Geography Archives: Africa

Antonia Baumgartner argues that behind the promise of peace, a set of recent U.S.-backed agreements have reshaped how the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s minerals, infrastructure, and political choices are tied to Washington’s strategic priorities. Under these arrangements, unlicensed and prospective mining areas are pooled into a reserve that gives the United States privileged, priority access to future concessions. As security and diplomatic backing for the Congolese government against Rwanda and M23 becomes linked to mineral access and supply-chain politics, questions are raised about sovereignty, long-term peace and stability.

Lars Cornelissen offers an extract from his recent book “Neoliberalism and Race”, which argues that race functions as an organizing principle of neoliberal ideology. Drawing on intellectual history and critical race studies, he traces both explicit and coded racial constructs within neoliberal thought from the interwar period to the present. The book shows that racial themes have consistently shaped neoliberalism, to the extent that its racial motifs cannot be removed without rendering it theoretically and politically incoherent.

As many parts of East Africa enter the traditional first rain season of the year, farmers are expressing uncertainty, especially after the flooding that hit Kenya in April 2024.

The SACP has long announced that it will contest local government elections separately from the ANC.

Western claims are contradicted by empirical evidence.

A plot to kill Burkina Faso’s president, Ibrahim Traoré, and disable a drone base, ahead of a planned foreign military intervention, was thwarted by security forces, while Burkinabes took to the streets sloganeering in support of Traoré.

He’s vowed to press Pretoria to “end” its genocide case against Israel.

A historic turning point in Sahelian sovereignty, as Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger bolstered their regional security through a unified military force and in the same week held its second AES summit.

This radical supplement to the editorial of ROAPE’s Fanon special issue raises awareness of how Fanon’s ideas, in the year of his centenary, continue to provoke fear and anxiety within the Western imperialist political establishment, especially as his work gains renewed prominence among pro-Palestinian activists. It provides Sarah Jilani, one of the contributors to this special issue, with the space to respond to a 2025 policy report published by the British Conservative think tank Policy Exchange, titled After Gaza: Fanon and His Acolytes, which includes a footnote mocking Jilani while insulting Fanon’s legacy.

Marxists advocate a world in which the working class is in the driver’s seat.

“Portraying Nigeria’s security challenges as a targeted campaign against a single religious group is a gross misrepresentation of reality,” said Nigeria’s information minister.

It’s clear that Trump hates Somalis. 

Sudan’s Communists hope that their “comrades in the world Communist movement will answer that call,” Saied said, and “do whatever they can to build an international movement to help win peace in Sudan and open the path for our people to decide our own future, free of interference and war.

After restoring the France-backed regime of Patrice Talon following a coup, foreign troops have remained in Benin, maintaining control over the Presidential residence and several key government buildings.

The UAE’s backing of Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces casts a long shadow over Canada’s push for new markets in the Middle East.

As panic-inducing travel advisories and doomsaying media reports prophesy the fall of Mali to an Al Qaeda affiliate attacking fuel convoys, the government has re-secured supply routes and hosted Mali’s first international defense expo in a supposedly besieged capital.

China’s zero-tariff policy for African countries is also part of its socialist internationalist commitment to strengthening economic ties and promoting industrial investment that supports local production in Africa.

In a symbolic joining of older and contemporary struggles against apartheid, Francesca Albanese delivered the Nelson Mandela lecture this autumn. Did her address manage to bury the fiction of the ‘liberal world order’ once and for all?

TONY BURKE recommends a new podcast about the legendary Nigerian musician and political activist FELA KUTI.

Backed by foreign powers, the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and Rapid Support Forces (RSF) are locked in a bloody war with devastating consequences for the Sudanese people.