Functionalist and Intentionalist Explanations of the Rwanda and Essay

Functionalist and Intentionalist Explanations of the Rwanda and Holocaust Mass Murders - Essay Example The mass murder in Rwanda is a perfect example of the modern time genocide born of ethnic hatred. As compared to the Holocaust genocide, the events unfolding in Rwanda in 1994 gave birth to the systematic slaughter of more than eight hundred thousand Moderate Hutu and Tutsi. This aspect position the Rwandese massacre to being a massacre of the modern phenomenon, absorbed by rationalism, bureaucracy and technology. The massacre of the European Jews, commonly referred to by a majority of scholars as the Holocaust, on the other hand is among the genocides known to the greater percentage of the educated in the society. Between the years 1941 and 1945, European Jews ranging between five and xix million were systematically massacred by the Nazi regime (under the leadership of Adolf Hitler) in collaboration with its allies and other surrogates in the Nazi-occupied territories. Irrespective of the astonishing intensity and scale of the genocide, the prominence of the Holocaust in the recent couple of years has been far from being preordained. Having given a brief preamble of both the Rwandese and the Holocaust genocides, this paper therefore, gears towards availing an in-depth comparison between the two genocides. In addition, this paper also does evaluate both the functionalist and the intentionalists explanation of the two cases of mass murder based on the principal areas of focus such as uniqueness, precedent and generality in either case as drawn from different theoretical quarters. Comparison and Evaluation of the Holocaust and Rwanda Mass Murders When it comes to the definition of what genocide is, it somehow proves to be challenging. Nevertheless, massacres have over and again been repeated in different parts of the world. The most imperative thing to keep in remembrance is that a mass murder remains to be not only a controversial, but also a contested debate among politicians, historians, academics, fascists and nationalists. Irrespective of the noticeable differences in the context of a mass murder, neither of th e sides presents a different opinion or even repudiates the authenticity of the Rwanda and the Holocaust, nor is there sombre rejection over the principle that the Hutus and Adolf Hitler were responsible for the crimes they set off. In this event therefore, it is imperative finding a mechanism of gauging the reality beyond the Rwanda and the Holocaust massacres (Christopher 2004, p.34). As thus, there arise two schools of thought as regards to the historiography of these genocides. These schools of thought are the functionalist and the intentionalist explanations of the genocides. Intenionalist versus Functionalist Explanation of the two Mass Murders Over the past two or so decades, the most heated debate has been revolving around an erudite predisposition by and large referred to as intentionalist and an antagonistic functionalist explanation. Arguably, a great percentage of the interpretation and data so gathered on the Rwanda and the Holocaust massacres relate in one way or the o ther either in the functionalist or the intentionalist perspectives. To begin with the Holocaust genocide it is even derivable from the word itself, the intenionalists’ explanation lays more accents on the intention that the Nazis had; and from the kick off, it is undeniable that these Nazis had their minds made up to eliminate the European Jews in whichever manner, including carrying a mass slaughter on them. An approach of this kind puts emphasis on the figure of Adolf Hitler and his monomaniacal passion to do away with what he referred to as the Jewish cancer from Germany and Europe as a whole (Tom 2010, p.25). Adolf’s stance of facilitating an elimination of the European Jews is clearly evidenced by the statement he makes when addressing a journalist. He confidently declares that in the event that he assumes power, his first priority