Jan Kees van Donge

Jan Kees van Donge passed away on 12 May 2024.

Jan Kees van Donge taught for a total of twenty years at three African universities, His first appointment in Africa was at the University of Zambia (1971-78). From 1982-1989 he worked at the University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania and in the period 1992-1997 he taught at Chancellor College, University of Malawi, Zomba. In the Netherlands he started as a teaching assistant at the Free University Amsterdam where he obtained his first degrees in political science. After returning from Tanzania he was appointed at Wageningen University -then named Wageningen Agricultural University. Since 1997 he taught, with an interruption of three years as an independent consultant, at the Institute of Social Studies in The Hague. In the last period, he taught as well regularly at the University of Namibia. Although he was mostly appointed to teach public administration type subjects, he also frequently conducted courses on comparative politics or on the political economy of agriculture. He gained his Ph.D. in 1993 at Wageningen University on a sociological analysis of economic life in the Uluguru Mountains Tanzania. However, he did not only publish on subjects of rural sociology, but also on African politics and public management type subjects.
Jan Kees van Donge worked as Regional Coordinator Africa and Country Coordinator Tanzania for the Tracking Development project and as professor of political science at the University of Papua New Guinea.