the import tax on second-hand clothing had different responses among the various social and economic groups. While most in the low-income class like my interlocutors, who relied on smuggling and/or purchasing second-hand clothes, criticized the restrictions as unfair, the upper-middle-class in Kigali, including cultural influencers, elites and some of the new generation of Rwandan returnees, welcomed the legislation. The ‘Made in Rwanda’ label, which some of them were professionally involved in, gave them a sense of national pride. In conversations with local fashion designers, NGO workers, journalists and artists, I found that they saw the ban on second-hand clothing as an anti-colonial statement on the part of the government. They belonged to a generation that had experienced Rwanda’s rapid social and economic development since the 1994 genocide and now viewed themselves as part of a larger ‘Afropolitan’¹⁰ anti-colonial struggle, culturally, politically and aesthetically. Incorporating pre-colonial inspired and locally produced jewellery and fashion allowed them to express a form of aesthetic citizenship that was rooted in Rwandan culture. Many of them perceived the dumping of discarded clothes from the West as neo-colonial and thus regarded the emergence of a local textile industry as a decolonizing effort.

Due to their higher price, for many sex workers, the ‘Made in Rwanda’ clothes were out of reach. Moreover, for those belonging to the lower socio-economic strata, the consumption of second-hand clothes from Europe was not only economic but also an integral aspect of their aesthetic presentation, signalling their cosmopolitan connections to the world outside Rwanda. Alongside the more expensive local textile goods, the ban on Western second-hand clothes had elicited a new trade deal with China, which had become a major importer of low-cost fashion to Rwanda (Wolff 2021). However, Chinese imports to Rwanda were perceived to be of lower quality compared to those manufactured for European markets. As Queem lamented: ‘The best quality comes from the second-hand fashion from Europe, but we don’t have them here anymore. We only get the worst [quality] from China and now this “Made in Rwanda”, but it’s not what we want to buy’.

Evidently, my interlocutors were aware of the global retail production cycles and knew that European or Musungu clothing – Musungu meaning of white or European origin in Swahili, including fashion brands like H&M and Zara – were also originally made in China, and that the fibres used consisted of similar synthetic materials. However, the trajectories of second-hand fashion, having already lasted one cycle of consumption in the ‘West’, made them more reliable and fashionable than the cheap, lower quality Chinese garments now being sold in the Rwandan malls.

Furthermore, to return to the circulation of aesthetic preferences and class dynamics, the desire for second-hand fashion was also a matter of taste. Contrary to a preference for clothing inspired by Rwandan cultural heritage, as promoted by many ‘Made in Rwanda’ brands and consumed by elite consumers, my interlocutors exhibited a material connection to the places where the clothes originated (see similar parallels drawn by Newell 2012; Lowe 2013; Masquelier 2013). Many sex workers frequently voiced the aspiration of migrating to Europe or North America by marrying a Musungu client. Consequently, their concepts of beauty, fashion and aesthetics became intricately linked with the desire for a better future (Oldenburg 2015). This parallels Jarrín’s (2017) findings in Brazil, where the desire for beauty was connected to dreams of wealth and social mobility. To further challenge the notion of Western hegemony in the world of beauty and fashion, my observations demonstrate how cosmopolitan taste and style involve transnational blending and the appropriation of styles as much as they represent an elaborate performance of success and modern citizenship (Fair 2004; Newell 2012; Masquelier 2013). The desires expressed by my interlocutors posed a contradiction to the prevailing state politics and the aesthetic ideals endorsed by Rwandan elite consumers. Similarly observed by Liebelt (2019) in Turkey, where religious, lower-class women rejected the secular elite’s beauty standards by making religious-leaning Muslim styles part of their everyday fashion, I too witnessed how my interlocutors expanded their ideas of aesthetic citizenship beyond the confines of state-led body politics by drawing on the affective images produced through the garments’ transnational trajectories.

