Current PhD Students

ECOWAS renewable energy regime and the promise of micro-level energy access: community governance and traditional financial cooperatives as alternatives? 

West African countries rank amongst the lowest in electricity access and highest in energy poverty in the world. To address these challenges, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) established renewable energy institutions aimed at securing electricity access in the region using renewables. These institutions have in the past decade received enormous foreign contributions and development aid. However, energy access and electricity availability remain insufficient especially in rural areas. The central theme of my dissertation is to examine why ECOWAS renewable energy instruments have been ineffective in achieving its set objectives and to further explore alternative approaches for improving energy self sufficiency in the region. The preliminary findings from the literature review reveal several critical dimensions which are as follows: first, ECOWAS renewable energy frameworks are constructed on top down governance approach in which elite policymakers, high level politicians, donor agencies and bureaucrats define policy objectives and design action plan for energy projects. This means that periphery communities do not have the opportunity to participate in the decision-making processes aimed at resolving their daily energy challenges. Second, ECOWAS renewable energy strategies are modeled after foreign intervention and development aid practices that have proven to be unproductive in transforming problems in Africa. In view of this, there is a need to explore alternative approaches which can be used to ensure energy access and guarantee affordable electricity in both urban and rural areas. Consequently, my doctoral dissertation seeks to investigate if ECOWAS renewable energy objectives will be better achieved if grassroots leadership are embedded in decision making processes. Furthermore, I intend to explore how community governance and indigenous cooperatives can be used for financing and managing small-scale energy projects. My research inquiry will be conducted using case study and mix methods.

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From Legal Frameworks to Cultural Institutions: African Heritage and the Fight Against Racism in Colombia

In Valle del Cauca, one of Colombia's regions that is both socioeconomically unequal and culturally rich, Afro-Colombian communities continue to struggle against the effects of racism, spatial segregation and historical marginalization. The threats faced by activists such as Yaneth Valencia, director of Lila Mujer (an organization supporting women with HIV and survivors of gender-based violence), highlight the persistence of colonial legacies in everyday life. Against this backdrop, African heritage is not only commemorated, but also strategically harnessed to reclaim space, dignity and identity. Drawing on decolonial theory, Afro-diaspora studies and African philosophy — particularly Ubuntu — this research analyses three key ways in which Afro-Colombians express their presence: legal frameworks such as Law 70 and the Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP); the commercialization of Blackness in tourist circles in Cali and Valle de Cauca; and the cultural work of institutions such as the Museo Afro in Cali and the community-run Museo de Mulaló. These places and strategies demonstrate how African descent functions as both a political resource and a site of cultural expression. Drawing on fieldwork, expert interviews and analysis of cultural and political discourse in Cali and the wider Valle del Cauca region, the study explores how Afro-Colombian actors navigate the tension between visibility and appropriation, and between state recognition and grassroots resistance. Ultimately, the research explores how African heritage endures as a collective memory, a political assertion of identity, and a social force in the ongoing struggle for justice and belonging in Colombia.

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Ecce Homo; Ecce Waliyo: Kombo Sillah – A Hero on a West African Stage

On the 29th September 1875, after twenty-five years of bloody jihad, Ibrahima Touray, commonly known as Kombo Sillah, proclaimed the Islamic State of Kombo. Situated in the western part of nowadays Gambia, he is considered there as a national hero today, due to his efforts in establishing Islamic structures and his success in converting the people of the region to Islam. In the present time, Kombo Sillah Drive, one of the conurbation’s arterial roads is named after him. Despite his heroisation and his impact on Gambia’s religious topography, so far there is no more than one short biographical work done on Kombo Sillah, scratching his extraordinary personality, and his socio political setting in transition, only on the surface. My PhD-thesis attempts to fill this gap in the historiography of Islamising Africa by placing Kombo Sillah’s strive for power and his strong willed efforts in defending it against any arising opposition by any diplomatic and military means in his variously changing political, religious and social environment of the long nineteenth century. My main question of interest is why Kombo Sillah was assigned the role of military commander of the Muslim army while being an Islamic scholar and not a soldier. The hypothetic answer is to be found in Kombo Sillah’s social position as a saint, which was justified by the doctrine of West African Sufism, and the spiritual powers attached to this function. Predictions, miracles, and spiritual attacks, and likewise protection against such attacks, played key roles in contemporary warfare. Looking at other jihad movements in the greater region of West Africa, it seems that sainthood and leadership were closely linked in comparable cases as well. Consequently, Kombo Sillah’s role as a saint takes centre stage in my PhD-thesis, as I try to reconstruct its significance to the society by analysing a rich corpus of oral traditions. Another focus will be laid on Kombo Sillah’s changing relations, conflicts, and battles with non-Muslim societies, with the British settlement bordering his emirate, and also with other jihad-leaders and Muslim towns. This I do by studying the colonial records and oral traditions, which offers many clues to explain his attempts to implement a new understanding of political power.

