Anti-Black Ontologies of the ‘Human’ as a Problem for International Relations

Organised by the Intersectional Humanities Research Hub, and the African Languages, Literatures and Cultures TORCH Network
Friday 3 May 2024
Speaker: Ola Osman (University of Cambridge)
Moderated by Dorothée Boulanger (University of Oxford), and Cinthya Cecilia Alvarado Rivera (University of Oxford)
In exploring the conventional treatment of the transatlantic slave economy and 'post-colonial armed rebel movements in Africa' as separate phenomena, this talk challenges the disciplinary boundaries of International Relations (IR). Drawing on Clausewitz’s notion of war as 'politics by other means,' this talk interrogates how the enduring legacies of colonialism and racial slavery shape contemporary systems, ideologies, and scholarly methods in IR. I propose an epistemic shift to understand Africa's 'unending' wars not merely as puzzles but as manifestations of historical and systemic racial injustices, particularly reflecting on U.S. plantation racism's global influence. The case of Liberia, with its unique history as a settlement for emancipated Africans, serves as a critical site for re-evaluating the broader impacts of the slave trade on continental African communities. Despite extensive historical literature, the analysis of race and racialization within these dynamics remains meagre. This talk aims to address these critical gaps by drawing on the theoretical protocols of Afro-pessimism to comprehend the geopolitical landscape of Liberia, and it suggests new terrains for understanding the influence of geopolitics on post-conflict situations in sub-Saharan Africa.