Prof Jennifer Robinson, Ms Varvara Karipidou, Mr Emmanuel Awohouedji, and Mr Wilfred Jana
Funding period: 1 September 2025 – 1 July 2026
Type of funding:
Seminar Series
Partner organisations: University College London (London, United Kingdom), Tallinn University (Tallinn, Estonia), and Civic Academy for Africa’s Future, (Cotonou, Benin)
Events: September 2025 in Tallinn (Estonia), February 2026 in Cotonou (Benin), and June 2026 in London (United Kingdom)
Organisers: Prof Jennifer Robinson (University College London, United Kingdom), Ms Varvara Karipidou (University College London, United Kingdom), Mr Emmanuel Awohouedji (London School of Economics and Political Science, United Kingdom) and Mr Wilfred Jana (University College London, United Kingdom)
Team members: Prof Tauri Tuvikene (Tallinn University) and Dr Expédit Ologou (University of Abomey-Calavi)
Contact: Prof Jennifer Robinson (PI-UCL)
Abstract:
This seminar series brings together scholars from and specialising in Africa and Eastern Europe to engage with analyses of urban politics, interrogating the nature of state agency and developing innovative comparative methodologies for cross-regional analysis (Stanek, 2022). It aims to bring these two contexts, each on the peripheries of urban studies and the global political economy, into closer dialogue. Both African and Eastern European contexts offer rich, underutilized insights for rethinking urban governance and statehood. They have long grappled with the complexities of state actors in urban development, challenging entrenched assumptions and opening new avenues for conceptualisation. Much of the existing theorisation on urban politics, rooted in Western contexts, fails to capture the fluid and negotiated nature of statehood in regions where institutional structures and governance mechanisms intersect with diverse actor interests including personal wealth accumulation, enhancing personal and communal networks and projecting legitimacy (Kinossian, 2012; Hagmann and Péclard, 2010). African studies has a rich literature on the nature of state power and state actors’ interests (Fourchard, 2024); and Eastern European scholars have grappled with interpreting the emergent, transitional forms of statehood after the demise of socialism (O’Dwyer, 2006). In both, colonial and socialist eras shape current state formations, and they share experiences of rapid political transitions. This provides a strong basis for initiating “comparative conversations” – posing questions from each context to influence interpretations of the other (Robinson, 2022).
The seminars will explore how African urban studies could leverage the extensive transnational connections and flows which shape developments there to engage with other contexts, linking to efforts in Eastern European scholarship to move beyond the territorial ‘containers’ of post-socialism and regional studies (Tuvikene, 2016); and they will provide an opportunity to bring Eastern European scholars’ interests in emergent, transitional institutions into conversation with the rich African studies literature on emergent and negotiated statehood. Through these seminars, we seek to inspire a new generation of scholars to think and talk with, from and across these two different regions, in a way that looks beyond places as either ‘theory production hubs’ or ‘data suppliers’ to support and contribute to existing urban debates through respectful comparative exchanges.