
African Futures in the Making
James Currey (Publisher)
Will be published approx. on 16. June 2026
Book
Paperback/Softback
318 pages
978-1-84701-487-0 (ISBN)
Description
What lies ahead for rural Africa, given a rapidly increasing population, climate change, poverty, inequality and projections of an increasing vulnerability to natural hazards and food shortages?
Bringing together scholars in ecology, agriculture, economics, human geography and cultural anthropology, from Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, Germany, The Netherlands and the UK, this book focusses on social-ecological transformation and future-making in rural Africa, especially in areas of rapid land-use change following the establishment of development corridors, conservation areas, and large-scale infrastructure projects. In Africa, discussions on the way forward are particularly conflict-ridden because people do not agree about desirable goals, because the gap between winners and losers seems to be bigger than elsewhere, and because the struggle for desirable futures is embedded in a problematic history of foreign domination and exploitation.
Focussing on eastern and southern Africa, topics examined range from the history of conservation initiatives and wildlife protection to visions of green development, from the gender implications of extreme climate events on pastoral economies to the use of information and communication technologies on farms and mobile money in geographically remote territories, from large-scale energy infrastructure projects and growth corridors to local ways of managing risk. The volume opens with reflections on African utopic registers of the future and conceptual decolonization in African futurity.
CONTRIBUTORS: Martin Ajei, Michael Bollig, Maxmillian Chuhila, Peter Dannenberg, Clemens Greiner, Prince K. Guma, Carolin Hulke, Linus Kalvelage, Eric Kioko, Britta Klagge, Uros Kovac, Astrid Matejcek, Richard Mbunda, Kennedy Mkutu, Detlef Mueller-Mahn, Frankline Ndi, Sabelo J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni, Rupert Neuhoefer, Anne Oketch, Dennis Ong'ech, Maggie Opondo, Gilbert Ouma, Javier Revilla Diez, Julian Rochlitz, Dorothea Schulz, Ian Scoones, Tahira Shariff Mohamed, Masresha Taye, Gideon Tups, Hauke-Peter Vehrs, Julia Verne
Published in association with the Collaborative Research Centre FUTURE RURAL AFRICA, funded by the German Research Council (DFG).
This book is available as Open Access under the Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND, funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) through the collaborative research center "Future Rural Africa", funding code TRR 228/3.
Bringing together scholars in ecology, agriculture, economics, human geography and cultural anthropology, from Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, Germany, The Netherlands and the UK, this book focusses on social-ecological transformation and future-making in rural Africa, especially in areas of rapid land-use change following the establishment of development corridors, conservation areas, and large-scale infrastructure projects. In Africa, discussions on the way forward are particularly conflict-ridden because people do not agree about desirable goals, because the gap between winners and losers seems to be bigger than elsewhere, and because the struggle for desirable futures is embedded in a problematic history of foreign domination and exploitation.
Focussing on eastern and southern Africa, topics examined range from the history of conservation initiatives and wildlife protection to visions of green development, from the gender implications of extreme climate events on pastoral economies to the use of information and communication technologies on farms and mobile money in geographically remote territories, from large-scale energy infrastructure projects and growth corridors to local ways of managing risk. The volume opens with reflections on African utopic registers of the future and conceptual decolonization in African futurity.
CONTRIBUTORS: Martin Ajei, Michael Bollig, Maxmillian Chuhila, Peter Dannenberg, Clemens Greiner, Prince K. Guma, Carolin Hulke, Linus Kalvelage, Eric Kioko, Britta Klagge, Uros Kovac, Astrid Matejcek, Richard Mbunda, Kennedy Mkutu, Detlef Mueller-Mahn, Frankline Ndi, Sabelo J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni, Rupert Neuhoefer, Anne Oketch, Dennis Ong'ech, Maggie Opondo, Gilbert Ouma, Javier Revilla Diez, Julian Rochlitz, Dorothea Schulz, Ian Scoones, Tahira Shariff Mohamed, Masresha Taye, Gideon Tups, Hauke-Peter Vehrs, Julia Verne
Published in association with the Collaborative Research Centre FUTURE RURAL AFRICA, funded by the German Research Council (DFG).
