The article takes stock of the eclectic Africa’s International Relations (AIR) scholarship with a view to setting a new research agenda for this vibrant subfield of International Relations (IR). It argues that the AIR community has taken a defensive approach to knowledge production and dissemination. It calls on AIR scholars to shift the emphasis from reactionary scholarship to an offensive knowledge production and dissemination by building research around five key themes. The article shows that a research agenda in the five areas can give epistemic freedom to AIR scholars, contribute to freeing IR from Euro-American metanarratives, and ultimately put AIR scholars in a position to develop analytical frameworks capable of capturing nuances and complexities of international life in Africa.
BT - African Affairs DO - 10.1093/afraf/adac022 IS - 484 LA - eng N2 -The article takes stock of the eclectic Africa’s International Relations (AIR) scholarship with a view to setting a new research agenda for this vibrant subfield of International Relations (IR). It argues that the AIR community has taken a defensive approach to knowledge production and dissemination. It calls on AIR scholars to shift the emphasis from reactionary scholarship to an offensive knowledge production and dissemination by building research around five key themes. The article shows that a research agenda in the five areas can give epistemic freedom to AIR scholars, contribute to freeing IR from Euro-American metanarratives, and ultimately put AIR scholars in a position to develop analytical frameworks capable of capturing nuances and complexities of international life in Africa.
PB - Oxford University Press (OUP) PY - 2022 SP - 487 EP - 499 T2 - African Affairs TI - A new research agenda for Africa’s international relations VL - 121 SN - 0001-9909, 1468-2621 ER -