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Research paper
Competition, patronage and fragmentation : the limits of bottom-up approaches to security governance in Ituri
People are affected by different kinds of insecurity in the Ituri Province in the northeastern DRC. This article investigates donor-driven attempts to improve security governance there. More specifically, it investigates bottom-up approaches to security governance in Ituri’s capital of Bunia…
Book chapter
Urbanisation and the Political Geographies of Violent Struggle for Power and Control: Mining Boomtowns in Eastern Congo
This chapter addresses rural–urban transformations in the Kivu provinces, DRC, and more particularly focuses on the complex relationship between dynamics of violent conflict and the emergence of urban mining ‘boomtowns’. Mining towns offer fascinating sites from which to investigate the…
Research paper
Between Tags & Guns: Fragmentations of public authority around eastern Congo’s artisanal 3T mines
This essay addresses the current dynamics governing access to artisanal mineral markets in eastern Congo’s two Kivu provinces, an area caught in over two decades of protracted and multi-scalar armed conflict. It examines how public authority is fragmented and (re-)shaped…
Briefing
Understanding Armed Group Proliferation in the Eastern Congo
Due to the proliferation of smaller armed groups and the disappearance and scattering of larger rebel movements, the armed group landscape of the eastern Congo has become increasingly fragmented. This fragmentation results from the interplay between the growing engagement of…
Background report
Stable Instability: Political settlements and armed groups in the Congo
This report analyses the stability, inclusivity and levels of violence of both the political settlement of the Congo as a whole and of political settlements in the conflict-ridden east. It shows that in each of these political arenas, armed groups…
Research paper
‘Living between Two Lions’: Civilian Protection Strategies during Armed Violence in the Eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo
This article examines how civilians assess, negotiate with, and in some cases deceive armed actors in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). It demonstrates that civilians not only navigate the precarious and unpredictable conditions within armed conflict, but…
Research paper
Courses au pouvoir: the struggle over customary capital in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo
This article analyses the production and reproduction of traditional chieftaincy in war-torn eastern DRC through the case of a succession dispute in Kalima (South Kivu). Kalima has seen two decades of political instability and violent conflict involving numerous local, national…
Background report
Indirect Rule in Armed Conflict: Theoretical Insights from Eastern DRC
Building on the analogy between armed factions in contemporary conflict settings and states in the making, this paper explores the conditions under which indirect rule emerges in contexts of armed conflict, and the consequences that this governance arrangement has on…
Blog
The many faces of the COVID-19 mask in Eastern DRC
The introduction of the mask during the COVID-19 outbreak changed daily life in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo and took many faces. From state repression in the city of Goma, to fear of the unknown in rural areas, the mask…
Blog
Humanitarianism in Uganda: Outcast in your own Home
Through the accounts of Evelyn and Mary’s lives with the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), Jacky Atingo and Melissa Parker ask why programmes funded by humanitarian agencies have done little to protect vulnerable people.
Blog
Returning from the LRA: obedience, stoicism and silence
Research with Ugandan women and their children, fourteen years after their return from life with the Lord’s Resistance Army, highlights the inter-generational dimensions of war and conflict. Obedience, stoicism and silence enabled their survival, and now shapes their day-to-day lives.…
Research paper
Maternal Vaccination in Uganda: Exploring Pregnant Women, Community Leaders and Healthcare Workers’ Perceptions
This research used qualitative methods to explore pregnant women, community leaders, healthcare workers, and programme managers’ perceptions of maternal vaccination in Kampala, Uganda. The authors found that public health messaging should target all community members, including partners and parents of…
Blog
What it means to be a ‘refugee’ in South Sudan and Uganda
After decades of armed conflict in South Sudan and Uganda, labels of ‘refugee’ and ‘internally displaced person’ fail to reflect the complex realities of the people they refer to. This blog post examines the history of movement across the region’s…
Blog
Lord’s Resistance Army hierarchies survive in peace time
Recent research suggests that the lives of women who have returned from extended periods with the Lord’s Resistance Army greatly vary. This blog post describes how these differences often depend on what kind of authority they commanded with the LRA…
Blog
Flattening the curve of Uganda’s coronavirus
The logic of flattening the curve should be treated differently where there are few health services to be overwhelmed, and people need to work in the day to eat at night. This blog post describes how lockdown in Uganda deserves…
Blog
Do COVID-19 conspiracy theories challenge public health delivery?
The Ugandan government’s severe response to Covid-19 has encouraged endless debate over the virus’ origins, in the face of unclear global explanations. Conspiracy theories and rumours proliferate, especially in regions with no recorded infections. This blog post explores how local…
Blog
In Uganda memories of Ebola spur resistance to COVID-19 public health efforts
Responses to COVID-19 vary across Uganda, with northern regions seeing resistance to public health efforts to enforce quarantine. For some communities the location of isolation and treatment centres, in particular, has caused public outrage, reviving memories of the 2000 Ebola…
Blog
How do we measure the effectiveness of lockdown in Uganda against COVID-19?