Skin-whitening as an appropriation of power and style

Despite the well-known harms and hazards of using skin-whitening cosmetics and decades of efforts to debunk the persistent belief that a lighter complexion symbolizes beauty and wealth, the popularity of whitening creams and bleach products is unbroken in the Global South and its various diasporas (Owoseje 2019). Therefore, when the Rwandan government justified its ban of bleaching cosmetics by referring to universally acknowledged health risks, this was widely perceived as support for decolonization. Characteristic of Rwandan law enforcement, legal actions against smuggling or selling skin-lightening creams in Rwandan markets were rigorously enforced in 2019 (Garcia 2019). During my fieldwork I learned of many cases of imprisonment or of fines of thousands of dollars being imposed for the possession of skin-lightening cosmetics. Yet, despite the ban and the significant dangers associated with these harmful chemicals, many of my interlocutors, including Assma, a young sex worker, continued to use bleach as part of her aesthetic labour (Mears 2014; Hofmann 2013). However, fearing potential imprisonment or hefty fines, she consciously modified her beauty practices, choosing to use the cream exclusively while travelling and refraining from importing it.

Assma was always outstanding in her appearance. Her hair was styled, cut, died, or twisted in a new fashion almost every time we met. She took pleasure in dressing up, wearing a wild variety of styles, from tomboy hoodies to Muslim gowns and bodycon dresses, sometimes accessorized with a blonde wig, gigantic sunglasses, or a fake Gucci bag. Once, Assma dressed in a flight attendant’s uniform, which she had bought in Goma. ‘In Goma, I’m a superstar!’ she told me when demonstrating her latest fashion purchases, a tight, navy-blue pencil skirt topped with a matching blazer jacket, collars embroidered with airline logos, illustrating Assma’s playfulness and her subjectivity as a cosmopolitan traveller. As a fashionista, Assma was eager to transform her looks beyond dressing up, namely by whitening her skin. Her relatively light skin-tone, she felt, added to her playful roles and styles and allowed her to embody multiple identities―from an Indian dancer to a Middle Eastern Muslim, or looks resembling Nicki Minaj and Rihanna. Among her family and other interlocutors, Asma’s skin stood out for its lightness in colour, but also for its patchiness, resulting from the use of products containing bleach over many years. While some sex-worker interlocutors resorted to temporary fixes like lighter toned foundations and powders, their illuminating effects were never as pronounced as Assma’s. Consequently, other sex workers openly admired Assma’s complexion and saw it as her secret to attracting numerous clients. ‘Clients, they prefer a lighter skin’, elaborated Assma. While the new legislation had made the use of whitening cosmetics challenging for many, Assma continued to apply them when abroad, as she was too afraid to smuggle them back home. She explained:

It is difficult to get the whitening cream in Rwanda. Bringing it here, you go to prison. In Goma, there are many types, and they are very cheap. The place [where I buy them] is called Cosmetic. But they are not selling the cream from Europe. They are selling the mix of something they produce in Congo and mix it with the Indian creams. The price depends on the quality and can be as low as 2000 Congolese francs [equivalent to one US dollar] or as high as 65 US dollars.

Despite Assma’s investment in higher quality bleaching creams, she too experienced the devastating effects of the active bleaching ingredient hydroquinone. Following a prolonged trip to Nairobi, she returned to Kigali feeling exhausted and ill with scabies, one of the common skin diseases associated with the use of bleach. Her skin was severely damaged, requiring treatment at a hospital in Kenya, which was paid for by a ‘generous client’. Assma explained that ‘he had to put down at least two hundred dollars’. Despite this incident, Assma remained determined to use bleaching creams, believing that by investing in superior-quality products she would achieve the desired look without causing harm to her skin. After the ban, finding the desired bleaching products on local Rwandan markets became increasingly difficult. While in the past Assma would have been familiar with most of the products and the salespeople, she now encountered greater challenges in acquiring the bleaching creams she preferred, having to obtain them whenever she went abroad. By jeopardizing her health for beauty, Assma’s situation is similar to that of Cheryl, who took risks by paying fines or offering sexual favours while smuggling second-hand goods into Rwanda.

