AIDS, NGOs, and the Politics of Testimony in West Africa
This article examines the relevance of the notion of “moving sovereignties” to the analysis of humanitarian aid through the case study of a small burkinabè NGO responding to the AIDS epidemic. It shows that this NGO occupies an intermediary space between the discourses of development agencies and a local reality characterised by material need. The concern of the international community to empower persons living with HIV in the fight against the epidemic translated into a local market for testimonials by those living with HIV. The recruitment and circulation of these narratives serve to mobilise resources, and also introduce new forms of subjectivity. These are challenged by different relations of reciprocity and exchange-“moral economies”- that are traced by the circulation of these narratives. The negotiation of these moral economies by the actors involved results in new political claims that define “therapeutic citizenship” and, through it, perhaps a new political space in the contemporary world.