This book is available as Open Access under the Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND, funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) through the collaborative research center "Future Rural Africa", funding code TRR 228/3.
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Oxford
United Kingdom
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Product notice
Paperback (trade)
Illustrations
10 maps, 6 colour and 1 b/w illus.
Dimensions
Height: 234 mm
Width: 156 mm
Thickness: 17 mm
Weight
445 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-84701-487-0 (9781847014870)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

Detlef Mueller-Mahn | Michael Bollig
African Futures in the Making
Book
approx. 01/2026
James Currey
€142.70
Not yet published
Persons
DETLEF MUELLER-MAHN is Professor of Development Geography, University of Bonn. He served as the spokesperson of the Collaborative Research Center (CRC-TRR 228) "Future Rural Africa" 2018-2021. His research focuses on the political ecology of land use change and rural development in East Africa and the Middle East. Eric Kioko). MICHAEL BOLLIG is Professor of Social and Cultural Anthropology at the University of Cologne. Carolin Hulke is a research associate at the University of Cologne, Institute of Geography and associate to the multi-disciplinary research project "Future Rural Africa" (CRC-TRR228/1). She is conducting her PhD research on southern African agricultural regional value chains, livelihood strategies and rural development. Clemens Greiner is the academic coordinator of the Global South Studies Center (GSSC). His current research focuses on rural change, political ecology, translocality, and (energy) infrastructures in Kenya. His regional specialization is on Eastern and Southern Africa. DETLEF MUELLER-MAHN is Professor of Development Geography, University of Bonn. He served as the spokesperson of the Collaborative Research Center (CRC-TRR 228) "Future Rural Africa" 2018-2021. His research focuses on the political ecology of land use change and rural development in East Africa and the Middle East. Eric Kioko). DOROTHEA E. SCHULZ is Professor & Department Chair, Department of Social & Cultural Anthropology, University of Muenster, Germany. Eric M. Kioko is a lecturer at Kenyatta University in the Department of Environmental Studies and Community Development where his research and teaching focuses on the dynamics of human-environment relations. His publications include Cooperation in the midst of conflict (with M. Gravesen, 2019) and Appeasing the land (with W. Okumu, 2018). HAUKE-PETER VEHRS is a Post-doctoral researcher in the project 'Future Rural Africa: Future-Making and Social Ecological Transformation' at the University of Cologne. Javier Revilla Diez holds a Chair in Human Geography at the Institute of Geography and is associated to the Global South Study Center at the University of Cologne. He participates in the collaborative research center 'Future Rural Africa: Future-making and social-ecological transformation'. Linus Kalvelage is a research associate at the Institute of Geography, University of Cologne. A member of the Collaborative Research Centre (CRC 228) 'Future Rural Africa: Future-making and social-ecological transformation', his research interests include tourism GPNs, nature conservation and regional development in Southern Africa. MICHAEL BOLLIG is Professor of Social and Cultural Anthropology at the University of Cologne.