Rather than focusing solely on the evident health risks or the racist and harmful idealization of whiteness as ‘colo-mentality’, Bakare-Yusuf (2013), a Nigerian writer, suggests an alternative interpretation. She proposes that bleaching can also be viewed as an act of agency and mimicry, validating it as a way of participating in the global fashion industry, as well as redefining the body she was given. This is particularly relevant for (mostly) women down the socio-cultural and economic scales, for whom appearance is a crucial currency. As Bakare-Yusuf (ibid.) explains, ‘[p]art of that currency is to “step out” with luminous, light, radiant skin enhanced by hydroquinone cream and layers of pale foundation, mascara, rouge, eye shadow and shimmering painted lips’. Transforming one’s skin colour thus becomes a way for young Nigerian women to juxtapose global trends, ideas and traditions in cosmopolitan intersections. For them, a yellow skin tone conveyed a sense of freshness and vitality, while whiteness was associated with fragility and negativity (ibid; see also Salami 2023). Similarly, Assma and other interlocutors in Rwanda often laughed at the pale faces and thin hair of Musungus that they considered unsuitable for trendy hairstyles. Whiteness (or Musungness) became a performance and an adverb they sometimes used to describe themselves or others. Acting like a Musungu referred to a temporary action of transforming something rather than transforming into someone. They did not aspire to become Musungus or to be white, but rather made use of Musungu beauty products and fashion to extract wealth from their clients. To them, the appropriation and mimicking of skin tone and fairness were a means of contesting and subverting the power dynamics associated with whiteness.

In the absence of bleach in Rwanda, Assma resorted to more traditional home-made methods of skin care. She followed beauty vloggers and social media celebrity accounts to learn and replicate beauty tricks. Assma explained: I don’t like to read. But on social media, I watch videos from Nigeria on how to mix your cream. I search ‘how to make my skin white’. At home, for example, I use tomatoes and egg yolk, mix them and apply them on my skin. From India and Congo to Nigeria, Assma’s aesthetic ideas underwent constant reconfiguration in all directions as material beauty practices continued to influence her online space. The application of creams, bleach, eggs, or tomatoes on her skin served as a form of self-care for Assma, enhancing her aesthetic confidence and nurturing her identity as an attractive, cosmopolitan, mobile woman. While Assma regarded her skin tone as a factor contributing to her success in attracting clients, it also symbolized her ability to afford expensive creams and her transnational experiences beyond the country’s borders, making it a tangible marker of her aesthetic manoeuvres. Thus, her everyday acts demonstrate the formation of aesthetic citizenship beyond state body politics, emerging from her aesthetic experiences in transnational contexts.

Conclusions

I began this article by examining how the cultivation of ‘model citizens’ through the idea of civic responsibilities and the creation of clean urban spaces in Rwanda served as means to unite the post-1994 still torn society and to distance the state from the discourse of genocide. By exploring how these efforts to harmonize aesthetic spaces are manifested in people’s individual aesthetic practices and self-presentations in public, I have suggested regarding aesthetic presentation as an essential component in the making of citizenship.

Building on Liebelt’s (2019) notion of aesthetic citizenship, I argued that in Rwanda, the concepts of aesthetic belonging and bodily self-fashioning intersect with issues of class and gender. Amid Rwanda’s vision as a modern state that no longer relies on foreign donations but seeks foreign investments, I described the introduction of a de facto ban on old Western second-hand clothes, which no longer suited the state’s desired self-image. Similarly, the prioritization of public health and moral concerns have rendered the use of skin bleach illegal. However, the attempt to regulate and ban these markets has posed challenges for ordinary lower-income Rwandans, especially those engaged in sexual labour, who are predominantly women and people with non-conforming gender or sexual identities. Through my sex-worker interlocutors’ experiences, I have shown how aesthetic practices, including the use of beauty and fashion products, are crucial for their professional success and aid their social and geographical mobility. The ability to access the right kind of clothing and use whitening creams now relies on the ability to cross nation-state borders and gain entry to locations like hotels and clubs to connect with clients. Not least, the acquisition of second-hand products and bleaching cosmetics are material manifestations of my interlocutors’ desires for better futures in places they dream of moving to.