In regions where state health systems are weak and premature death is common, it is possible for COVID-19 to have swept many parts of the world unnoticed, without the virus’ mass global awareness. This blog post reports from Uganda on…
Blog
Dispelling COVID-19 rumours at local levels in Pakwach, Uganda
Rumours can have significant consequences for how local communities engage their health systems, posing problems for epidemic containment which can rely on trust in state actors. This blog post examines rumours associated with COVID-19 in the Pakwach district of Uganda,…
Blog
Humanitarian diagnostics for sleeping sickness in Uganda
A key impetus for the invention of a Rapid Diagnostic Test (RDT) for sleeping sickness (also known as human African trypanosomiasis or HAT) was the persuasive advocacy for better ‘field ready tools’ by medical humanitarian agencies such as Médecins Sans…
Blog
Why is there Need for Long-Term Investment in the Uganda Virus Research Institute, The Home of Zika?
In this post, the authors offer a grounded account of Zika virus, one in which its discovery is an entry point into a broader history of the UVRI and the people who worked there. In doing so, they combine autobiographical…
Blog
When ‘a People’s War’ Turns Against Them: Reflections on Uganda’s ‘War of the Wananchi’ against COVID-19
With the incumbent President facing a critical election in early 2021, the truths over COVID-19 in Uganda became highly contested, as measures announced in the name of the people against COVID-19 began to double as interventions against the spread of…
Blog
“Escaping from Quarantine” from Quarantined: My Ordeal in Uganda’s Covid-19 Isolation Centers
Ugandan intellectual and philosopher, Jimmy Spire Ssentongo has painted a behind-the-scenes picture of how the Ugandan state handled the coronavirus disease. While the Ugandan president praised self and staff for putting the coronavirus in check through the state’s isolation centres,…
Blog
The Logic of Contesting States During a Crisis: Revelations from Uganda’s COVID-19 Fight
This piece examines state legitimacy during the COVID-19 pandemic in Uganda. It examines various contestations to this legitimacy, such as the Mbarara University of Science and Technology (MUST) student strike. The strike reveals how state institutions condition(ed) public indifference with…
Research paper
The political economy of landslides and international aid relief: a qualitative investigation in rural Uganda
Linking environmental degradation in Bududa to political, economic, and social factors provides a broader context in which to view risk from landslides in this community, as a critical case in demonstrating how economic globalization benefits some at the expense of…
Research paper
‘When I die, let me be the last.’ Community health worker perspectives on past Ebola and Marburg outbreaks in Uganda
This paper describes findings from interviews with health workers from three outbreaks of Ebola and Marburg virus disease.
Research paper
Geographical versus social displacement: the politics of return and post-war recovery in Northern Uganda
The civil war in Northern Uganda in the period 1986–2006 fundamentally altered former ways of life and created diverse and complex needs. Protracted conflict and displacement create, reveal, and enforce vulnerability, which can undermine resilience. Based on in-depth interviews with…
Research paper
Protection and well-being of adolescent refugees in the context of a humanitarian crisis: Perceptions from South Sudanese refugees in Uganda
Improved understanding of refugees’ perceptions of provision of humanitarian support in these contexts is important to improve design and delivery of humanitarian assistance. Refugee adolescents displaced to low and middle-income countries face a range of adversities. The authors explored one…
Research paper
Pandemics and soft power: HIV/AIDS and Uganda on the global stage
The COVID-19 outbreak of 2020 threatened years of effort by the Chinese authorities to extend its influence around the world. As with COVID-19, HIV/AIDS presented a fundamental threat not only to countries’ internal social stability and population health, but also…
Research paper
COVID-19, Public Authority and Enforcement
The securitization of health is not a new phenomenon. However, global responses to the 2014–2016 Ebola outbreak in West Africa reveal the extent to which epidemic preparedness and response is now shaped by geopolitical concerns. This commentary describes how enforcement…
Research paper
Moving Toward ‘Home’: Love and Relationships through War and Displacement
This article calls for greater attention to spatial considerations and proposes the concept of movement as an integral dimension of understanding affinal relationships. This observation is derived from reflections on how the experiences of displacement and return in northern Uganda…
Research paper
Challenges to Ebola preparedness during an ongoing outbreak: An analysis of borderland livelihoods and trust in Uganda
Ebola Virus Disease in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) was declared a public health emergency of international concern on July 17, 2019. The first case to cross the border into Uganda in June 2019 demonstrates the importance of better…
Research paper
Experiences of the one-health approach by the Uganda Trypanosomiasis Control Council and its secretariat in the control of zoonotic sleeping sickness in Uganda
Elimination of sleeping sickness from endemic countries like Uganda is key if the affected communities are to exploit the potential of the available human and livestock resources (production and productivity). Trypanosoma brucei rhodesiense, the parasite that causes acute sleeping sickness…
Research paper
Land is now the biggest gun: climate change and conflict in Karamoja, Uganda
Places that are both recovering from violent conflict and dependent on natural recourses face the overlapping challenges of reducing the risk of recurring conflict, promoting economic recovery, and ensuring sustainable environmental management: all challenges exacerbated by climate change. This article…
Research paper
COVID-19 and Its Related Stigma A Qualitative Study Among Survivors in Kampala, Uganda
COVID-19-related stigma is gradually becoming a global problem among COVID-19 survivors with deleterious effects on quality of life. However, this social problem has received little attention in research and policy. This study aimed at exploring the COVID-19-related stigma among survivors…
Research paper
Institutional vulnerabilities, COVID-19, resilience mechanisms and societal relationships in developing countries
COVID-19 pandemic challenges could be utilised as an opportunity to reform government institutions to develop resilience measures that would potentially meet contemporary and future challenges. This article highlights that the current approach of institutions has failed to meet societal need.…
