From Biolegitimacy to Antihumanitarianism: Understanding People’s Resistance to Ebola Responses in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

Despite the devastating impact of the Ebola pandemic which emerged in eastern DRC’s North Kivu in 2018, local populations seemed skeptical about its existence. This led to significant local resistance to the medical response, including armed attacks and violence, which seriously disrupted the response. This brief first investigates the Ebola response, both in terms of patient care and prevention, and pays particular attention to the security logics of the response, which are the basis of local mistrust and resistance. Then, the research brief looks into the different acts of resistance, their actors, and their discourses, in order to understand the logics underlying the antihumanitarianism that it suggests and that has been recorded in the region for several years. Finally, we present a genealogical and political economy perspective on Ebola to understand the contemporary and historical factors underlying the issues related to the public’s response.