PLENARY

Fri 1st July, 14.00-15.15

Strengthening the foundations of social science research in Africa: the CODESRIA experience

Professor Adebayo Olukoshi

adebayo.olukoshi@codesria.sn

Abstract

The modern history of the social sciences in Africa is relatively recent, dating in most cases from the decade after the Second World War when the pioneer university colleges were established as the sun began gradually to set on the colonial rule. A review of that history will reveal a series of setbacks and advances in the development of the social sciences to which the African social research community has responded in a variety of ways, and with varying degrees of success. More recently however, new developments have emerged which put the future of the social sciences in danger and which, if not tackled, would further sharpen the asymmetries that underpin the international production of knowledge within various disciplinary frames and about Africa itself. The CODESRIA experience will serve as the entry point for the assessment of the promise and travails of contemporary social research in Africa.

Chair: Professor Patrick Chabal, President of AEGIS
Discussant: Dr. Elísio Macamo, University of Bayreuth

With support from the British Academy