Beyond the Crises: Zimbabwes Prospects for Transformation


Book Description

Over the past years, few African countries have been the focus of discussions and analyses generating a vast array of literature as much as Zimbabwe. The socioeconomic and political crises since the turn of the century have deeply transformed the country from the ideals of a vibrant freshly independent nation just two decades earlier. These transformations have necessitated the call for the restructuring of Zimbabwean society, polity, and economy. But this literature remains exclusively within the realm of academic thinking and theorising, with no concerted effort to move beyond this by explicitly drawing out the policy implications. Beyond the Crises: Zimbabwes Prospects for Transformation is a welcome addition to the academic and policy literature with a much broader and all-embracing focus in terms of policy interventions. By focusing on different aspects of social and economic justice, Murisa and Chikweche go beyond initiating a broad discussion on these two key pillars of human development with a view to suggesting possible future directions of practical solutions and policy development for the attainment of inclusive social and economic justice for Zimbabweans.




Zimbabwe@40


Book Description

Zimbabwe @ 40 is a celebration of the country's four decades of independence and statehood. Forty years is a relatively short period in a nation's life, but it is a formative period: what lessons can be learnt from the successes and failures, challenges and opportunities of the last 40 years? What should be avoided in the next 40? Lloyd Sachikonye and David Kaulemu have assembled a distinguished team of scholars to address these questions, and the book focuses on issues that characterise the country's development trajectory: the linkage between values and institutions; defects in its democracy; the 'curse' of mineral and agricultural endowment; the impact of migration; and the social exclusion of women and young people. The book is written from a depth of commitment to a just, peaceful and prosperous Zimbabwe, and represents a 'work in progress', reflecting the continuing research, evaluation and dialogue that each of the authors is engaged in, and signalling the nature and direction of future such work. As the editors conclude: 'None of the chapters are pessimistic, nor are they negative about the country. They are realistic about the gravity of the historical moment the nation faces and the high moral, political and economic mountains we must climb before we can see the Promised Land. Yet they are full of hope - they are convinced that we have not come to the end of history.'




Claiming Agency


Book Description

Claiming Agency. Reflecting on TrustAfrica’s First Decade takes an in-depth look at an African-led foundation that set out to do things differently. Founded in 2006, when solutions to Africa’s challenges were often developed outside its borders, TrustAfrica sought to practice a kind of philanthropy that both benefits Africans and actively supports their agency. Now, at the ten-year mark, the book asks, what does this kind of philanthropy make a difference? If so, how? What are its unique ways of working? The answers are found in chapters that reflect on how TrustAfrica and its partners advanced a range of issues - from women’s rights, small-holder agriculture, and democratic reform in Liberia and Zimbabwe to international criminal justice and illicit financial flows. In a clear-eyed look at money and power, the authors observe that donor funds all too often come with strings that constrict African agency - and recommend ways in which donors from Africa and the global north can foster independent action and strengthen movements for change.




The Political Economy of Livelihoods in Contemporary Zimbabwe


Book Description

Since the introduction of the fast track land reform programme in 2000, Zimbabwe has undergone major economic and political shifts and these have had a profound impact on both urban and rural livelihoods. This book provides rich empirical studies that examine a range of multi-faceted and contested livelihoods within the context of systemic crises. Taking a broad political economy approach, the chapters advance a grounded and in-depth understanding of emerging and shifting livelihood processes, strategies and resilience that foregrounds agency at household level. Highlighting an emergent scholarship amongst young black scholars in Zimbabwe, and providing an understanding of how people and communities respond to socio-economic challenges, this book is an important read for scholars of African political economy, southern African studies and livelihoods.




Subtle Agroecologies


Book Description

This book is about the invisible or subtle nature of food and farming, and also about the nature of existence. Everything that we know (and do not know) about the physical world has a subtle counterpart which has been scarcely considered in modernist farming practice and research. If you think this book isn’t for you, if it appears more important to attend to the pressing physical challenges the world is facing before having the luxury of turning to such subtleties, then think again. For it could be precisely this worldview – the one prioritises the physical-material dimension of reality - that helped get us into this situation in the first place. Perhaps we need a different worldview to get us out? This book makes a foundational contribution to the discipline of Subtle Agroecologies, a nexus of indigenous epistemologies, multidisciplinary advances in wave-based and ethereal studies, and the science of sustainable agriculture. Not a farming system in itself, Subtle Agroecologies superimposes a non-material dimension upon existing, materially-based agroecological farming systems. Bringing together 43 authors from 12 countries and five continents, from the natural and social sciences as well as the arts and humanities, this multi-contributed book introduces the discipline, explaining its relevance and potential contribution to the field of Agroecology. Research into Subtle Agroecologies may be described as the systematic study of the nature of the invisible world as it relates to the practice of agriculture, and to do this through adapting and innovating with research methods, in particular with those of a more embodied nature, with the overall purpose of bringing and maintaining balance and harmony. Such research is an open-minded inquiry, its grounding being the lived experiences of humans working on, and with, the land over several thousand years to the present. By reclaiming and reinterpreting the perennial relationship between humans and nature, the implications would revolutionise agriculture, heralding a new wave of more sustainable farming techniques, changing our whole relationship with nature to one of real collaboration rather than control, and ultimately transforming ourselves.




