Publications

Peer-reviewed articles

2024. ‘Seamless imaginaries, territorialized realities: the regional politics of corridor governance in Southern Africa’, Territory, Politics, Governance 12(8): 1073-1094. https://doi.org/10.1080/21622671.2022.2092205. [open access]

2024. (With Seth Schindler, Ilias Alami, Jessica DiCarlo, Nicholas Jepson, Steve Rolf, Mustafa Kemal Bayırbağ, Loius Cyuzuzo, Meredith DeBoom, Alireza F. Farahani, Imogen T. Liu, Hannah McNicol, Julie T. Miao, Philip Nock, Gilead Teryi, Maximiliano Facundo Vila Seoane, Kevin Ward and Yawei Zhao) ‘The Second Cold War: US-China Competition for Centrality in Infrastructure, Digital, Production Finance Networks’. Geopolitics 29(4): 1083-1120. [open access]

2023. (With Kjeld van Wieringen) ‘From loan-financed to privatised infrastructure? Tracing China’s turn towards public-private partnerships in Africa’, Journal of Current Chinese Affairs 52(3): 434-463. [open access]

2023. ‘The life and work of Professor Ian Taylor: introduction to a “special” special issue’, Contemporary Voices: St Andrews Journal of International Relations (Special issue on the life and work of Professor Ian Taylor). [open access]

2023. (With Frangton Chiyemura and Elisa Gambino) ‘Infrastructure and the politics of African state agency: shaping the Belt and Road Initiative in East Africa’, Chinese Political Science Review 8: 105–131. https://doi.org/10.1007/s41111-022-00214-8. [open access]

2022. (With Pádraig Carmody and Ricardo Reboredo) ‘From “debt diplomacy” to donorship? China’s changing role in global development’, Global Political Economy 1(2): 198–217. https://doi.org/10.1332/UZHW7185. [open access]

2022. ‘”Win-win” contested: negotiating the privatisation of Africa’s Freedom Railway with the “Chinese of today”‘, Journal of Modern African Studies 60(1): 111-134. 2022, https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022278X21000446. [open access]

2022. ‘Debt, distress, dispossession: towards a critical political economy of Africa’s financial dependency’, Review of African Political Economy 49(171): 173-183, https://doi.org/10.1080/03056244.2021.1950669. [Link to open access version]

2022. (With Pádraig Carmody and Ian Taylor) ‘China’s Spatial Fix and “Debt Diplomacy” in Africa: Constraining Belt or Road to Economic Transformation?’, Canadian Journal of African Studies 56(1): 57-77, https://doi.org/10.1080/00083968.2020.1868014. [open access]

2022. ‘The Chinese infrastructural fix in Africa: Lessons from the Sino-Zambian “road bonanza”’, Oxford Development Studies 50(1): 14-29, https://doi.org/10.1080/13600818.2020.1861230. [LINK to pre-copyedited, author-produced manuscript]

2020. (With Ian Taylor). ‘In a fix: Africa’s place in the Belt and Road Initiative and the reproduction of dependency’, South African Journal of International Affairs 2020, 27(3): 277-295, https://doi.org/10.1080/10220461.2020.1830165.

2015. (With Anthony Leysens) ‘Regionalism Revised: A Critical-reflectivist Framework for Engaging the Changing Nature of Developing Regionalisms in Africa’, Politikon: South African Journal of Political Studies 2015 42(3): 299-323, https://doi.org/10.1080/02589346.2015.1104465.

2015. (With Anthony Leysens) ‘Civil Society in Southern Africa – Transformers from Below?’, Journal of Southern African Studies 2015 41(4): 887-904, https://doi.org/10.1080/03057070.2015.1060091.

Books

2023. The political economy of China’s infrastructure development in Africa: Capital, state agency, debt. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan. [Preview of introduction]

    2024. (Co-edited with Pádraig Carmody, Mandira Bagwandeen and Anthony Leysens) Africa’s Railway Renaissance: The role and impact of China. Abingdon: Routledge. [Preview of introduction]

    Special issue

    2023. Guest editor for a special issue on the life and work of the late Professor Ian Taylor. Contemporary Voices: St Andrews Journal of International Relations.

    Book chapters

    2025 (With Pádraig Carmody and Ricardo Reboredo) ‘From “debt diplomacy” to donorship: China’s changing role in global development’, in Mayer, M., Kavalski, E., Rudyak, M. and Zhang, X. (eds.) Routledge Handbook on Global China. London: Routledge.