The promotion of a politically conscious aesthetics rejecting Western dominance has thus become integral to Rwanda’s narrative of a new African modernity. While these policies can be deemed progressive economically and environmentally, they have marginalized certain groups, turning them into smugglers or making them complicit in illegal activities. The struggles for beauty, as highlighted by Jarrín (2017), are inscribed on the bodies of those with fewer privileges. Trapped between their aesthetic desires, which are derived from transnational encounters and travels, and the confined expectations imposed by the state, my sex-worker interlocutors have been able to shape and expand their styles and notions of cosmopolitan beauty and aesthetic citizenship by crossing the nation-state borders. More generally too, they navigate borderlands and engage in aesthetic practices that transcend moral and social boundaries, as well as aesthetic expectations of them.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This paper is based on fieldwork conducted for my doctoral studies in Anthropology and African Studies, which is part of the Anthropology of Human Security in Africa (ANTHUSIA) research program. It has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Grant Agreement no. 764546. Additionally, my research has been funded by the ZEIT-Stiftung Ebelin und Gerd Bucerius, Hamburg, within the Ph.D. scholarship program “Beyond Borders”.

Notes

1. ‘People of Rwanda’ in the Kinyarwandan language.

2. Although there are various ways and scales of lighting, toning and whitening skin colour (related to different cultural and political terminologies), in this paper I refer to the practice as skin-whitening and bleaching, following the colloquial terminology in the Rwandan press and among my interlocutors. Skin-whitening, in this context, is not intended literally but refers more to using bleach or other lightening affect chemicals and lotions to achieve a lighter skin tone.

3. In the reconciliation processes of the genocide, precolonial Gacaca councils were reopened. In them, the perpetrator reveals his crime in front of the village or is challenged by the public about their crime. The penalty must be determined by the community’s unanimous decision (Clark 2010; Longman 2017).

4. Umuganda, freely translated as ‘doing together’, is a mandatory, monthly cleaning day set by the state. During the unpaid community work programme, all citizens over the age of eighteen clean and renovate common areas. At the end of the day, the entire neighbourhood gathers to talk about any disputes and disagreements (Purdeková 2018, 235).

5. Civil service for young Rwandans, building on volunteerism, and emphasizing the value of cooperation and volunteering, although participation in Itorero is compulsory for target groups such as teenagers (Sundberg 2016, 6).

6. Vision 2050 has a grand-scale development plan for Rwanda, envisaging the country’s transformation into an upper mid-income nation, thereby achieving economic independence from foreign aid and reasserting its regional and global political influence. See, https://www.minecofin.gov.rw/fileadmin/user_upload/Minecofin/Publications/REPORTS/National_Development_Planning_and_Research/Vision_2050/English-Vision_2050_Abridged_version_WEB_Final.pdf (accessed March 10th, 2024)

7. See, for example, Human Rights Watch Report (2022), https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2022/country-chapters/rwanda (accessed March 10th, 2024).

8. Delinquency refers to ‘any conduct that does not conform to the legal requirements or moral standards of the Rwandan society’ (Republic of Rwanda, Ministry of Local Government: National Policy against Delinquency, p. 22. Archived from the original PDF on 13^th December 2022.

9. In Rwanda, transit centres, governed by the 2017 law establishing the National Rehabilitation Service and subsequent government orders, can detain individuals for ‘deviant behaviours’ like prostitution, drug use, begging, or informal street-vending without requiring additional legal justification. These centres serve as temporary placements before a possible transfer to jail, rehabilitation centres for reform, education, skills development, and the reintegration of individuals exhibiting such behaviours. However, Human Rights Watch and other human rights NGOs have consistently reported cases of abuse and mistreatment of people within these centres, as have some of my interlocutors. See https://www.hrw.org/report/2020/01/27/long-we-live-streets-they-will-beat-us/rwandas-abusive-detention-children (accessed March 10th, 2024).

10. Especially in fashion, art, music, popular culture and the consumer industry, Afropolitanism has become celebrated and used term to redefine cosmopolitanism from an Afrocentric perspective and experience (Mbembe 2020; Salami 2023).