Publications
Articles
Urban renewal in Ibadan, Nigeria: World class but essentially Yoruba. AFRICAN AFFAIRS. 2021. Vol 120 (480) pp.391-415. (open access)
Contesting localisation in interfaith peacebuilding in northern Nigeria. OXFORD DEVELOPMENT STUDIES. 2020. Vol 48 (4) pp.373-386. (Free e-prints for those without institutional access here)
Making pandemic politics transparent: lessons from Nigeria. RENEWAL. 2020. Vol 28 (3) p. 24-28. (open access version here).
Transparency and mistrust: Who or what should be made transparent?
GOVERNANCE. July 2019. Vol 32 (3). pp.565-580. (open access here)
Beyond programmatic versus patrimonial politics: Contested conceptions of legitimate distribution in Nigeria. JOURNAL OF MODERN AFRICAN STUDIES. September 2019. Vol 57 (3) pp. 415-436. (open access here)
Review essays
The death of political possibility? Reading State and society in Nigeria 40 years on. February 2022. Review of African Political Economy, 49:171, 184-191, DOI: 10.1080/03056244.2022.2033521 (Final version on journal website. Author Accepted Manuscript available to download here.)
Book chapters
Framing and blaming: Discourse analysis of the Boko Haram uprising, July 2009 in Boko Haram: Islamism, politics, security and the state in Nigeria, ed. Pérouse de Montclos, M-A. African Studies Centre, Leiden / IFRA-Nigeria (open access)
Other publications
The Solid Facts of a Life. Wasafiri February 2022. 37:1, 52-56, DOI: 10.1080/02690055.2022.1999662
(Author Accepted Manuscript available here)
Urban renewal in Ibadan, Nigeria: World class but essentially Yoruba. AFRICAN AFFAIRS. 2021. Vol 120 (480) pp.391-415. (open access)
Contesting localisation in interfaith peacebuilding in northern Nigeria. OXFORD DEVELOPMENT STUDIES. 2020. Vol 48 (4) pp.373-386. (Free e-prints for those without institutional access here)
Making pandemic politics transparent: lessons from Nigeria. RENEWAL. 2020. Vol 28 (3) p. 24-28. (open access version here).
Transparency and mistrust: Who or what should be made transparent?
GOVERNANCE. July 2019. Vol 32 (3). pp.565-580. (open access here)
Beyond programmatic versus patrimonial politics: Contested conceptions of legitimate distribution in Nigeria. JOURNAL OF MODERN AFRICAN STUDIES. September 2019. Vol 57 (3) pp. 415-436. (open access here)
Review essays
The death of political possibility? Reading State and society in Nigeria 40 years on. February 2022. Review of African Political Economy, 49:171, 184-191, DOI: 10.1080/03056244.2022.2033521 (Final version on journal website. Author Accepted Manuscript available to download here.)
Book chapters
Framing and blaming: Discourse analysis of the Boko Haram uprising, July 2009 in Boko Haram: Islamism, politics, security and the state in Nigeria, ed. Pérouse de Montclos, M-A. African Studies Centre, Leiden / IFRA-Nigeria (open access)
Other publications
The Solid Facts of a Life. Wasafiri February 2022. 37:1, 52-56, DOI: 10.1080/02690055.2022.1999662
(Author Accepted Manuscript available here)
Working papers and drafts under review
Talking about inequality without talking about class: the politics of priority in southwest Nigeria
Despite high and rising levels of inequality in Nigeria, there is little explicit class-based politics. Rather than looking for a pre-defined set of discourses around class, this paper takes an inductive approach, what do Nigerians talk about when they talk about inequality? In particular, it focuses on a series of recent hotly-contested gubernatorial elections in Nigeria’s economically vibrant southwest region. Both major parties struggled to define the meaning of two common tropes: stomach infrastructure and Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Together these show how inequality is contested through idioms of priority, sequencing and temporality.
Under review as of September 2021. Draft available on request.
Despite high and rising levels of inequality in Nigeria, there is little explicit class-based politics. Rather than looking for a pre-defined set of discourses around class, this paper takes an inductive approach, what do Nigerians talk about when they talk about inequality? In particular, it focuses on a series of recent hotly-contested gubernatorial elections in Nigeria’s economically vibrant southwest region. Both major parties struggled to define the meaning of two common tropes: stomach infrastructure and Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Together these show how inequality is contested through idioms of priority, sequencing and temporality.
Under review as of September 2021. Draft available on request.
