ABSTRACT Resilience-thinking has become a dominant adaptation vision in the Anthropocene. The concept has spread through policy governance, spurred by the need to utilise existing systems to understand and develop critical approaches to adapt and ‘bounce back' in the face of climate crises. We analyse how African indigenous peoples are recognised as the epitome of resilience, yet such claims characterise the re-colonisation of indigeneity and do not address the long histories of colonial violence nor the asymmetrical power relations in resilience policy. Framed as the ‘Age of Man', the Anthropocene obfuscates the roles of race, colonialism, capitalism and patriarchal oppression, erasing racialised histories of extractive imperialism. Drawing from decolonial theory, we argue that through ‘Africanising indigeneity’, indigenous African ontologies can legitimise decolonial struggles in the Anthropocene. In essence, by re-imagining decolonial struggles as emancipation, de-Westernisation and recognition of African indigenous knowledge systems, we contend that it becomes possible to (re)conceptualise and decolonise the Anthropocene. We conclude that for indigeneity to become more valuable in resilience governance and knowledge production, it needs to be better approached and reconceptualised within a critical and pluriversalistic/pluralistic frame, stressing its strengths for a decolonisation project – as a set of contemporaneous struggles and a source of alternative futures.

ABSTRACT The enslaved Black female body was a significant site of sexual exploitation during the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade and fated to a long passage of sexual assault. Slavery was rife with various sexual aggressions like rape on the enslaved Black woman by both Black and white heterosexual men. In addition, to facilitate their sexual perversions, the white slave masters ‘whiten’ the Black identities of the female slaves by revoking the slaves’ African names and imposing on them white Euro-American names. This ‘whitened’ identity becomes a fetish for the slave masters as they fixate on the misrepresented Black female bodies to satisfy their sexual fantasies. Though scholarship has grappled with the issue of sexual violation in the slavery arena, (Foster 2019; Jennings 1990, Oduwobi 2017), the subject has not received the fullest attention. For instance, there exist significant gaps on the question of the psychosexual motivations which drive the white slave masters to ‘whiten’ and fixate on their Black female slaves. Situating the present paper in the period of proto-colonialism, the long period of European and African commercial interrelations when slavery thrived, this study adopts Frantz Fanon’s psychoanalytical framework on colonial sexuality as well as Freudian libido theory to discuss the interplay of sexuality and identity between the Black slave raider and the slave master with the enslaved Black woman, as well as the relationship between the white slave master and the Black enslaved woman. The study focuses on two Ghanaian neo-slave narratives: Joseph Baiden’s Seeds of Slavery (2018) and Manu Herbstein’s Ama (2002) and concludes amongst others that the quest to ‘whiten’ the enslaved Black woman is borne out of the slave master's irrepressible obsession with the Black female body.

ABSTRACT This study examined the British conquest of the Benin and Owa kingdoms, as depicted in Ola Rotimi’s Ovonramwen Nogbaisi and Sam Ukala’s Iredi War, with a view to teasing out both the vanquished and the victor’s perspectives. These books have been critically analysed, generating volumes of literature. However, this study focuses on the roles both Africans and British played during the invasions of both kingdoms. Historical and literary research methods were used to gather data from secondary sources. The study reveals that Britain’s disregard for African institutions of authority and the brutality inexperienced and overzealous officers displayed pushed Africans to confront them. This was contrary to the numerous victor’s reports detailing how African kings were dethroned and describing their kingdoms as hostile and barbaric in their traditional ceremonies. We also found that the British built their success not only with their power but also relied on internal and external African involvement and collaboration. These dramaturgical adaptations, like the victor’s reports, contain details on the vanquished the victor did not tell, and are therefore recommended for further study.