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Men Own Cattle, Women Own Gardens, Or?" Gendered Land and Livestock Tenure in the Context of Livelihood Change and Social Transformations among the Jie Pastoralists of Karamoja, Uganda. 

Pastoralism in Karamoja, North-Eastern Uganda, has increasingly come under pressure over the past decades due to a multiplicity of different factors including climate change, repeated loss of grazing lands to protected areas, farming and mining as well as increasing land tenure privatization, and significant livestock losses as a result of decades of armed conflict and disarmament. Moreover, development interventions in the region have since colonial times aimed at curtailing pastoralist mobility, promoting sedentarization and the adoption of agriculture. Facing these pressures, many families in Karamoja have shifted away from pastoralism as their primary source of livelihood and placed more emphasis on crop cultivation – a development evident in the progressing acquisition of former grazing lands for cultivation purposes – as well as other ‘alternative livelihoods’. Considering that pastoralist production is traditionally structured along gender lines, livelihood change and associated social transformations are often experienced differently by men and women. As production patterns change, gender relations change, with implications for the distribution of roles and responsibilities within society, as well as the way women and men access, use and control critical resources such as land and livestock. It is against this background that my dissertation seeks to understand how gendered land and livestock tenure in Karamoja have evolved over time in response to abovementioned social transformations. Drawing on qualitative fieldwork conducted predominantly in newly established agricultural settlements in Karamoja between 2013 and 2015, I analyze how gender and labor relations are currently being renegotiated, and how women’s and men’s customary rights to land and livestock are changing as a result. In doing so, I aim to shed light on social power relations manifesting themselves in renegotiation processes at family and (to a limited extent) communal levels, and explore how women and men experience and cope with changing roles and rights in different ways. Thereby differences existing between women and men as well as among women and men – based on age, marital status and other relevant factors – are taken into consideration. To allow for broader contextualization of research findings, the dissertation furthermore attempts to understand the nature of contemporary social transformations, tracing their historical roots and examining their perceived newness and permanence.

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Creativity and Greatness Young musicians and their (trans)local relations in Accra, Ghana, and beyond (2013 – 2018) (working title) 

Africa’s youth, a growing and therefore increasingly important social group, has mainly been studied as marginalized. Researchers recently discussed youths as being in “waithood“ (Honwana 2012), and frequently as a risk for societies’ stability. Less attention has been paid to young people’s fruitful cultural participation, for instance in the field of expressive culture. In Ghana’s fast growing and globally intertwined capital Accra, youths play a particularly important role in music production of various genres (Collins 2002, 2012). Against this background, I conduct an ethnographic study of young instrumental musicians in several genres ([gospel]-highlife, afrofunk, [afro-]pop, brass, neo-traditional), accompanying their activities of creating music in public and hidden spaces. I am interested in diverse ways young musicians contribute to cultural production, and more specifically in the relations they maintain in these creative processes (with colleagues, teachers, students, mentors, patrons, idols, and audience). Considering the omnipresent factor of accelerated global mobility, particular focus is put on translocal relations. Methodologically, the thesis is based on several field researches, amounting to nine months in Accra over a period of four years in total. I combine extensive participant observation with multiple instruments of documentation, such as audio and video recordings, ethnographic and biographic interviews, photographs, and extracts from social media. This material is interpreted with respect to theories on youth and cultural expression, trying to link an actor-centered perspective with a macro-perspective on structural and contextual factors. Shedding light on linkages between music production and coming of age, the thesis aims to contribute to research interests of different disciplines: To the debate on youth and participation, to (ethno-)musicological case studies of music transmission and production in understudied informal settings and, by capturing interplays of local and translocal aspects in micro-processes of cultural creativity, to broader cultural studies’ interests.

