Number of results to display per page
Search Results
82. Linking People, Crossing Borders: A Conversation with Mo Ibrahim
- Publication Date:
- 03-2013
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- World Policy Journal
- Institution:
- World Policy Institute
- Abstract:
- Born in northern Sudan at the end of World War II, educated in England with a Ph.D. in engineering and mobile communications, Mo Ibrahim returned to Africa in 1998, bringing cellular technology with him. At the time of his arrival, there were barely three million landline telephones on the entire continent—the bulk of them in North Africa and the nation of South Africa. Most of sub-Saharan Africa was all but inaccessible to terrestrial telephone lines. The Democratic Republic of Congo had only 3,000 phones to serve its population of about 55 million. Seeing demand for mobile phones and with little competition from landlines, Mo Ibrahim created Celtel, beginning in Kenya, branching quickly into Uganda and Tanzania. The company allowed millions of mobile subscribers to roam freely across borders, recharging with local cards as they went. Quickly, Celtel expanded across Gabon, the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Republic of Congo, Malawi, Zambia, and finally his native Sudan—a vast pan-African territory almost devoid of telecommunications boundaries. By the time he sold Celtel five years ago, he had linked 24 million people—a number that was growing exponentially.
- Political Geography:
- Kenya, Africa, Sudan, South Africa, North Africa, and England
83. Decaf empowerment? Post-Washington Consensus development policy, fair trade and Kenya's coffee industry
- Author:
- Zoë Pflaeger
- Publication Date:
- 07-2013
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Journal of International Relations and Development
- Institution:
- Central and East European International Studies Association
- Abstract:
- There has been much debate surrounding the shift in development policy towards the Post-Washington Consensus and its associated Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers. This article seeks to engage critically with and further this literature by considering the concept of empowerment and its role within this consensus through an examination of development policy aimed at farmer empowerment in Kenya. This is investigated with a focus upon coffee producers in the context of Kenya's coffee reforms and the restructuring of the global coffee industry. While acknowledging the limitations of the dominant approach, exacerbated in the African context due to a problematic interpretation of the African state, it is argued that analyses of empowerment should also consider the opportunities for its re-politicisation. Drawing upon Gramscian thought, this article suggests that fair trade initiatives have the potential to offer an alternative approach to farmer empowerment more capable of challenging the concentration of power among roasters and buyers that has taken place within the coffee industry.
- Topic:
- Development
- Political Geography:
- Kenya, Africa, and Washington
84. Rethinking Ivory: Why Trade in Tusks Won't Go Away
- Author:
- John Frederick Walker
- Publication Date:
- 06-2013
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- World Policy Journal
- Institution:
- World Policy Institute
- Abstract:
- TSAVO WEST, Kenya—Two years ago, in what was billed as a defiant message to elephant poachers, Kenya's President Mwai Kibaki arrived by helicopter at a dusty airstrip in Tsavo West National Park to set fire to five tons of seized contraband ivory.
- Political Geography:
- Kenya and Africa
85. Libya and the Responsibility to Protect
- Author:
- Simon Adams
- Publication Date:
- 10-2012
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect
- Abstract:
- For those concerned with the international community's Responsibility to Protect (R2P), the implementation of United Nations (UN) Security Council Resolution 1973, which authorized a military intervention in Libya, has caused much controversy and dissension. From the start of Muammar al-Qaddafi's violent crackdown against protesters in February 2011, R2P informed the Security Council's response. Adopted at the UN World Summit in 2005 and intended as an antidote to the inaction that had plagued the UN during the genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda and Srebrenica, R2P represents a solemn commitment by the international community to never again be passive spectators to genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing or crimes against humanity. While R2P played some role in preventing an escalation of deadly ethnic conflict in Kenya during 2007, it had never been utilized to mobilize the Security Council to take coercive action against a UN member state before.
- Topic:
- Civil War, Human Rights, Human Welfare, Regime Change, and Insurgency
- Political Geography:
- Kenya, Arabia, Cambodia, United Nations, North Africa, and Rwanda
86. Renewables in the Energy Transition: Evidence on Solar Home Systems and Lighting-Fuel Choice in Kenya
- Author:
- Jann Lay, Janosch Ondraczek, and Jana Stoever
- Publication Date:
- 07-2012
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- German Institute of Global and Area Studies
- Abstract:
- We study the determinants of households' choices of lighting fuels in Kenya, including the option of using solar home systems (SHSs). The paper adds new evidence on the factors that influence the introduction and adoption of decentralized and less carbonâ€intensive energy sources in developing countries. We capitalize on a unique representative survey on energy use and sources from Kenya, one of the few relatively wellâ€established SHSs markets in the world. Our results reveal some very interesting patterns in the fuel transition in the context of lightingâ€fuel choices. While we find clear evidence for a crosssectional energy ladder, the income threshold for modern fuel use – including solar energy use – is very high. Income and education turn out to be key determinants of SHSs adoption, but we also find a very pronounced effect of SHSs clustering. In addition, we do not find a negative correlation between grid access and SHSs use.