ABSTRACT Urbanising Africa has produced congestion, deprivation and vulnerabilities that expand informal livelihoods and cause informal transportation to thrive. Existing multi-dimensional urban livelihood discourses are yet to adequately incorporate the insecurity perspective that women encounter. Studying urban livelihood insecurity from a gender viewpoint by examining why and how women migrate to male-dominated tricycle transport services in Ibadan metropolis, the inherent challenges and the extent of the livelihood’s sustainability, the article made use of qualitative ethnographic research methods adopting sustainable livelihood theory. Information was gathered from interviews, observations and secondary sources and content analysed. Owing to livelihood trends, the need for financial relief of domestic burden and socioeconomic coping strategies, women venture into the tricycle livelihood and can register their space by employing livelihood assets to address the associated livelihood risks and stress. Findings also reveal the gendered livelihood insecurity of time poverty and discrimination that women riders encounter. Though the aspect of sustainability is a crucial element of livelihood security, women riders’ perspectives vary on the sustainability of tricycle livelihood. Some women riders view tricycle livelihood as high-risk, some perceive it as a symbol of women’s emancipation and liberation from occupational stereotypes, and others assert that tricycle livelihood is sustainable because its benefits supersede the risk. This contention is therefore an indication that enhancing gender mainstreaming in male-dominated occupations is a work-in-progress, requiring gender-sensitive transformation and governmental intervention.

ABSTRACT In the early twentieth century, scholars studied the Nuer social organisation and described it as a system of interconnected patrilineal lineages, clans, tribal segments, and tribes. They viewed the Nuer society as lacking centralised political institutions and complex social structures. However, this observation was based on the Nuer of the nineteenth century, who had weak ties to their common origin and history, allowing for intermixing with neighbouring peoples, mainly Dinka and Anuak. Over the twentieth century, factors such as globalisation, colonialism, and civil wars caused the Nuer society to undergo significant changes. They transitioned from a genealogically segmented pastoralist society to an ethnic group. However, this ethnic identity is currently facing challenges and fragmentation due to displacement and increased mobility. This paper examines how the Nuer have defined boundaries between themselves and others throughout history, depending on the cultural and structural contexts that shape their identity, through an in-depth analysis of literature, oral history, historical research, and interviews.

ABSTRACT In 2007, the Constitutional Court ordered that the South African government must enforce the principle of sustainable development in awarding environmental authorisation for developmental projects. This legal mandate, rooted in the Constitution, has been a powerful tool for environmentalists in their fight for sustainable development. Armed with appropriate legal apparatus, environmentalists continue to lodge protests against development initiatives. This article examines how environmentalists have shaped the discourse around the meanings of consultation and development since then. With more control and ligating leverage, they vehemently oppose undertakings that have potentially adverse impacts on the environment, the people and their heritage. Environmentalists have successfully persuaded courts to value the importance of sustainable development, climate crisis, customary rights and intangible cultural heritage, as well as consultation and public participation, making it difficult for the state and industry to implement any projects. While environmentalists have complicated state implementation of development projects, they have entrenched the protection of land rights and participatory democracy. The findings help us imagine the proper implementation of future development projects. The article underscores the importance of South Africa’s Constitution in ensuring the functioning of democracy, particularly in how it empowers communities to protect their land.

ABSTRACT Relying on accounts of some members of the Rastafari community, this paper advances a conversation on the Rastafari appreciation of and response to the Coronavirus pandemic in Ghana. Significant to the discussion is the question of how Rastafari social and political orientation, as well as their religious beliefs and spiritual imaginations both aided and frustrated the management of the Coronavirus pandemic in Ghana. We aver that framed as socially excluded members of society, the Rastafari community deploys a variety of resources to manage certain hard-to-believe events in life, including the Coronavirus pandemic. The paper provides an analytically stimulating account of the interrelationship between social exclusion, health and meaning-making.