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Christian beliefs in the worldview of local healers in Malawi 

From the beginnings of missionary work in Africa, the ideas of Christianity have often been in conflict with established traditional beliefs by local communities. Many rites and beliefs about spiritual world, transmitted for generations, were declared as incompatible with Christianity by missionaries and it was the aim among some of them that such rites and beliefs should be extinguished. Until now, traditional healing practices figure among these cultural traditions that are not accepted in many Christian congregations. However, in spite of such strong rejection on the part of church communities, they have resisted extinction. Instead, new adapted forms have arisen, integrating some elements from Christian beliefs. In Malawi today, it is therefore hardly possible to encounter healing practitioners (asing’anga) who would not at some stage in their practices refer to Jesus or use some Christian symbols and songs. My dissertation project envisages a study of the historical processes underlying the changes in the healing practices of Malawi, with a focus on the time period from the 1960s until now and on the role of implanted Christian worldview in these changes. It is intended to identify in great detail the modifications of the healing practices taking place during this period and how they are related to the increasing Christianization process of large sectors of the population in Malawi. In particular, I intend to investigate how and why an amalgamation between these rather different worldviews has come about. The background and the factors leading to convergence between elements of the two systems of ideas are to be identified and examined in great detail. I will look at the development and use of Christian-influenced ideas in their adaptive modifications among present-day healing practitioners and religious innovators under social pressure. To unfold this theme, I will undertake ethnographic fieldwork and also archival work in the country. Oral narratives will be an important part of the source material.

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Ethnische Grenzverschiebung und Demokratie in Burundi (2000-2020) 

Dieses Dissertationsprojekt befasst sich mit der Geschichte und der Gesellschaft Burundis in der Zeit von 2000 bis 2020. Es geht davon aus, dass Ethnizität in Burundi im Wandel ist und die gesellschaftlichen Veränderungen bzw. Verschiebungen von ethnischen Grenzen auf die Diskurse über Demokratie in diesem behandelten Zeitraum wirkten. Zu den hier verwendeten theoretischen Modellen ist festzuhalten, dass hauptsächlich die konstruktivistischen Theorien der Ethnizität sowie die Theorie der Konkordanzdemokratie als Grundlage herangezogen werden. Der Fokus liegt auf der Art und Weise wie Ethnizität in den burundischen Diskursen (de)konstruiert wurde. Analysiert werden schriftliche, mündliche und audiovisuelle Quellen auf Basis der historischen Diskursanalyse von Landwehr (2018).

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Colonial Situations and Policies on the Move. French and Muslim Law in the Quatre Communes of Senegal. 

Four towns on the Senegalese coast known as the Quatre Communes were an outcome of a colonial project founded on the French assimilation policy. The communes were under the jurisdiction of French law and their inhabitants regarded as citizens of France and enjoy the privileges which were attached to French citizenship. Another unique characteristic of the communes was that due to the large Muslim population, Muslim tribunals were established which had jurisdiction on civil matters. This meant that there was a group of people, French citizens of Muslim faith, who could elect which judicial system would preside over their civil affairs. This group of people were known as originaires. This distinct characteristic was heavily contested throughout the years. To be a good and proper French citizen one had to abide by the French Civil Code. However, Muslim law has its basis in the Quran and is thus indispensable from faith. Consequently, French law and Muslim law in many matters are incompatible, and yet both were applied in the Quatre Communes. At the beginning of the 20th century, due to the constant re-examination and modification of the originaires’ privileges and status, a great number of Western educated originaires began to engage greatly in local politics, and with Blaise Diagne’s election for deputy for Senegal in the Chambre des députés in 1914, a new chapter commenced. This victory brought about a drastic shift, one where Africans had gained power within the colonial framework which fought to maintain their colonial subjects in clear-cut legal subordination. Ultimately, as a result of the French colonial policy of assimilation, came the emergence of Senegalese nationalism. Senegalese nationalism initially did not mean independence, rather it meant equality, pride and bettering oneself and one’s people; “Sénégal pour les sénégalais”. It emerged as an opposition to French colonial domination. ‘Black politics’ in Senegal as a whole was ahead of its time. The ‘African consciousness’ which occurred in the communes at the beginning of the 20th century was a vital step towards African nationalism and independence movements elsewhere in Francophone Africa. The Quatre Communes set the foundation for the rest of French speaking Africa. They became the exception of the French colonial empire. The quest of the originaires for political recognition and their success in Senegalese political institutions paved the way towards the political independence of Francophone Africa. The democratic institutions which France had extended to Senegal were an expansion of the French ideals of assimilation and therefore functioned as a form of imposing colonial control. Political activity and the right to vote within the colonial system was a special privilege at a time where most colonial subjects were deprived of any human rights, let alone political ones. The assimilation policy taught the Senegalese that they could be equal to the French. Blaise Diagne’s victory in the elections of 1914 signified a rise to power by Africans within the colonial system.