Beyond the crises: Zimbabwe's prospects for transformation


Book Description

Over the past years, few African countries have been the focus of discussions and analyses generating a vast array of literature as much as Zimbabwe. The socioeconomic and political crises since the turn of the century have deeply transformed the country from the ideals of a vibrant freshly independent nation just two decades earlier. These transformations have necessitated the call for the restructuring of Zimbabwean society, polity, and economy. But this literature remains exclusively within the realm of academic thinking and theorising, with no concerted effort to move beyond this by explicitly drawing out the policy implications. Beyond the Crises: Zimbabwe's Prospects for Transformation is a welcome addition to the academic and policy literature with a much broader and all-embracing focus in terms of policy interventions. By focusing on different aspects of social and economic justice, Murisa and Chikweche go beyond initiating a broad discussion on these two key pillars of human development with a view to suggesting possible future directions of practical solutions and policy development for the attainment of inclusive social and economic justice for Zimbabweans.




Governance and Societal Adaptation in Fragile States


Book Description

This book examines the various ways in which some fragile states in the Global South (or states with limited statehood) have adopted, and adapted to, processes of governance in their quests to address the socialized problems affecting their societies. It tells the story of these states’ resilience in the societal adaptation to a liberalized notion of governance. In addition to comparative case studies, the book also analyzes the engendered interplay of culture, economics, and politics in the creation of people-centric governance reforms. The contributing authors shed light on weak states’ often constructive engagement in the promotion of state governance under a variety of societal conditions, adverse or otherwise, and on their ability to remain resilient despite the complexities of the political and economic challenges they face.




Beyond Agricultural Impacts


Book Description

Beyond Agricultural Impacts: Multiple Perspectives on Climate Change in Africa presents the theories and methods commonly applied in climate change assessment from various locations in Africa, also inspiring further research that addresses the broad spectrum of societal impacts that result from altered climate status. Using case studies, the work provides insights into climate change impacts and adaptation with a lens on vulnerable groups in African agriculture, e.g. smallholder crop and livestock farmers, women and youth. The book also highlights areas of further interest in climate change and agriculture research in Africa, all done through views from multiple disciplines in the agriculture and climate change nexus. - Presents themes, theories, tools and methods for mitigating the impact of climate change in African agriculture - Highlights the research gaps and opportunities in research on climate change and agriculture - Uses examples and cases to provide insights into shaping future research - Provides insights from African countries, including Lesotho, Malawi, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Uganda, Ghana and Cameroon




Handbook of Climate Change Across the Food Supply Chain


Book Description

This book presents climate change as a global phenomenon which affects the entire food chain. Many studies analyzing environmental impacts of food systems confirm significant effects of food production on climate change. Most of them associate primary production with emission of greenhouse gasses identified as one of the causes resulting in warming the atmosphere and global climate effects. A wider perspective shows that the food chains start at farms with consumers being at the end of the pipeline. This approach emphasizes the role of the entire food chain highlighting different kinds of environmental impacts affecting climate change. On the other side, temperature changes and variations of precipitation patterns, together with extreme weather events and water reduction, are recognized as predictors for producing less food, decreased food quality, new food safety risks, biodiversity losses, and depletion of resources associated with food production in modified circumstances. Last but not least, these effects introduce new threats known as food security where some assumptions stress that almost one billion of people are hungry not receiving enough food as a result of climate changes. As a result, the UN highlights the need for combating climate change and promotes sustainable (food) consumption and production. Based on the perceived need to promote and disseminate information on climate change related to food system, the “Handbook of Climate change across the food supply chain” is being produced. The publication compiles information, experiences, practical initiatives, and projects around the subject matter and makes it available to a wide audience. It is expected that the “Handbook of Climate change across the food supply chain” makes many benefits of climate service clearer and, inter alia, leads to an increase in the demand for such important services.




Integration in the Southern African Development Community Region


Book Description

Using political and public administration perspectives, this book argues that for democratization and integration to be consolidated and institutionalized, direct involvement of the people of Southern Africa is paramount. Democratization and integration are about people, the sovereigns, and not merely the abstract actors called nation states.