Content
Table of Contents
List of Illustrations
Introduction: Future-making and Social-ecological Transformation in Rural Africa
Detlef Mueller-Mahn and Michael Bollig
Part 1: Bringing Future-Making into Perspective - African Perspectives and the Decolonial Turn
1 Black/African Imaginations of the Future
Sabelo J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni
2 Conceptual Decolonization in African Universities: An Imperative for Shaping African Futures
Martin Ajei
Part Two: Technologies, imaginaries, and practices of future-making in rural Africa
3 'In technology we trust': Digital Visions and their Implications for Agricultural Futures in Eastern Africa
Astrid Matejcek, Rupert Neuhoefer, Julian Rochlitz, and Julia Verne
4 Green Futures and National Planning: Rhetoric and Reality in Rural East Africa
Eric M. Kioko, Detlef Mueller-Mahn, and Maxmillian J. Chuhila
5 The Growth-Corridor Vision and its Realities - Regional Economic Impacts in Namibia and Tanzania
Javier Revilla Diez, Peter Dannenberg, Carolin Hulke, Linus Kalvelage, Gideon Tups, and Richard Mbunda
6 The Making of an Energy Resource Periphery? Scalar Politics, Frontier Dynamics, and Future-Making in Northern Kenya
Clemens Greiner, Britta Klagge, Kennedy Mkutu, and Frankline Ndi
7 Africa, The Conservation Continent? Future-Making and the Globalization of Wildlife Protection
Hauke-Peter Vehrs and Michael Bollig
Part Three For prayer, profit, and persistence - aspirations and hope in the future-making in rural Africa
8 Gendered African Futures and Extreme Climate Events in
Turkana, Kenya
Maggie Opondo, Gilbert Ouma, Anne Oketch, and Dennis Ong'ech
9 Reimagining Africa's Rural Futures in the Age of Mobile Money
Prince K Guma
10'Joining the church' as a Form of Future-making? Il Chamus Christians' Futural Orientations in Baringo County, Northern Kenya
Dorothea Schulz, Uros Kovac
11 The Politics of Anticipation in East Africa's Rangelands
Ian Scoones, Tahira Shariff Mohamed, and Masresha Taye
Epilogue: African Futures and the Way Forward
Detlef Mueller-Mahn and Michael Bollig
Index
List of Illustrations
Introduction: Future-making and Social-ecological Transformation in Rural Africa
Detlef Mueller-Mahn and Michael Bollig
Part 1: Bringing Future-Making into Perspective - African Perspectives and the Decolonial Turn
1 Black/African Imaginations of the Future
Sabelo J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni
2 Conceptual Decolonization in African Universities: An Imperative for Shaping African Futures
Martin Ajei
Part Two: Technologies, imaginaries, and practices of future-making in rural Africa
3 'In technology we trust': Digital Visions and their Implications for Agricultural Futures in Eastern Africa
Astrid Matejcek, Rupert Neuhoefer, Julian Rochlitz, and Julia Verne
4 Green Futures and National Planning: Rhetoric and Reality in Rural East Africa
Eric M. Kioko, Detlef Mueller-Mahn, and Maxmillian J. Chuhila
5 The Growth-Corridor Vision and its Realities - Regional Economic Impacts in Namibia and Tanzania
Javier Revilla Diez, Peter Dannenberg, Carolin Hulke, Linus Kalvelage, Gideon Tups, and Richard Mbunda
6 The Making of an Energy Resource Periphery? Scalar Politics, Frontier Dynamics, and Future-Making in Northern Kenya
Clemens Greiner, Britta Klagge, Kennedy Mkutu, and Frankline Ndi
7 Africa, The Conservation Continent? Future-Making and the Globalization of Wildlife Protection
Hauke-Peter Vehrs and Michael Bollig
Part Three For prayer, profit, and persistence - aspirations and hope in the future-making in rural Africa
8 Gendered African Futures and Extreme Climate Events in
Turkana, Kenya
Maggie Opondo, Gilbert Ouma, Anne Oketch, and Dennis Ong'ech
9 Reimagining Africa's Rural Futures in the Age of Mobile Money
Prince K Guma
10'Joining the church' as a Form of Future-making? Il Chamus Christians' Futural Orientations in Baringo County, Northern Kenya
Dorothea Schulz, Uros Kovac
11 The Politics of Anticipation in East Africa's Rangelands
Ian Scoones, Tahira Shariff Mohamed, and Masresha Taye
Epilogue: African Futures and the Way Forward
Detlef Mueller-Mahn and Michael Bollig
Index