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Talks

Book Talks for ‘The Ideological Scramble for Africa’

University of Trento, Trento, Italy, 26 April 2022.
Africa Talks seminar series Department of African Studies and Anthropology, the University of Birmingham, 19 April 2023, 3:15-4:45.

Events Organized

2022

Workshop ‘Colonialism on the Public Stage: Courts, Commissions and the Making of an ‘Official’ Colonial Memory, The Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities and Social Sciences (NIAS), Amsterdam, 9 November 2022.

Part of the organizing Committee, 2022 European Summer School on the (Global) Cold War, 29 August-31 August 2022, Barchem, the Netherlands (with Laurien Crump)
Conference ‘East African Regionalism in Uncertain Times: Historical Legacies, Contemporary Challenges and Future Prospects’, Conference on Arts and Humanities Research Council and the British Institute in Eastern Africa, Nairobi, 23 July 2022.
2022 Public Seminar Series, ‘Unsettling Knowledge’, monthly series on the decolonization of research and teaching, organized for the Decolonisation Group.
‘The World of Anton de Kom’, Workshop at Utrecht University, 26 April 2022 (Together with Rachel Gillett).

2021

Part of the organizing Committee, 2021 European Summer School on the (Global) Cold War, 1-3 September 2021 (with Utrecht University and the London School of Economics) (Laurien Crump, Lorena De Vita, Corina Mavrodin, Eline van Ommen, Paschalis Pechlivanis)

Workshop, Market Revolutionaries Digital Workshop: An Interdisciplinary Workshop on Neoliberalism and the Global South, by the Decolonisation Group, Utrecht University, 28-19 May 2021 (https://decolonisationgrou.wixsite.com/neoliberalismglobal).
2021 Public Seminar Series, ‘Unsettling Knowledge’, monthly series on the decolonization of research and teaching, organized for the Decolonisation Group.
Part of the scientific committee for Conference, ‘Occidentalism: The West since 1945’ at the University of Paris, the Fall of 2021. [cancelled]

2020

Workshop, ‘Neoliberalism and the Third World Project: How Neoliberal Development Programs reshaped international relations in the 1970s and 1980s’, Utrecht University, 2-3 June 2020.
Part of the scientific committee for Conference, ‘Spores of Empire’ Utrecht University, January 2020.

2019

Workshop, ‘Visions of African Unity’, University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa, 4-6 March 2019. (organized together with Matteo Grilli, https://visionsofafricanunity.wordpress.com/)

2018

Workshop, ‘Decolonisation Focus Meetings: Elise van Nederveen Meerkerk, ‘Women, work and colonialism in the Netherlands and Java’, 6 December 2018.
Workshop, Settler Colonialism at the Bar: A Workshop with Brenda Bhandar, Utrecht University, Utrecht, 4-5 October 2018. (organized together with Rachel Gillett, https://www.decolonisationgroup.com/settler-colonialism-at-the-bar-2018)
Film Viewing, ‘Invictus’, Shanghai University, 13 September 2018.
Film Viewing, ‘Black Panther’ and Q&A, Theater ‘t Hoogt, Utrecht, 6 June 2018 (together with Rachel Gillett and the Uglobe Decolonisation Group).

2017

Panel on ‘Global Africa and Cold War Diplomacy (1950s-1970s)’ for the Annual Meeting of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR), Arlington, VA, 22-24 June 2017, with Elizabeth Schmidt, Alessandro Iandolo and Lazlo Passemiers.

2014

Workshop: ‘The Cold War in the Benelux’, Leuven, 19 December 2014, with Kim Christiaens.

2013

Two panels on ‘Africa and the Cold War’ for the Annual Meeting of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR), Arlington, VA, 20-22 June 2013, with Jim Meriwether, Jason Parker, Ryan Irwin, Alessandro Iandolo, Katrin Zippel, Luke Nichter, Philip Muehelenbeck and Hannah Higgen.

