Achille Mbembe (the links are to previous references of Mbembe on this blog) gave a lecture at the Birkbeck School of Law in March of this year. You can download an audio recording of the talk entitled ‘Law, Democracy and the Ethics of Mutuality: Notes on the South African Experiment’ here.
What can the complete civil disobedience of the Sudanese Professionals Association teach us at a moment when belief in the efficacy of nonviolent protest is in decline?
In his debut novel, Thaer Husien remixes genre and takes readers on a psychedelic ride through a dystopian yet disturbingly familiar future Palestine.
When rising against ruling-class corruption, Nigerians must reject the hero culture that has historically undermined genuine activism.
The countless African artifacts that continue to be held in Western institutions after being obtained illegally send a violent message that makes efforts toward reconciliation inconsequential.
At Africa Energy Week, the language of resource sovereignty disguised a new form of climate denial that appropriates progressive rhetoric in service of fossil fuel companies.
Despite South Africa’s ban on arms exports to Israel and its condemnation of Israel’s actions in Palestine, local arms companies continue to send weapons to Israel’s allies and its major arms suppliers.
Join us on November 21st as we discuss the politics underlying the popular uprising in Mozambique with António Bai, Anne Pitcher, and José Jaime Macuane.
Since June’s anti-finance bill protests, dozens of people remain unaccounted for—a stark reminder of the Kenyan state’s long history of abductions and assassinations.
Reflections on Trump’s 2024 US presidential victory.
A decade ago, the kind of protest movement gripping Mozambique over the last few weeks would have been difficult to fathom.
Há dez anos, seria difícil imaginar esse tipo de movimento que vem ocorrendo nas últimas semanas em Moçambique.
On the deplatforming of ‘African Stream.’
A personal reflection on what it’s like to fight anti-homosexuality laws as one of the few openly LGBTIQ+ rights activists in Uganda.
This week, Kamel Daoud became the first Algerian to receive France’s most prestigious literary honor. Yet, in Algeria, no one seems to care.
African postcolonial cinema serves as a mirror, revealing the limits of escape—whether through migration or personal defiance—and exposing the tensions between dreams and reality.
Mati Diop’s ‘Dahomey’ isn’t solely concerned with the subject of repatriating Beninese artifacts, but with returning the debate to the Beninese themselves.
In Cuba, new forms of marginalization and racism have surfaced, but the dream of a good society based on the core principles of “buen vivir” for its people has not died.
The world is slowly opening its eyes to how Paul Kagame’s regime abuses human rights, suppresses dissent, and exploits neighboring countries.
After a historic election and on the eve of celebrating fifty years of independence, Mozambicans need to ask whether the values, symbols, and institutions created to give shape to “national unity” are still legitimate today.
Depois de uma eleição histórica e em vésperas de celebrar os 50 anos de independência, os moçambicanos precisam de perguntar se os valores, símbolos e instituições criados para dar forma à “unidade nacional” ainda são legítimos hoje.