New book: Beside the State. Emergent Powers in Contemporary Africa

The book 'Besides the State' is edited by Alice Bellagamba and Georg Klute, and includes chapters on Mali, Chad, the DRC, Mozambique, Ghana, and East Africa. It explores various forms of emergent powers in contemporary Africa that operate beside the state and challenge its monopoly to control territories and populations. Some of these emergent powers are local, while others are regional, trans-national or even global.

Some are 'New guys' (militias, community organizations, NGOs, religious movements, TNCs) and others are 'Old fellows' (traditional leaders or chiefs and clan elders). The book addresses the internal and external factors contributing to the complex political landscape of competing, overlapping and intersecting state and non-state powers existing in Africa, and touches on the situations of conflict and para-sovereignty that it gives rise to. The Chapter by Helene Maria Kyed (DIIS) specifically explores the renewed role of the 'Old Fellows', name traditional leaders and how their recognition by the state creates a highly heterogeneous setting where local and central powers confront each other.