By Nisar Majid, Research associate, London School of Economics and Political Science
The federal government of Somalia was established in 2013 after years of peace and reconciliation talks, held in the context of a famine in 2011 and the rise of militant Islam in the form of al-Shabaab. It was the first permanent central government in Somalia since the start of the civil war in 1991.
Peace agreements and political…
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By Carren Ginsburg, Senior Researcher in Public Health, University of the Witwatersrand
Chantel Pheiffer, Assistant Professor in Urban Public Health, UMass Boston
Mark A. Collinson, Reader in Population and Public Health, MRC/Wits Rural Public Health and Health Transitions Research Unit, School of Public Health, University of the Witwatersrand
Michael White, Professor Emeritus of Sociology, Brown University
Moving between rural homes, towns and cities is a normal part of life for many South Africans. Young adults often move in search of work or education, sometimes settling elsewhere for long periods and sometimes moving repeatedly between rural homes and urban destinations. These patterns of temporary and circular migration are particularly prevalent in South Africa. They have deep roots in the country’s labour system and apartheid…
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By Damilola Peter Olatade, Lecturer, Lagos State University
Sunday Adeniyi Adegeye, known as King Sunny Adé, is 80 this year. He has devoted more than 60 years of his life to influencing Nigeria’s popular music and promoting the unique sounds of jùjú music.
Jùjú is a Nigerian musical tradition that combines intricate rhythms, percussion, guitars, talking drums, call-and-response and Yoruba oral culture. It’s not only entertainment but a vehicle for expressing cultural identity, transmitting proverbs and praise traditions, and social life commentary.
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By Rana Mitter, Professor of U.S.-Asia Relations, Harvard Kennedy School
When Presidents Donald Trump and Xi Jinping last sat down in May 2026, talk was centered on three Ts: trade, technology and Taiwan.
The latest summit, due to begin in the United States on Sept. 24, looks set to focus on the same set of issues again. The main difference will…
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By Kelly Baldwin Heid, PhD Candidate, Ecology, Biodiversity and Nature-based Solutions ICLEI Europe, University of Freiburg
Rita de Sousa e Silva, Assistant Professor, Ecology, Leiden University
When Olivia Besters began caring for the patch of soil beneath the chestnut tree outside her home in Freiburg, Germany, more than 35 years ago, biodiversity was not on her mind.
“It was the optics,” she told me. The ground was compacted and littered with trash and dog “legacies”. Besters simply wanted the space directly outside her front door to look nicer. “Everything else came much later,” she said. “Thirty-five years ago, no one talked about climate change or insect decline.”
Over time, one tree bed expanded into 36 across Besters’ neighbourhood of Herdern. So deep is…
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By Julie Wharton, Senior Lecturer, Institute of Education, University of Winchester
Inclusion has become one of the most prominent concepts in contemporary education policy in England. Its position at the centre of the Department for Education’s ambitions can be seen in recent guidance on the creation of “inclusion bases”, spaces that support pupils with additional needs, in mainstream schools.
It is also present in wider reforms designed to support children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (Send). These include guidance…
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By Tabitha Rowland, PhD in Institute of Irish Studies, University of Liverpool
In case you missed it, Rachel Cusk’s new novel Life of M has been the centre of heated online debate. Dubbed a “biogossip” (biography based on gossip) allegedly inspired by the actress Natalie Portman, the novel investigates fame, power and truth with a particular emphasis on storytelling.
Much of the discussion…
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By Human Rights Watch
A national cybercrime court in Mali on September 14 sentenced a prominent journalist, Abdramane Keïta, to two years in prison on bogus charges, in the military government’s latest attack on media freedom. Click to expand Image Abdramane Keïta, director of the newspaper Le Témoin (The Witness), Bamako, Mali. © Private Security forces arrested Keïta, director of the newspaper Le Témoin (The Witness), on June 9 in Bamako, Mali’s capital, days after he commented on a television program that the Al-Qaeda-linked Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (Jama’at…
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By Candice Stewart
Deep-sea mining may generate sediment plumes, destroy habitats and reduce the biodiversity that cascades through the food chain, placing fisherfolk in the middle of an uncertain ocean economy.
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By Daria Dergacheva
Elections in Russia are a sham. Yet when someone appears genuinely committed to an anti-war agenda, many had seize that hope as a chance to change, including young TikTokers
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