- Topic:
- Development, Education, and Energy Policy
- Political Geography:
- Kenya and Africa
87. Food Crisis in the Horn of Africa: Progress Report, July 2011 - July 2012
- Author:
- Sophie Mack Smith
- Publication Date:
- 07-2012
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Oxfam Publishing
- Abstract:
- The 2011 drought across the Horn of Africa was, in some places, the worst to hit the region for 60 years. It was first predicted about a year beforehand, when sophisticated regional early warning systems began to alert the world to the possibility of drier-than-normal conditions in key pastoral areas of Ethiopia, Somalia and Northern Kenya, linked to the effects of the climatic phenomenon La Niña.
- Topic:
- Security, Development, Humanitarian Aid, Food, and Famine
- Political Geography:
- Kenya, Africa, Ethiopia, and Somalia
88. And Africa Will Shine Forth: A Statesman's Memoir
- Author:
- Jean Ping
- Publication Date:
- 08-2012
- Content Type:
- Book
- Institution:
- International Peace Institute
- Abstract:
- Everyone knows that Africa, cradle of humanity, land of the Pharaohs and human civilization, and vast reservoir of human and natural resources, is not doing well. She crosses the deepest crisis that has shaken her since the end of colonial times. The specter of chaos lurks everywhere. She is now seen as the continent of “collapsing states” and “zombie nations”; the continent of extreme poverty, misery, and injustice; the continent of horrors, of the Rwandan genocide and of the worst atrocities committed in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Kenya, Darfur and elsewhere. This brutal reality has been, for quite some time now, analyzed by most observers and experts with certain fatalism, as testified by these book titles with pessimistic or even alarmist tones: “Black Africa Started on the Wrong Foot” (René Dumont), “Can Black Africa Take Off?” (Albert Meister); “And What If Africa Refused Development” (Axelle Kabou); “Africa Down” (Jacques Giri). By now, it is just a chorus of permanent lamentations about the “lost continent,” the “damned continent,” or the “cursed continent” whose past is not passing. And the rest of the world, which sees us as negligible, even contemptible (“all corrupt and all dictators,” they say), consider that henceforth, they no longer need us.
- Topic:
- Conflict Resolution, Security, Economics, Post Colonialism, Natural Resources, Fragile/Failed State, and Neoimperialism
- Political Geography:
- Kenya, Africa, Darfur, Liberia, and Sierra Leone
89. Kenyan Somali Islamist Radicalisation
- Publication Date:
- 01-2012
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- International Crisis Group
- Abstract:
- Somalia's growing Islamist radicalism is spilling over into Kenya. The militant Al-Shabaab movement has built a cross-border presence and a clandestine support network among Muslim populations in the north east and Nairobi and on the coast, and is trying to radicalise and recruit youth from these communities, often capitalising on long-standing grievances against the central state. This problem could grow more severe with the October 2011 decision by the Kenyan government to intervene directly in Somalia. Radicalisation is a grave threat to Kenya's security and stability. Formulating and executing sound counter-radicalisation and de-radicalisation policies before it is too late must be a priority. It would be a profound mistake, however, to view the challenge solely through a counter-terrorism lens.
- Topic:
- Conflict Prevention, Security, Islam, Armed Struggle, and Insurgency
- Political Geography:
- Kenya and Africa
90. Kenya: Impact of the ICC Proceedings
- Publication Date:
- 01-2012
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- International Crisis Group
- Abstract:
- Although the mayhem following the disputed December 2007 elections seemed an exception, violence has been a common feature of Kenya's politics since the introduction of a multiparty system in 1991. Yet, the number of people killed and displaced following that disputed vote was unprecedented. To provide justice to the victims, combat pervasive political impunity and deter future violence, the International Criminal Court (ICC) brought two cases against six suspects who allegedly bore the greatest responsibility for the post-election violence. These cases have enormous political consequences for both the 2012 elections and the country's stability. During the course of the year, rulings and procedures will inevitably either lower or increase communal tensions. If the ICC process is to contribute to the deterrence of future political violence in Kenya, the court and its friends must explain its work and limitations better to the public. Furthermore, Kenya's government must complement that ICC process with a national process aimed at countering impunity and punishing ethnic hate speech and violence.
- Topic:
- Political Violence, Democratization, Government, and International Law
- Political Geography:
- Kenya and Africa