News & Events

Current land tenure literature is mostly geared towards the various regimes of tenure, land registration, and establishing a cadastre in order to reduce transaction costs and guarantee investor confidence. The crucial role played by land brokers is rarely mentioned. Indeed, the term ‘land broker’ or equivalent is entirely missing from the land tenure lexicon. In this working paper, Marcel Rutten and Moses Mwangi share the most recent experiences in the emergence of formal land markets, and examine the underrated role of brokers in the transfer of land in Kenya.

Marcel Rutten writes about the little attention development cooperation with Africa received in the Dutch election campaign. The Dutch Party for the Animals did point to climate change causing people to suffer most from weather vagaries, as witnessed in Africa's drylands. The party has also called for the protection of wildlife. By doing so it touches on a dilemma: the expansion of land set aside for wild animals makes a growing nomadic pastoralist population less resilient. Read Rutten's blog.

On the occasion of the seminar on ‘The Beeker Method: Planning and Working on the Redevelopment of the African City’, jointly organized by the ASCL and African Architecture Matters on 23 March, the ASCL Library has compiled a web dossier on urban architecture and urban planning. The dossier opens with an introduction by Dr. Antoni Folkers (African Architecture Matters), and concludes with links to relevant websites. Read the web dossier.

Turtle 1: building a car in Africa tells the story of the Turtle, a car built entirely from reused or hand-made car parts, in Suame Magazine, an industrial zone in Kumasi, Ghana. This car-building project, initiated by visual artist Melle Smets and researcher Joost van Onna, is at the cutting edge of action research and art. It is the subject of our latest Library Highlight!

This LeidenASA lecture is organized by Dr Mamoudou Sy. The speaker, Biram Dah Abeid, is a Mauritanian politician and advocate for the abolition of slavery. He was listed as one of "10 People Who Changed the World You Might Not Have Heard Of" by PeaceLinkLive in 2014. He has also been called the Mauritanian Nelson Mandela by online news organisation Middleeasteye.net. Biram Dah Abeid received the United Nations Prize in the Field of Human Rights in 2013. The lecture itself will be in French (see the abstract below). After the lecture a 20 minute film (in English) will be shown on contemporary slavery. The lecture will be introduced by Dr Mayke Kaag and Dr Mamoudou Sy. There will be time for questions and discussion.

We proudly inform you that our senior researcher Dr Chibuike Uche has been appointed as the Chair holder for the new Stephen Ellis Chair for the Governance of Finance and Integrity in Africa at Leiden University. The Chair starts on 1 April and will be funded by the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs for the first three years. On 4 April, the Netherlands’ outgoing Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr Bert Koenders, will officially launch the Chair with a special video message. Dr Chibuike Uche will give a presentation. You are kindly invited to this event.