Seeing like a citizen, acting like a state: Exemplary events in unified Yemen

Abstract

This chapter uses a discussion of three recent events in Yemen to dramatize the relationship between state power and the experience of citizenship in the aftermath of national unification in 1990.1 The first event is a "direct," purportedly competitive presidential election on September 23, 1999, the first since unification and unprecedented in the histories of the former countries of North and South Yemen. The second is the celebration of the tenth anniversary of national unification on May 22, 2000, including the extraordinary preparations leading up to the event. The third is the public sensation following the arrest and prosecution of a man touted as Yemen’s first bona fide "serial killer," which occurred during the lead-up to the decennial celebration.