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Die ostafrikanischen Sammlungen der k.(u.)k. Kriegsmarine für das k.k. Naturhistorische Hofmuseum 

Nicht nur ehemalige Kolonialmächte wie Großbritannien, Frankreich oder Deutschland müssen sich einer intensiven Auseinandersetzung mit Objekten aus dem kolonialen Kontext stellen, sondern auch Österreich, das zu Zeiten der Habsburgermonarchie ein Vielvölkerstaat und eine europäische Großmacht war und insofern als „nicht-klassische“ Kolonialmacht gelten kann. Museen in Europa profitierten von kolonialen Bestrebungen und dem Ausbau kolonialer Strukturen, die das Sammeln von Objekten und human remains wesentlich in den Kolonien wesentlich erleichterten. Das k.k. Naturhistorische Hofmuseum bildete in dieser Hinsicht keine Ausnahme. Meine Forschung zu den ostafrikanischen Sammlungen der k.(u.)k. Kriegsmarine am Weltmuseum Wien und Naturhistorischen Museum Wien, welche die Sammlungen des k.k. Naturhistorischen Hofmuseums übernahmen, schließt an die internationale, interdisziplinäre und interinstitutionelle Forschung zum Thema ‚koloniale Erwerbskontexte’ an, um diese am Beispiel österreichischer Museen weiter voranzutreiben. Im Sinne einer Provenienzforschung zu Sammlungen aus den kolonialen Kontexten rückt die Identifizierung von sensiblem Sammlungsgut aus den ostafrikanischen Sammlungen der k.u.k. Kriegsschiffe „Frundsberg” (1884-85) und „Saida” (1886-87) in den Fokus. Durch Quellenstudium und Feldforschung werden einerseits die Modi des Erwerbs im Rahmen der jeweiligen Reisen herausgearbeitet, andererseits die Bedeutungsverschiebungen der Kulturgüter sowie der human remains durch die Translokation beforscht.

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The Writing Systems of Indigenous African Languages: The Case of N'Ko 

Indigenous writing systems in Africa play a crucial role in preserving and transmitting the continent’s diverse cultures and languages. N’Ko, an alphabet developed in 1949 by Solomana Kanté for the transcription of Manding languages such as Bambara, Dioula, and Mandingo, represents one of the most remarkable examples of this phenomenon. Kanté maintained that his alphabet was universal and could be used to transcribe all the world’s languages claim that poses a significant linguistic and cultural challenge for Africa. However, Aboubacar Diakité, a contemporary expert on N’Ko, argues that the system requires adaptation, particularly the addition of specific letters, to better represent the phonetic particularities of Bambara, Dioula, and Mandingo, thereby making it more complete. This dissertation seeks to examine these two opposing positions, which have not yet been sufficiently addressed in academic literature. Through a comparative analysis, it evaluates the linguistic, cultural, and philosophical implications of these differing conceptions of N’Ko. The aim is to understand the challenges of N’Ko regarding its adaptability to the various Mandingo languages and to assess how well it meets the phonetic requirements of Africa’s linguistic diversity. Ultimately, this research offers a critical reflection on the value of N’Ko as an instrument of linguistic and cultural unity, while also addressing the challenges inherent in its further development and broader application.

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Transformation of Ethnic Conflict through Constitutional Design: The Cases of Ethiopia, Kenya and Nigeria 

In his prior academic pursuits at the University of Dundee and the Vienna School of International Studies, he specialised in international human rights and criminal justice as well as diplomacy and peace and conflict studies. Before moving to Vienna, he served as a law lecturer at Haramaya University College of Law for four years. His current PhD project focuses on managing ethnic conflicts through institutional interventions in deeply divided African societies.
Besides academia, he is active in the media through his popular podcast, Buffet of Ideas.

Research subjects: Comparative Constitutional Law and Social Theory
Research areas: peace and conflict studies; human rights; transitional justice; diplomacy
Some of his publications can be found here: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=TBBbOukAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao
Supervisors: Prof. Dr. Adams Bodomo, Prof. Markus Kornprobst (Diplomatic Academy)

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