My blogging colleague Lisa Gambone has been doing fine work over at the FPA War Crimes Blog where African affairs cross her transom quite regularly. Please check out her work.
Just a couple of loose ends from Hillary Clinton’s just-completed Africa trip: The Washington Post’s Mary Beth Sheridan sheds a spotlight on how women’s issues were central to the Secretary of State’s mission: “Clinton’s just-concluded 11-day trip to Africa has sent the clearest signal yet that she intends to make women’s rights one of her […]
This IRIN report on the lack of enforcement of laws that are on the books serves as a pretty good reminder that the rule of law is contingent upon both the existence of the laws but also the will and the infrastructure to enforce that law. One of the ironies of Apartheid-era South Africa is […]
After nearly twenty recession-free years, South Africa’s economy just experienced its third quarter of negative growth. Still, given that South Africa was late to feel the global economic crunch and that the contractions have been somewhat modest compared to what some might have expected, hopefully South Africa will benefit from recovery soon. The country certainly […]
I have not yet seen District 9 but I am excited to see what by all accounts is a pretty good sci-fi thriller with serious metaphorical Apartheid overtones and real South Africa connections. I would welcome any opinions in the comments and will write a review when I do catch it.
Land reform is a problematic issue in southern Africa’s formerly white-dominated settler colonies. On the one hand, reform is clearly necessary and justified. On the other hand, well, look at Zimbabwe as a case study of how not to handle land redistribution. For years Robert Mugabe used the threat of land reform as a cudgel […]
It has been a tough couple of days for NGO’s in Mauritania and Somalia. In Mauritania the Peace Corps has withdrawn its volunteers after an uptick in violence in the West African nation. In southern Somalia still-unidentified gunmen attacked a World Food Program headquarters at Wajid district in the Bakool region. Al-Shabab Islamists are suspected […]
As should be clear, I am an ardent supporter of America developing a strong Africa policy that will serve all sides but that will allow Africans to set the direction of policies, priorities, and the general approach. And I sure wish America had done something with regard to Darfur several years ago. It seems a […]
At the risk of self indulgence, it appears that many analysts agree with my own assessment of the situation in Mozambique that four competing parties agreeing to form a government is a lot easier than those parties actually forming the government.
The 100-days benchmark for assessing presidential leadership is pretty silly even as it becomes increasingly common. In the United States there is at least a bit of historical salience given Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s “Hundred Days” of frenzied New Deal activity. In May, when I was a fellow at Keele University’s David Bruce Centre for American […]
In her last major stop on her whirlwind Africa tour (all respect, Cape Verde) Hillary Clinton in Liberia weighed in on the controversy surrounding President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and the recommendation of her country’s Truth and Reconciliation that she (and other politicians) not be allowed to hold office after their current terms expire. Clinton put […]
When people think about the humanitarian crises caused by the nightmare that is Somalia, an effectively ungoverned, stateless society beset by violence, chaos, and grave uncertainty, they tend to think of the effects of that violence. But there is a largely unexplored crisis that looms barely beneath the surface in which such instability means that […]
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