PRIVATIZATION OLD AND NEW: STYLIZED NARRATIVES VERSUS CHANGING REALITIES OF THE FIRM, THE PROFIT MOTIVE AND THE STATE
Despite the changing nature of privatization in practice, privatization has typically been justified with reference to a singular stylised story about the public and private sector and how each operates: the efficient but cut-throat world of private profits contrasted with the more systematic but lumbering public sector. Yet, whilst certain discourses display remarkable continuity over time, the nature of contemporary capitalism, and the state’s role within it, have undergone remarkable changes. My contention in this paper is that this stylised narrative, and its associated imaginaries, is a poor model for how private firms actually operate, and thus is misleading as a basis for debates about the benefits and costs of privatization. I take inspiration from Chiara Cordelli in The Privatised State (2020, 4) where she observes “when it gets down to it then, government today is not what many intuitively think it is.” Just as Cordelli seeks to highlight the discrepancy between popular notions of the state, in this paper I extend this process of de-familiarising to the private sector, both the firm and the profit motive. By roughly dividing the practice of privatization into phase one, ranging the late 1970s to early 2000s, which emphasised state divestiture and phase two, which champions public-private partnerships and spans from the early 1990s to today, this paper foregrounds key shifts in the conceptualisation of the public and private sector, and the realities of states and markets under changing conditions of capitalism.
Presented at the Political Studies Association Conference hosted by Queen's Belfast on 30th March 2021 and at the Development Studies Association conference, hosted by UEA on Thursday 1st July 2021.
Despite the changing nature of privatization in practice, privatization has typically been justified with reference to a singular stylised story about the public and private sector and how each operates: the efficient but cut-throat world of private profits contrasted with the more systematic but lumbering public sector. Yet, whilst certain discourses display remarkable continuity over time, the nature of contemporary capitalism, and the state’s role within it, have undergone remarkable changes. My contention in this paper is that this stylised narrative, and its associated imaginaries, is a poor model for how private firms actually operate, and thus is misleading as a basis for debates about the benefits and costs of privatization. I take inspiration from Chiara Cordelli in The Privatised State (2020, 4) where she observes “when it gets down to it then, government today is not what many intuitively think it is.” Just as Cordelli seeks to highlight the discrepancy between popular notions of the state, in this paper I extend this process of de-familiarising to the private sector, both the firm and the profit motive. By roughly dividing the practice of privatization into phase one, ranging the late 1970s to early 2000s, which emphasised state divestiture and phase two, which champions public-private partnerships and spans from the early 1990s to today, this paper foregrounds key shifts in the conceptualisation of the public and private sector, and the realities of states and markets under changing conditions of capitalism.
Presented at the Political Studies Association Conference hosted by Queen's Belfast on 30th March 2021 and at the Development Studies Association conference, hosted by UEA on Thursday 1st July 2021.
NEOPATRIMONIALISM 2.0: THE ROLE OF LARGE GRANT-FUNDED RESEARCH CENTRES IN PARADIGM MAINTENANCE
Recent calls to decolonise the university and, in particular, development studies, have problematised the way that knowledge about the developing world is controlled by elite institutions (Kwoba, Chantiluke, and Nkopo 2018). As new funding regimes create new organisational structures, the effect of large grant-funded research centres on the maintenance of old paradigms or the emergence of new ones has yet to receive scholarly attention. This paper explores how the neopatrimonialism paradigm (Mkandawire 2015) - the world view whereby politics in the global South is essentially characterised as driven by the personalistic power of calculative elites herding irrational but docile masses - has been sustained by the institutional structures of two large grant-funded research centres at a Russell Group University. The centres advance the concepts of moral populism and the political marketplace to rethink public authority in “more open and less normative” ways. Drawing on existing work on how policy paradigms are embedded in organisational structures, this paper argues that the hierarchical structure, insulation from internal critique and lack of academic accountability lead these centres to unconsciously engage in maintaining the neopatrimonialism paradigm.
Presented at CPAID and CRP Seminar Series, London School of Economics, 8th November 2018. Under review as of August 2021. Draft available on request.
Recent calls to decolonise the university and, in particular, development studies, have problematised the way that knowledge about the developing world is controlled by elite institutions (Kwoba, Chantiluke, and Nkopo 2018). As new funding regimes create new organisational structures, the effect of large grant-funded research centres on the maintenance of old paradigms or the emergence of new ones has yet to receive scholarly attention. This paper explores how the neopatrimonialism paradigm (Mkandawire 2015) - the world view whereby politics in the global South is essentially characterised as driven by the personalistic power of calculative elites herding irrational but docile masses - has been sustained by the institutional structures of two large grant-funded research centres at a Russell Group University. The centres advance the concepts of moral populism and the political marketplace to rethink public authority in “more open and less normative” ways. Drawing on existing work on how policy paradigms are embedded in organisational structures, this paper argues that the hierarchical structure, insulation from internal critique and lack of academic accountability lead these centres to unconsciously engage in maintaining the neopatrimonialism paradigm.
Presented at CPAID and CRP Seminar Series, London School of Economics, 8th November 2018. Under review as of August 2021. Draft available on request.
