'This study contributes significantly to our understanding not only of Somaliland, but of the predicament of the Somali people as a whole… a major scholarly success.’ – Professor Ali Mazrui, Albert Schweitzer Professor in the Humanities, Binghamton University

Author: Iqbal D Jhazbhay

The rights of women are occupying an increasingly important place in the global – and Africa – political discourse. African governments have committed themselves to a growing number of instruments for protecting and promoting the rights of women, yet implementation continues to lag. In May 2005 the Institute for Global Dialogue held a ground-breaking workshop at which analysts and activists from numerous African countries surveyed gender instruments applicable to Africa, identified factors influencing their implementation, and evolved proposals for strengthening them. The proceedings were encapsulated in a volume entitled Gender Instruments in Africa: critical perspectives, future strategies (IGD 2005). It provided a valuable guide to this emerging dimension in African politics, and was well received throughout the continent.

Edited by Michele Ruiters

NOW in its sixth decade, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict remains a major challenge in world politics and the root cause of polarisation in the region and elsewhere. This timeous study brings together scholars, politicians, and activists of varying persuasions who examine the multidimensional aspects of the conflict.

Edited by Aslam Farouk-Alli

'Few subjects are as complicated as China’s African policy and the motives behind it...' - Emmanuel J Hevi

CHINA'S growing engagement with Africa has major implications for both sides, and has added an important strategic context to South-South co-operation.

In this volume, two leading South African scholars examine this dynamic which takes on added meaning because of the new Sino-South African axis.

Author: Garth le Pere and  Garth Shelton

This innovative study illuminates the possibilities and pitfalls of regional efforts to promote African development. Comparing the two most prominent initiatives of the past quarter century, Ikome accounts for the shift from an inward-looking strategy of ‘collective self-reliance’ to one embracing economic globalisation and ‘good governance’. His analysis of the continent’s currently most prominent initiative, the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD), steers well clear of the mindless pessimism and uncritical optimism that too often dominate debates on these subjects. An important investigation of the international dimensions of Africa’s development challenges.

Author: Francis Nguendi Ikome

China's rapid rise to global prominence has become the cause of much debate, reflection, and concern. This topic is especially relevant and of profound consequence to Africa, given China's considerable and growing presence on the continent and the similarities and differences in circumstances and development trajectories between it and African countries. Central to the debate is whether China’s earlier support for independence struggles and development initiatives in Africa is giving way to a more exploitative and self-serving relationship, characterised by resource imperialism and a disregard for accountable governance and human rights.

Edited by: Garth le Pere.

In May 1994, less than two weeks after the South Africa’s first democratic election, a constitutional assembly was formed to draft a final constitution. The assembly understood that in order for the constitution to have legitimacy, the people of South Africa had to be involved in creating it. After intense planning and conceptualisation, an innovative public participation process was developed. This book chronicles that process and is IGD’s contribution to celebrating the 10th anniversary of the constitution’s adoption.

Author: SynnØve Skjelten

This book presents a compilation of papers by a diverse range of authors and summaries of the discussions at an IGD workshop. The focus is on trade liberalisation and WTO rules on the environment and natural resources and their interface with national trade policy and challenges of sustainable development.

Edited by Michelle Pressend

Since its establishment in 1945, the United Nations has cast a long shadow across global affairs. Its 60th anniversary provided analysts with an opportunity to reflect on its past successes as well as its future challenges. To mark this occasion, the IGD organised a conference at which scholars and diplomats of international repute and with significant experience of and expertise in UN matters reflected on the UN’s manifold accomplishments, its unmet ambitions, untrodden pathways, and future challenges.

Edited by Garth le Pere and Nhamo Samasuwo

This book, published in July 2006, significantly complements the burgeoning literature on regional integration in Africa. It is the most up-to-date guide to SADC's history and institutions, its policies and programmes, legal underpinnings and position in unfolding continental and global affairs. It offers a frank analysis of SADC's shortcomings, achievements and prospects and reviews its extensive restructuring.

Author: Gabriel H Oosthuizen

In order to understand the challenges facing this country that has suffered the ravages of war and plunder, the IGD convened a symposium in Pretoria, South Africa in May 2005. The symposium invited the participation of all the major political parties and civil society groupings in the DRC to evaluate the situation and examine the prospects for enduring peace and political change.

This report represents proceedings of a roundtable discussion hosted and organised by the IGD in Grand Bassam, Cote d'Ivoire in November 2005. Its purpose was to bring together a broad cross-section of concerned parties to discuss the state of the country's transition to peace and democracy.

It is the year 2020. Has violent conflict turned most of southern Africa into an ‘arc of chaos’, marked by collapsed states and widespread starvation? Has sustained economic growth, guided by a new generation of committed leaders, begun to make inroads into poverty and inequality? Or have corrupt elites allowed the region to slide into decay?

Gender instruments in Africa. Critical perspectives, future strategies. Ten years after the Beijing Conference on Women, and 30 years after the first United Nations Conference on Women, the situation of women in Africa has not improved. This also holds true for all other regions of the world, as governments admitted at the Beijing+10 meeting in New York in March 2005.

Edited by: Christi van der Westhuizen

Foreign policy is widely regarded as one of the post-apartheid government’s major areas of achievement, yet remains one of the most challenging. In this volume, leading scholars provide critical assessments of the conduct of South African foreign policy since 1994 against the background of six principles articulated by Nelson Mandela in a celebrated article published in the journal Foreign Affairs in 1993.

Edited by: Walter Calsnaes And Philip Nel

Towards a free trade agreement between China and the Southern African Customs Union. South Africa and its partners in the Southern African Customs Union (SACU) – Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia, and Swaziland – are considering negotiating a free trade agreement with China. Given China’s growing economic power, this initiative has far-reaching implications which have to be carefully weighed.

Edited by: Peter Draper and Garth le Pere

The revival of the East African Community (EAC) – comprising Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda – is one of the most important developments in sub-Saharan Africa in recent years. The first EAC was regarded as a promising experiment in regional economic integration on the continent, but collapsed painfully in 1977.

Edited by: Rok Ajulu