Rather than academic ‘quibbling’, as is often suggested by those who perpetuate the ‘Irish were slaves too’ meme, the differences and commonalities between these two forms of unfree labour are of fundamental importance to our understanding of the development of racialised perpetual chattel slavery in the Anglo-American colonies.

A chronicle and analysis of Frederick Douglass’ visit to Limerick (1845)

In the 1960s, the concept of development became increasingly intertwined with conceptions of independence amongst Basotho. Politicians and administrators before and after independence wanted to use development to legitimize their rule and consolidate power for a fairly weak central government. Their inability to procure funding for large projects…[Read more]

An Introduction to the special issue of the International Journal of African Historical Studies on Localizing the History of Development in Africa.

This article tells the story of Maleseko Kena, a woman born in South Africa but who lived most of her adult life in rural Lesotho. It narrates how her story of helping apartheid refugees cross the border and move onward complicates understandings of what the international border, belonging, and citizenship meant for individuals living near it. By…[Read more]

The rhetoric of development served as a language for Sotho politicians from 1960–70 to debate the meanings of political participation. The relative paucity of aid in this period gave outsized importance to small projects run in rural villages, and stood in stark contrast to the period from the mid-1970s onwards when aid became an ‘…[Read more]