The Nordic Africa Institute
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Development dilemmas and manufactured hazards
No full textDevelopment processes have conflicting aims and players, and these are a challenge for making good policy. Choosing the wrong development path could have devastating consequences. Research into development issues is key to understanding the realities about which political decisions have to be made
Improved recycling performance : Policy options for Nigerian cities
No full textIn Nigeria there is a glaring absence of formal recycling of municipal waste. As a result, the informal sector has taken up the role of “critical but unacknowledged gap filler” in the waste recycling system, achieving low but significant recycling rates. This policy note deals with what can be done to improve recycling performance in Nigerian cities
Agricultural Development and Food Security in Africa : The Impact of Chinese, Indian and Brazilian Investments
No full textThe subject of food security and land issues in Africa has become one of increased importance and contention over recent years. In particular, the focus has shifted to the role new Global South donors - in particular India, China and Brazil - are playing in shaping African agriculture through their increased involvement and investment in the continent. Approaching the topic through the framework of South-South co-operation (SSC), this highly original volume presents a critical analysis of the ways in which Chinese, Indian and Brazilian engagements in African agriculture are structured and implemented. Do these investments have the potential to create new opportunities to improve local living standards, transfer new technology and knowhow to African producers, and reverse the persistent productivity decline in African agriculture? Or will they simply aggravate the problem of food insecurity by accelerating the process of land alienation and displacement of local people from their land? Topical and comprehensive, ‘Agricultural Development and Food Security in Africa’ offers fresh insight into a set of relationships that will shape both Africa and the world over the coming decades.CONTENTS: Introduction: peasants, the state and foreign direct investment in African agriculture / Fantu Cheru and Renu Modi -- PART I. Overview -- 1. Catalysing an agricultural revolution in Africa: what role for foreign direct investment? / Fantu Cheru, Renu Modi and Sanusha Naidu -- 2. Agrarian transformation in Africa and its decolonization / Sam Moyo -- PART II. India -- 3. India and Africa: new trends in sustainable agricultural development / Gurjit Singh -- 4. India’s strategy for African agriculture: assessing the technology, knowledge and finance platforms / Renu Modi -- 5. Up for grabs: the case of large Indian investments in Ethiopian agriculture / Dessalegn Rahmato -- 6. Indian agricultural companies, ‘land grabbing’ in Africa and activists’ responses / Rick Rowden -- PART III. Brazil -- 7. Brazil’s cooperation in African agricultural development and food security / Thomas Cooper Patriota and Francesco Maria Pierri -- 8. Brazil, biofuels and food security in Mozambique -- Kai Thaler -- 9. South–South cooperation in agriculture: the India, Brazil and South Africa Dialogue Forum / Alexandra Arkhangelskaya and Albert Khamatshin -- PART IV. China -- 10. China’s food security challenge: what role for Africa? / Simon Freemantle and Jeremy Stevens -- 11. China’s agricultural and rural development: lessons for African countries / Xiuli Xu and Xiaoyun Li -- 12. Conclusions and the way forward / Fantu Cheru and Renu Modi</p
Sexual Violence as a Weapon of War? : Perceptions, Prescriptions, Problems in the Congo and Beyond
No full textAll too often in conflict situations, rape is referred to as a 'weapon of war', a term presented as self-explanatory through its implied storyline of gender and warring. In this provocative but much-needed book, Eriksson Baaz and Stern challenge the dominant understandings of sexual violence in conflict and post-conflict settings. Reading with and against feminist analyses of the interconnections between gender, warring, violence and militarization, the authors address many of the thorny issues inherent in the arrival of sexual violence on the global security agenda. Based on original fieldwork in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, as well as research material from other conflict zones, Sexual Violence as a Weapon of War? challenges the recent prominence given to sexual violence, bravely highlighting various problems with isolating sexual violence from other violence in war. A much-anticipated book by two acknowledged experts in the field, on an issue that has become an increasingly important security, legal and gender topic.Contents: 1. Sex/gender violence -- 2. ‘Rape as a weapon of war’? -- 3. The messiness and uncertainty of warring -- 4. Post-coloniality, victimcy and humanitarian engagement: being a good global feminist? -- 5. Concluding thoughts and unanswered questions </p
Musical Violence : Gangsta Rap and Politics in Sierra Leone
No full textHip Hop has become a global force in recent years. However, when taken up by youth outside its American birthplace, it is often dismissed as a shallow adaptation or imitation of American popular culture. However, its global popularity cannot be questioned, and its proliferation is aided by its adaptability to local contexts. It has become associated with an emergent youth political identity in many parts of the world, a result of its ability to embody rebellious youth energy. Hip Hop is a new global lingua franca for youth rebellion that exists beyond the boundaries of the state, and is aided by the emergence of the internet and accompanying communications technologies. Analysis of the political ramifications of Hip Hop in West African societies is vital to gaining a true sense of what democracy means in the local context. This paper focuses on the West African country of Sierra Leone, and explores how youth participation in Hip Hop there is a radical political project
What is the good city?
No full textThe development of industrial capitalism in Europe gave rise to conditions that motivated the rise of modern urban planning. In Africa, urban models for ordering society emerged in the late 1930s. Andrew Byerley looks at the laboratory of urban Africa
Election-Related Violence : The Case of Ghana
No full textThis Current African Issue gives an overview of the causes and experiences of electionrelated violence in relation to patronage politics in Ghana. Ghana has been framed b ythe international community as a unique bastion of democracy and peace on the African continent. Nevertheless, the country has come from a military regime like many of its democratic African counterparts and is still prone to some of the problems faced by its more turbulent neighbours. The three main guiding issues that this publication will address in relation to election-related violence in Ghana are: The causes of election-related violence in Ghana Who the people most likely to cause election-related violence are The role that “big men” play in election-related violenc
Building a Police Force "for the good" in DR Congo : Questions that still haunt reformers and reform beneficiaries
No full textThe police in DRC are indeed a permanent domestic risk. The lack of policy, service or management regime for the acquisition of equipment explains the deficient, dilapidated, obsolete and very often inappropriate equipment. Moreover, police units have very weak operational capacity and police officers lack self-confidence and pride in their profession. These shabbily dressed men and women in faded uniforms daily develop an indifferent attitude towards their profession and work in general. Inefficient and ineffective, the Congolese policeforce is wholly demoralised and unprofessional. This has negatively affected the relationship between police and population. It has led to the withdrawal of people’s cooperation, a must for successful police work and for meeting people’s expectations