On Wednesday 27 October 2021, GGA convened a live webinar, hosted by the Mail & Guardian, bringing together a range of climate change experts. The objective of the discussion was to identify what should be at the top of Africa’s agenda as the African Group of...
Tragic events have recently befallen South Africa - scenes that most of us would like to forget but cannot unsee. Like the riots that broke out in the UK 10 years ago, or the storming of the US Capitol in support of Trump, the orchestrated looting and violence of July...
Governance Performance Index – South Africa 2021 It is abundantly clear that local municipalities in South Africa are, on average, not delivering on their constitutional mandate. Many are on the brink of collapse, undermining the promise of a better life for all. The...
South Africa’s Constitutional Court decision to sentence former president Jacob Zuma to 15 months in prison for contempt of court is momentous. Amid the incompetence, chaos and corruption that dominates media headlines, the move is a sorely needed light in the...
South African politics is certainly more intriguing than fiction. Behind the drama, though, is the reality that twenty-seven years into our fragile democracy we are at a critical juncture. Critical junctures are major events that disrupt existing political and...
For many African countries, Covid-19 has provided a useful cover for leaders to advance authoritarian ends, consolidate their autocracies and undermine whatever rule of law existed before. This seems especially true for ruling coalitions in countries with access to mineral or hydrocarbon wealth.
Published within the Extremisms in Africa anthology series, this chapter by Blessed Mangena and Dr Mokete Pherudi provides an overview of the origins of Ansar al-Sunnah in Cabo Delgado, including methods of recruitment the group uses and prospects for containment....
Published within the Extremisms in Africa anthology series, this chapter by Leigh Hamilton and Rami Sayed focuses on the spread of Islamist ideology to Mozambique, in particular its northern-most province of Cabo Delgado, detailing the erosion of civilian...
In weakly institutionalised contexts, natural resource wealth tends to be a curse instead of a blessing. Where citizens are relatively powerless to hold ruling elites to account, resource wealth undermines development prospects.
Scholar Richard Auty first coined the phrase ‘resource curse’ in 1993 to illustrate the confounding nature of the relationship between natural resource abundance and under-development. Intuitively we expect that natural resources would provide the bedrock for development. To the contrary, empirical evidence suggests a strong correlation between natural resource wealth and poor development outcomes, at least since the early 1970s.
On Wednesday 27 October 2021, GGA convened a live webinar, hosted by the Mail & Guardian, bringing together a range of climate change experts. The objective of the discussion was to identify what should be at the top of Africa’s agenda as the African Group of...
Tragic events have recently befallen South Africa - scenes that most of us would like to forget but cannot unsee. Like the riots that broke out in the UK 10 years ago, or the storming of the US Capitol in support of Trump, the orchestrated looting and violence of July...
Governance Performance Index – South Africa 2021 It is abundantly clear that local municipalities in South Africa are, on average, not delivering on their constitutional mandate. Many are on the brink of collapse, undermining the promise of a better life for all. The...
South Africa’s Constitutional Court decision to sentence former president Jacob Zuma to 15 months in prison for contempt of court is momentous. Amid the incompetence, chaos and corruption that dominates media headlines, the move is a sorely needed light in the...
South African politics is certainly more intriguing than fiction. Behind the drama, though, is the reality that twenty-seven years into our fragile democracy we are at a critical juncture. Critical junctures are major events that disrupt existing political and...
For many African countries, Covid-19 has provided a useful cover for leaders to advance authoritarian ends, consolidate their autocracies and undermine whatever rule of law existed before. This seems especially true for ruling coalitions in countries with access to mineral or hydrocarbon wealth.
Published within the Extremisms in Africa anthology series, this chapter by Blessed Mangena and Dr Mokete Pherudi provides an overview of the origins of Ansar al-Sunnah in Cabo Delgado, including methods of recruitment the group uses and prospects for containment....
Published within the Extremisms in Africa anthology series, this chapter by Leigh Hamilton and Rami Sayed focuses on the spread of Islamist ideology to Mozambique, in particular its northern-most province of Cabo Delgado, detailing the erosion of civilian...
In weakly institutionalised contexts, natural resource wealth tends to be a curse instead of a blessing. Where citizens are relatively powerless to hold ruling elites to account, resource wealth undermines development prospects.
Scholar Richard Auty first coined the phrase ‘resource curse’ in 1993 to illustrate the confounding nature of the relationship between natural resource abundance and under-development. Intuitively we expect that natural resources would provide the bedrock for development. To the contrary, empirical evidence suggests a strong correlation between natural resource wealth and poor development outcomes, at least since the early 1970s.