    2025. (With Klara Leithäuser) ‘Infrastructure and energy’, in Engel, U. (ed.) Yearbook on the African Union 2023. Volume 4. Leiden: Brill.

    2024. (With Muhidin Shangwe) ‘Contemporary geopolitics-cum-geoeconomics in East Africa: New scrambles and omni-alignments’, in Cope, Z. (ed.) The Palgrave Handbook of Contemporary Geopolitics. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan.

    2024. (With Mandira Bagwandeen) ‘Infrastructure’, in Engel, Ulf (ed.) Yearbook on the African Union 2022. Volume 3. Leiden: Brill. [Link to OPEN ACCESS book]

    2024. ‘The political economy of China’s globalising railways – and their arrival in Africa’, in Zajontz, T., Carmody, P, Bagwandeen, M. and Leysens, A. (eds.) Africa’s Railway Renaissance: The role and impact of China. Abingdon: Routledge.

    2024. ‘Chinese globalism, African regionalisms and state spatial strategies: The intricacies of regionalising Africa’s railway renaissance’, in Zajontz, T., Carmody, P., Bagwandeen, M. and Leysens, A. (eds.) Africa’s Railway Renaissance: The role and impact of China. Abingdon: Routledge.

    2024. (With Pádraig Carmody, Mandira Bagwandeen and Anthony Leysens) ‘Introduction: China’s role in Africa’s railway renaissance’, in Zajontz, T., Carmody, P, Bagwandeen, M. and Leysens, A. (eds.) Africa’s Railway Renaissance: The role and impact of China. Abingdon: Routledge. [Chapter can be downloaded in the “Preview PDF” on the Taylor & Francis website]

    2023 . ‘Infrastructure’, in Engel, Ulf (ed.) Yearbook on the African Union 2021. Volume 2. Leiden: Brill. [Link to OPEN ACCESS book]

    2022. ‘Railway imperialisms in East Africa: Laying the tracks for exploitation’, in Cope, Zak and Ness, Immanuel (eds.) Oxford Handbook of Economic Imperialism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    2021. ‘Infrastructure’, in Engel, Ulf (ed.) Yearbook on the African Union 2020. Volume 1. Leiden: Brill. [Link to OPEN ACCESS book]

    2021. (With Ian Taylor) ‘Capitalism and Africa’s (Infra)Structural Dependency: A Story of Spatial Fixes and Accumulation by Dispossession‘, in Oritsejafor, E.O. and Cooper, A.D. (eds.) Africa and the Global System of Capital Accumulation. Routledge.

    Non-refereed articles and op-eds (selected)

    2023. (With Ricardo Reboredo and Pádraig Carmody) ‘The geopolitics of debt in Africa’, Review of African Political Economy Blog.

    2022. ‘Tanzania and Zambia want to upgrade the ‘Uhuru Railway’ – but can they?’, The Conversation. [also published in, amongst others, Beijing Bulletin, AllAfrica, Modern Ghana]

    2022. ‘Tanzania and Zambia want to upgrade Tazara – but can they?, The Citizen (Dar es Salaam), 21 September.

    2022. ‘Remembering Ian Taylor’, Developing Economics.

    2022. ‘Remembering Ian Taylor’, African Studies Association of the UK (ASAUK) Newsletter 27(107): 8-12.

    2021. ‘China and Africa’s Debt Crisis’, The Elephant.

    2021. ‘China’s spatial fix and Africa’s debt reckoning’, Review of African Political Economy Blog.

    2019. ‘”Fixing” Africa’s infrastructure: But at what price?’, Pambazuka News, 13 February, LINK to article.

    2019. ‘”Fixing” Africa’s infrastructure: But at what price? Problematising Chinese infrastructure development in Africa’, St Andrews Africa Summit Review 3(1): 4-7.

    2018. ‘Vom Freiheits- zum Überlebenskampf: Die TAZARA auf der Suche nach der Erfolgsspur’, Afrika Süd 2018(1): 29-31.

    2018. ‘From the freedom struggle to a fight for economic survival: Tanzania-Zambia Railway Authority (TAZARA)’, St Andrews Africa Summit Review 2(1): 15-18.

    2017. ‘The demise of the post-apartheid consensus and South Africa’s search for leadership’, St Andrews Africa Summit Review 1(1): 16-17.