ABSTRACT The article explores the challenges of protected area co-management within the context of land restitution. Co-management has been used to resolve land claims in protected areas, as well as to reconcile conservation objectives and land rights. It also focuses on the re-emergence of traditional authorities, engaging with debates around the role of chiefs in a democratic South Africa. Some scholars argued that chiefs are still relevant and can play a role in a democratic dispensation. Others challenged the relevance of chiefs in a democratic era given their hereditary nature. Dwesa-Cwebe Nature Reserve serves as case study. Chiefs were denied any special designation beyond being citizens in a protected area management arrangement, where newly elected institutions were set up to collaborate with the state. They regained authority and relevance around such management within a decade of the 2001 restitution agreement. The study uses qualitative data collection and ethnography. It contends that co-management failures resulted in increased poverty and community unrest, culminating in the reassertion of chiefs’ authority, followed by the re-alignment of state conservation with traditional leadership. It shows that chiefs, despite not democratically elected, may still represent the interests of their subjects, advocate for local rights, and stand against marginalisation of local voices. It concludes by highlighting the nuanced and evolving role of chiefs in balancing community interests with conservation imperatives on ancestral land.

ABSTRACT The article attempts a philosophical exposition of the Oromo’s indigenous notion of Namummaa for the sake of conflict resolution/peacebuilding and common good in Ethiopia. As a relational philosophy, Namummaa explains the ontological conception of peace the Oromo people hold; it is embedded in their religious and communal sense of relationality and belonging. The study emphasizes whether this ontological ideal promotes nonviolence, renunciation of self-aggrandizement at the expense of the cosmos, community, or others, and bolsters mutual coexistence—all of which are essential for building peace and resolution of conflicts in contemporary Ethiopia. Thus, apart from the normative-philosophical theorisation of Namummaa, the article attempts to present a balanced and critical assessment of Oromo indigenous concepts and practices of human relation by making a qualitative reflection on their possible application as a conflict resolution and peacebuilding mechanism not only for the intra-Oromo but also for the inter-cultural relationships in Ethiopia today. After a thorough and systematic reading of available written and oral sources garnered from primary and secondary data, the study concludes that Namummaa, according to the Oromo perspective, is complex, connected to the strong quality of human beings and meaningful in terms of building intercultural dialogue for peacebuilding in Ethiopia.

Transitional justice ideas, processes, and institutions offer post-conflict and tormented societies the glimmer of hope of a more stable future erected upon values of the rule of law, accountability, justice, post-conflict reconstruction, and development. Societies wracked by violence see transitional justice as offering the tools to midwife a democratic, rule-of-law state. Broadly speaking, transitional justice can be said to be concerned with how societies address legacies of past human rights abuses, mass atrocity, or other forms of severe social trauma, including genocide or civil war, in order to build a more democratic, just, and peaceful future. Epistemically, the field of transitional justice is variegated, comprising theoretical debates, the comparative assessment of domestic accountability schemes, international criminal justice, the study of truth commissions, and ethical-legal debates concerning the morality of compromise on accountability for gross and systemic violations of human rights. Several subthemes to the discipline suggest the absence of complete coherence in its characterization and praxis. The focus of this article on transitional justice in Africa domesticates the exploration of the subject matter in the African experience. Transitional justice in the African context takes on a special character and orientation. While the core objective of transitional justice praxis in Africa remains similar to transitional justice orthodoxy in the international context—namely, the fight against impunity and the push for accountability and post-conflict reconstruction and development—the emerging consensus points to the effective realization of socioeconomic justice, gender justice, and the right to development as equally critical, if not central, to the redress of past injustices. Instrumental to the successful delivery of this broadened set of objectives is a combination of traditional and nontraditional frameworks embedded in a wide range of laws, policies, institutions, and community norms and customs. In combination, they present the rough contours of an African model and mechanism for not only dealing with the legacies of conflicts and violations of human rights, but also addressing governance deficits and developmental challenges in line with the African Union’s Agenda 2063. This article is structured around a number of themes aimed at deepening appreciation of the field of transitional justice in Africa, namely: Transitional Justice Laws, Policies, and Norms; Transitional Justice Accountability Systems; criminal accountability in Africa’s transitional justice praxis; Human Rights, Democracy, and Governance; Decolonization and Postcoloniality; Conflict and Transitional Justice; Transitional Justice Goals and Outcomes; Reimagining the Field of Transitional Justice; and journals publishing on transitional justice.