Research
Isaac
Kamola
Book Manuscript in Progress:
Structuring Knowledge: Producing the Global Imaginary Within the African University
Abstract:
This project examines how knowledge about globalization is produced within various African universities. I examine how African universities in South Africa, Uganda and Nigeria adapt to various economic constraints such as the World Bank’s structural adjustment policies, the World Trade Organization’s treatment of education as an exportable service, investments in higher education by philanthropic organizations, and the expansion of study abroad infrastructures within African universities. This analysis makes it possible to see how structural differences between U.S. and African universities not only shape how globalization is conceptualized but also set the terms under which African countries integrate into an economy already imagined as “global.” Studying globalization through an analysis of the political economy of higher education reveals the conditions under which knowledge about globalization is produced, and contributes to the claim that scholars should consider the university an important institution worthy of social scientific inquiry.
Dissertation:
Kamola, Isaac. Producing the Global Imaginary: Academic Knowledge, Globalization and the Making of the World. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota (May, 2010). [Abstract and Chapter Outline or PDF]
Committee:
Bud Duvall (Advisor), Professor & Department Chair, Department of Political Science, University
of Minnesota
Michael Barnett, University Professor of International Affairs and Political Science,
Elliott School of International Affairs, George Washington University
Lisa Disch,
Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Michigan
Premes Lalu, Associate Professor of History & Director of the Programme on
the Study of the Humanities in Africa, Univ. of the Western Cape, South Africa
Antonio Vasquez-Arroyo, Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Minnesota
Publications:
“Reading ‘the Global’ in the Absence of Africa” in Claiming International Relations: Worlding Beyond the West, Arlene Tickner, David L. Blaney & Ole Waever (eds), Routledge, forthcoming, expected: 2012. (PDF)
“Capitalism at Sea: Piracy and ‘State Failure’ in the Gulf of Aden,” Globalization, Social Movements and Peacebuilding, Jackie Smith and Ernesto Verdeja (eds.), Syracuse University Press, forthcoming. (PDF)
“Creating Commons: Divided Governance, Participatory Management, and Struggles Against the Enclosure of the University” (with Eli Meyerhoff) in Polygraph, 21 (2009), 15-37. (PDF)
"Coffee and Genocide: A Political Economy of Violence in Rwanda" in Transition: An International Review, 99 (2008), 54-70. (PDF)
“The Global Coffee Economy and the Production of Genocide in Rwanda” in Third World Quarterly, April 2007 28(3), pp571-592. (PDF)
Review of: Atilio A. Boron, Empire and Imperialism: A Critical Reading of Michael
Hardt and Antonio Negri (Zed Books, 2005). In Millennium: Journal of International
Studies, September 2007 35(3), 767- 769.
Review of: Isabelle Duyvesteyn, Clausewitz and African War: Politics and Strategy
in Liberia and Somalia (Frank Cass, 2005). In Millennium: Journal of International
Studies, August 2006 34(3), 987-989.
Under Review
“Why Global?: Diagnosing the Globalization Literature Within a Political Economy of Higher Education,” International Political Sociology (June 2011).
“Producing the Global Imaginary,” British Journal of Politics and International Relations (August 2011).
“Pursuing Excellence in a ‘World Class African University’: Mamdani and the Politics of ‘Global’ Higher Education,” for a special issue of African Journal of Higher Education (September 2011)
“The Crisis of the ‘Global’ University, in South Africa,” for a special issue of Theory and Event (November 2011)
Current Projects:
Structuring Knowledge: Producing the Global Imaginary Within the African University (book manuscript in progress)
“Affective Labor and the Political Economy of Higher Education” (presented at Northeastern Political Science Association, 2010)
“Reading Althusser Within the Neoliberal University” (presented at Western Political Science Association, 2011)
“Critical Tensions: Situating ‘Critical IR Theory’ Within a Political Economy of Higher Education,” with Raymond Duvall (presented at International Studies Association, 2010)
Research
Interests:
Globalization; IR theory; international political economy; African politics; political economy of conflict in Africa; political economy of higher education; African postcolonial theory.
Research Statement (PDF)