News & Events

In contrast to historians who argue that colonial Northern Rhodesia (current Zambia) nearly collapsed during the course of the First World War, Prof. Jan-Bart Gewald in his latest book argues that it was precisely on account of the war that the British South Africa Company was able to establish effective colonial administration. Gewald will talk about his findings during the ASCL seminar on 28 January. All welcome, please register!

Merel van 't Wout, winner Africa Thesis Award 2015, will take a closer look at efforts to promote entrepreneurship as a development strategy during this Africa Today seminar on 14 January. Based on the stories of seamstresses in Bolgatanga (Ghana) she argues that there is a huge discrepancy between the theoretical arguments underlying efforts to advance entrepreneurship among the poor, and the everyday realities that people portrayed as “entrepreneurs” are facing on a daily basis.

This new working paper by Marion Eeckhout focuses on the financial means of implementation generated since the Monterrey Conference for attaining the Millennium Development Goals in Sub-Saharan African countries. It explores whether the Monterrey Consensus in 2002 constituted an inclusive action agenda, thus creating an equal chance for all developing countries to benefit from the additional financial resources mobilized. 

The ASC is saddened by the news that Professor Sam Moyo, former President of the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA) passed away on 22 November. Professor Moyo had a car accident in New Delhi, India, where he was attending a conference on labour questions in the Global South. ASC director Ton Dietz worked closely with Professor Moyo in the 1990s and wrote a tribute to commemorate him. 

On the occasion of the retirement of ASC researcher Wijnand Klaver, the ASCL is organizing the seminar 'Nutrition in Sustainable Development – Africa on its way from undernutrition to obesity?' on 15 December. Invited speakers are Thom Achterbosch (Wageningen University) on 'Pathways towards sustainable food systems for healthier African diets', and Patrick Kolsteren (Ghent University) on 'Sustainabe nutrition research for Africa in the years to come'. Plus: read the interview we did with Wijand! 

Since March 2013 the Central African Republic (CAR) has been the stage of violence. Accounts of genocide, interreligious conflict and cannibalism have coloured what has been called the ‘most forgotten conflict on earth’. Elections are due 27 December 2015. Will elections help the country out of the impasse? What are the roots of the violence? And how do citizens navigate through insecurity? Two guests from CAR, cartoonist Didier Kassaï and journalist Pacôme Pabandji, will participate in the debate, that is to be followed by the launch of kassaï's comic book ‘Tempête sur Bangui’.

With the prolific expansion of cities and the growth of a more affluent middle class, alcohol consumption patterns are changing across Africa. This is, for example, reflected in the increased consumption of wine in oil-producing states such as Angola. Find book titles, articles and electronic documents in our latest web dossier 'Alcohol in Africa', with an introduction by Paul Nugent, Centre of African Studies, Edinburgh.

A new ASC working paper reviews Dutch development policies for the years 1949-2015, with particular attention for private sector development (PSD). Since the beginning, Dutch government has strongly supported policies stimulating private sector and economic development in the Netherlands and in developing countries. PSD took a central role as it was assumed that poverty could only be alleviated when a country’s economy is stimulated. The long history of Dutch development cooperation shows continuity in its approach towards development policy as a way of promoting Dutch businesses and export in developing countries.

The last two articles that our late colleague Stephen Ellis (1953-2015) completed, have been published. His final article, 'Nelson Mandela, the South African Communist Party and the Origins of Umkhonto we Sizwe', concerns Mandela’s relationship to the South African Communist Party (SACP) in the early 1960s, when the guerrilla army Umkhonto we Sizwe was created. It demonstrates that Umkhonto was essentially a creation of the SACP, as newly available archives reveal. The other article, co-authored by Mark Shaw (University of Cape Town) is entitled 'Does organized crime exist in Africa?'.

In his new book Forged in the Great War: People, Transport, and Labour, the Establishment of Colonial Rule in Zambia, 1890-1920, Jan-Bart Gewald, Professor of Southern African History at Leiden University and senior researcher at the ASC, writes about the establishment of colonial rule in Northern Rhodesia (currently Zambia). In contrast to historians who argue that the colonial state nearly collapsed during World War One, Gewald argues that the establishment of effective colonial rule in Northern Rhodesia only came about on account of the unique conditions that developed in WWI. Read the interview we did with him!