This book analyses the rapidly increasing role of African states, leaders and other political actors in international politics in the 21st Century. In contrast to the conventional approach of studying how external actors impacted on Africa’s international relations, this book seeks to open up a new approach, focusing on the impact of African political actors on international politics. It does this by analysing African agency – the degree to which African political actors have room to manoeuvre within the international system and exert influence internationally, and the uses they make of that room for manoeuvre. Bringing together leading scholars from Africa and Europe to explore the role and conception of African Agency, this book addresses a wide range of issues, from relations with western and non-western donors, Africa’s role in the UN and World Trade Organisation, negotiations over climate change, trade agreements with the European Union, regional diplomatic strategies, the character and extent of African state agency, and agency within corporate social responsibility initiatives. African Agency in International Politics will be of interest to scholars and students of Africa’s international relations, African politics, development, geography, diplomacy, trade, the environment, political science and security studies.

This book examines the role of the African Union in relation to African agency in international politics. It examines the manner and extent to which the African Union exercises two forms of agency—shirking and slippage—in its strategic and collaborative partnerships. The author focuses on four major AU partnerships with the European Union, NATO, the United Nations and US AFRICOM. The books examines African agency in each partnership by exploring the politics and dynamics of each partnership in different aspects: the multilevel engagement, institutionalization, resource contribution and disbursement, as well as preference linkage. It specifically does that by examining African ownership and leadership in all of these aspects. The book highlights the role of agency slack as a survival strategy to escape from the AU’s subaltern position in international politics. It designates the partnership with the European Union as emblematic of African agency; while the others exhibit different forms of agency slack. Partnerships with NATO and the United Nations exhibit shirking, while that with the US AFRICOM exhibits slippage.

Moving beyond a self-indulgent attitude about Africa’s historical victimhood, the book seeks to capture how African states individually and Africa’s collective institutions (the AU) are providing agency in Africa’s international relations. While African states have been trailblazers in such ideas as ‘The Responsibility to Protect’, as conceived in the African Union Constitutive Act (2001) which preceded the United Nations (UN) Secretary General’s report “In Larger Freedom” (2005) in which the UN adopted the concept, African agency in international relations has not always been captured proactively. This volume seeks to document Africa (and African states) in a state of proactivity as opposed to a reactionary mode of international relations which has long been the case due to the discipline’s heavy concentration on the West. The main themes explored are: African agency in international relations and commerce, agency in Africa’s balancing of big and regional powers, reshaping Africa-EU relations beyond the Cotonou Agreements, Africa and international human rights institutions, African efforts in elections and conflicts in Africa and relationship building among African leaders.

Africa is a continent of 54 countries and over a billion people. However, despite the rich diversity of the African experience, it is striking that continuations and themes seem to be reflected across the continent, particularly south of the Sahara. Questions of underdevelopment, outside exploitation, and misrule are characteristic of many - if not most-states in Sub-Saharan Africa. In this Very Short Introduction Ian Taylor explores how politics is practiced on the African continent, considering the nature of the state in Sub-Saharan Africa and why its state structures are generally weaker than elsewhere in the world. Exploring the historical and contemporary factors which account for Africa's underdevelopment, he also analyses why some African countries suffer from high levels of political violence while others are spared. Unveilling the ways in which African state and society actually function beyond the formal institutional façade, Taylor discusses how external factors - both inherited and contemporary - act upon the continent. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.

China's engagement in Africa is generally portrayed simply as African countries being exploited for their mineral wealth by a wealthy political and economic superpower. Is this always the case? Certain African countries have been able to use China's involvement in the region to grow their economies and solicit renewed interest from previously disengaged foreign powers by using their relationship with China to bolster their political capital. In this thought provoking and original work Lucy Corkin demonstrates how Angola has been amongst the most successful of African nations in this role. The concept of 'African agency' covers a wide range of different countries with very different capabilities and experiences of engaging with China. In each individual county there are a myriad of actors all with increasingly discernible agencies. Uncovering African Agency; Angola's Management of China's Credit Lines casts a fascinating new light on China's involvement with her largest African trading partner and through this shows how different African states and the governmental actors within them are able to exploit the relationship to their best advantage.

This volume offers a comprehensive evaluation of the concept of global order, with a particular emphasis on the role of regional organisations within global governance institutions such as the United Nations. Building from a solid theoretical base it draws upon the expertise of numerous leading international scholars offering a broad array of timely and relevant case studies. These all take into consideration the historical setting, before analysing the contemporary situation and offering suggestions for potential realignments and readjustments that may be witnessed in the future. The volume adopts an interdisciplinary approach when addressing some of the most pressing issues of global governance which our global community must tackle. This presents the readers an opportunity to understand related topics such as political economy, international law, institutions of global governance, in conjunction with the academic field of International Relations (IR). It further helps students and interested readers understand the theoretical and practical foundations to the changing nature of global affairs.

Decolonisation has lost its way. Originally a struggle to escape the West’s direct political and economic control, it has become a catch-all idea, often for performing ‘morality’ or ‘authenticity’; it suffocates African thought and denies African agency. Olúfẹ́mi Táíwò fiercely rejects the indiscriminate application of ‘decolonisation’ to everything from literature, language and philosophy to sociology, psychology and medicine. He argues that the decolonisation industry, obsessed with cataloguing wrongs, is seriously harming scholarship on and in Africa. He finds ‘decolonisation’ of culture intellectually unsound and wholly unrealistic, conflating modernity with coloniality, and groundlessly advocating an open-ended undoing of global society’s foundations. Worst of all, today’s movement attacks its own cause: ‘decolonisers’ themselves are disregarding, infantilising and imposing values on contemporary African thinkers. This powerful, much-needed intervention questions whether today’s ‘decolonisation’ truly serves African empowerment. Táíwò’s is a bold challenge to respect African intellectuals as innovative adaptors, appropriators and synthesisers of ideas they have always seen as universally relevant.