West Africa

This issue of Africa Spectrum explores Africa's role in international politics. Among other topics, it examines Tanzania's peace and security policy, the West African Health Organisation, and Africa’s position in climate negotiations.

The current issue of the Africa Spectrum contains analyses on topics such as participatory media cultures in Kenya and the impact of COVID-19 measures on marketplaces in Ghana as well as a call to rethink African studies in general.

In cooperation with the RWI - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research and commissioned by the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, our team is evaluating selected programs of the Special Initiative “Decent Work for a Just Transition“ in Ghana and Côte d'Ivoire. The aim is to identify causal effects of an intervention on the beneficiaries. Learn more about the results of the rigorous impact evaluation here.

GIGA researchers Theodora Benesch and Julia Köbrich supervised a training programme for younger people in Togo that promotes interreligious dialogue. An accompanying research project investigates the effect of the programme on social cohesion. More on that in this news item. 

GIGA Senior Research Fellow Dr. Julia Grauvogel was part of a delegation that travelled to Ghana from 2 to 8 October 2024. The trip was organised by Hamburg’s Ministry for Science, Research, Equality and Municipalities under the leadership of Katharina Fegebank, the ministry’s head and Second Mayor of Hamburg. The delegation’s intensive talks opened promising avenues of future research cooperation. 

Opposition politician Bassirou Diomaye Faye has won the presidential election in Senegal with an absolute majority. In this interview, GIGA researcher Martin Acheampong explains what the new head of state stands for, the condition the country is in ahead of Faye’s turn at the helm, and what the election result means for West Africa.

This latest issue of Africa Spectrum covers topics such as West African Pidgin English, the influence of Chinese consumer goods on the beauty ideal in Côte d’Ivoire, the use of TikTok by political actors prior to Zimbabwe’s recent elections, struggles over access to resources in Tanzania, and more.

Drawing upon ethnographic and historical research to study settings in East, West, and Southern Africa, the articles in this special issue review the social changes that have taken place regarding men's roles and assess prospects for the emergence of counter-hegemonic masculinities.

The current issue of Africa Spectrum analyses four concepts of African futures, constitutional amendments in Africa, the quantification of child labour by Ghana’s mass media, heterogeneity among Ugandan youth agripreneurs, and more.

This issue of Africa Spectrum explores Africa's role in international politics. Among other topics, it examines Tanzania's peace and security policy, the West African Health Organisation, and Africa’s position in climate negotiations.

The current issue of the Africa Spectrum contains analyses on topics such as participatory media cultures in Kenya and the impact of COVID-19 measures on marketplaces in Ghana as well as a call to rethink African studies in general.

In cooperation with the RWI - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research and commissioned by the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, our team is evaluating selected programs of the Special Initiative “Decent Work for a Just Transition“ in Ghana and Côte d'Ivoire. The aim is to identify causal effects of an intervention on the beneficiaries. Learn more about the results of the rigorous impact evaluation here.