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Human Rights in Africa

Human Rights in Africa

Bonny Ibhawoh’s (2018) “Human Rights in Africa” is a long overdue contribution to the human rights discourse. This is not only a critical assessment of the dominant narrative about the origins of human rights as known today, but also a call for revival of knowing histories that are not well known, prioritized or taught. The […]

Tags: #Africa #History #Human Rights #Vernacularization #Vernacularizing

Thought Provokers
Evaluation Landscape in Africa

Evaluation Landscape in Africa

Thousands of evaluations have been conducted across Africa, producing large amounts of knowledge. However, these reports are not often captured and shared nor are they easily accessible, nor are always made available to the public. There is no search platform, like Web of Science for academic publications, for evaluations. Some donors have created their own databases, but […]

Tags: #Africa #Capacity #Evaluation #Evaluation Landscape #M&E

Thought Provokers
Who Are You and Why Are You Here?

Who Are You and Why Are You Here?

I have previously noted my interested in the expanded journal version of people recounting their experiences (e.g. this recent book on the Ebola response). The style (and title) of Jacques Claessens “Who are you and why are you here?” (2018), which was originally published in French in 2013 and translated in this version by Nigel […]

Tags: #Books #Burkina Faso #Development Studies #International development #Jacques Claessens

Thought Provokers
Medical Apartheid

Medical Apartheid

Winner of several awards, Harriet A. Washington’s “Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present” (2006) documents a history we tend only to know bits and pieces of. Those familiar with ethics will be aware of the Tuskegee Study, but likely not the bigger story. This is […]

Tags: #Apartheid #Medical Apartheid #Medicine #Public Health #United States

Thought Provokers
Getting to Zero: On the Ebola Frontline

Getting to Zero: On the Ebola Frontline

“It seems very hard to stop this now, but I think we all just have to believe that it is possible.” (Norwegian epidemiologist, p. xvii)   Within development studies literature there is a sub-genre of memoires, biographies and dairies. Some are troubling to read. Not all are well written. Some are extremely informative. Most present […]

Tags: #Development #Ebola #Humanitarian #Learning #Public Health

Thought Provokers
How Democracies Die

How Democracies Die

We tend to assume that democratic processes, norms and structures are ‘sticky’ and rarely ‘die’. The cases we might think about are those that ended due to war and conflict, with the emergence of dictatorship in the form of fascism or military rule. In “How Democracies Die” (2018) Levitsky and Ziblatt provide a clear counter-narrative, […]

Tags: #Democracy #Governance #Norms #Political Science #Politics

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