Since becoming president of China and general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, Xi Jinping has emerged as China's most powerful and popular leader since Deng Xiaoping. The breathtaking economic expansion and military modernization that Xi inherited has convinced him that China can transform into a twenty-first-century superpower.In this collection, leading scholars from the United States, Asia, and Europe examine both the prospects for China's continuing rise and the emerge...

An Islamo-facist terrorist with shifty eyes who ends up being nothing more than a red herring. A CNN anchorwoman who is too attractive to have gotten her job based solely on her questionable credentials. A wizened and respected CNN anchorman whose famous beard could be its own situation room topic. A nuclear physicist with precognitive abilities and fondness for being killed by buses in the first act. A black man/rap mogul who goes against type and actually lives to the end of the movie. A...

There is no question that Africa is endowed with abundant natural resources of different magnitudes. However, more than a decade of high commodity prices and new hydrocarbon discoveries across the continent has led countless international organizations, donor agencies, and non-governmental organizations to devote considerable attention to the potential of natural resource–based development.Natural Resource–Based Development in Africa places a particular emphasis on the act...

Africa’s natural resource sectors are experiencing unprecedented levels of foreign investment and production. Hailed as a means of reducing poverty and reliance on foreign aid, the role of foreign corporations in Africa’s extractive sector is not well understood and important questions remain about the impact of such activities on people and on the environment.With reference to global governance initiatives aimed at promoting ethical business practices, this volume offers a timely ...

Chapter 1 “Re-Storying African (Studies) Pedagogies: Decolonizing Knowledge and Centering Black Agency?” is available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com.

This book is the first to focus on state-led ‘extractive bargains,’ designed to reach a social consensus on the extent of extractive activities, how they should be governed and their negative consequences mitigated. These state-led ‘bargains’ have taken a number of different forms and offer varying degrees of promise in meeting environmental and social concerns. The book critically examines ‘bargains’ in states across the Global North and the Global South, incorporates Indigenous issues, a...

This volume provides up-to-date information on what has happened in the African ‘land rush’, providing national case studies for countries that were heavily impacted. The research will be a critical resource for students, researchers, advocates and policy makers as it provides detailed, long-term assessments of a broad range of national contexts. In addition to the specific questions of land and investment, this book sheds light on the broader international political economy of development...

This book gives a comprehensive overview of Ghana’s hydrocarbon economy using actor network and assemblage theories to contest the methodological nationalism of mainstream accounts of the resource curse in resource-rich countries.Drawing upon recent field research focused on Ghana’s oil and gas sector and utilizing the theoretical framework of actor network theory, the authors contend that there is an assemblage of political, economic, social and environmental networks, processes, ...

This book critically examines the practice and meanings of corporate social responsibility (CSR) and how the movement has facilitated a positive and somewhat unquestioned image of the global corporation. Drawing on extensive fieldwork material collected in Ghanaian communities located around the project sites of Newmont Mining Corporation and Kinross Gold Corporation, the monograph employs critical discourse analysis to accentuate how mining corporations use CSR as a discursive alibi to ga...

This volume examines the impact of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) on Africa’s development post-2015. It assesses the current state of the MDGs in Africa by outlining the successes, gaps and failures of the state goals, including lessons learned. A unique feature of the book is the exposition on post-MDG’s agenda for Africa’s development. Chapters on poverty, south-south partnership, aid, gender, empowerment, health as well as governance and development explore what feasible altern...

This volume examines how communities, companies, and governments contest and contribute to the evolution of norms, rules and decision-making procedures that govern stakeholder consultation in the extractive industries.In recent years international organisations, governments and companies around the world have dramatically reformed the regime that governs consultations with community stakeholders about proposed extractive projects. However, the characteristics of this consultation r...

Meaningful Stakeholder Engagement (MSE) is both a concept and a management approach, drawing on a combination of theoretical and applied knowledge areas (e.g., impact assessment, business and human rights, and stakeholder theory). MSE has become a key element of corporate sustainability risk-based due diligence as a process that responsible business enterprises are expected to apply to identify and manage harmful impacts on the environment and society.Despite the obvious and growin...