Invited Lectures (as Separate Events)

Public lecture on ‘Managing Modernization’: JFK’s and LBJ’s efforts to transform the anticolonial Project in Africa (1960-1966)’, public lecture, Charles University, Prague, 12 December 2017.
‘The Ideological Scramble for Africa: How the Dream of African Development Reshaped a Continental Cold War (1945-1966)’, Seminaire, Institut Français, Johannesburg, South Africa, 1 June 2016

Papers Presented

2023

‘Anticolonial Capitalism: Ghana, Jerry Rawlings and UNCTAD (1981-1992)’, ‘Closing the Global Inequality Gulf: UNCTAD and the World’ with Glenda Sluga, Alessandro Iandolo, Stella Krepp and Vivien Chang, American Historical Association (AHA), Philadelphia, 5-8 January 2023.

2022

‘Panel: African Diplomacy: Unique or Part of the Global’, with Frank Gerits, Matteo Grilli, Mark Deets, Michelle Moyd, Nana Osei-Opare, African Studies Association Annual Meeting, Philadelphia, PA, 17–19 November 2022.
Chair and discussant of panel ‘Panel 5: Alternative Internationalisms’ at ‘Making and Breaking Global Order in the Twentieth Century’, Leiden, 14-15 October 2022.
‘Africa and the Cold War’, Cold War Summer Symposium, Barchem, 29-31 August 2022.
‘Decolonisation of higher education in practice’, with Rachel Gillett, Decolon-Ice Seminar, Reykjavik, 31 August-1 September 2022.
‘Spreading the News Session: New Histories of Postcolonial Ideas’, with Ozan Ozavci, Rachel Gillett and Esther Captain), Historicidagen (History Days), Rotterdam, 25-27 August 2022.
‘Safeguarding the East African Economic Order: The Relationship between The European Economic Community and the East African Community (1967-1977)’, ‘East African Regionalism in Uncertain Times: Historical Legacies, Contemporary Challenges and Future Prospects’, Conference on Arts and Humanities Research Council and the British Institute in Eastern Africa, Nairobi, 23 July 2022
Chair of ‘Beyond Left and Right: Case Studies on the United States and the Cold War in the Global South’, with Thomas Field, Laila Ballout, Abou Bamba and Brad Simpson, SHAFR Annual Meeting, New Orleans, 16-18 June 2022.
‘Anticolonial Capitalism: Ghana, Jerry Rawlings and UNCTAD (1981-1992)’, ‘Closing the Global Inequality Gulf: UNCTAD and the World’ with Glenda Sluga, Alessandro Iandolo, Stella Krepp and Vivien Chang, SHAFR Annual Meeting, New Orleans, 16-18 June 2022.
‘Anticolonial Capitalism: the emergence of Afro-Asian Neoliberal Development Theory in the 1970s’, GIB Symposium, International History Section Conference at Utrecht University, 3 June 2022.
‘Orality in Diplomatic History Roundtable’, with Harry Mace and Sigrun Marie Moss, European University Institute's (EUI) Diplomatic and International History Working Group, 16 May 2022 (online, by invitation).
‘Parallel lives, diverging legacies?: Paul Panda Farnana and Anton de Kom’, Anton de Kom’s We Slaves of Suriname and the Francophone Atlantic, with Rachel Anne Gillett, Kesewa John, Francio Guadeloupe, French Colonial Historical Society Meeting, Charlotteville, NC, 12-14 May 2022.
‘Parallel Lives: Anton de Kom and Paul Panda Farnana’, The World of Anton De Kom, 26 April 2022.
‘Anticolonial Capitalism: Ghana as a Laboratory of Neoliberal Development Theory (1981-1992)’, Institutional Challenges and Policy Responses: A PPE Conference, Utrecht, 7 April 2022.
‘Eurocentrism and historical research’, Seminar of the History Department at Utrecht University, 4 April 2022.
‘Europe’s Last Colonies’, Europe Cluster, Utrecht University, 18 January 2022.

2021

‘The EEC and East Africa (1960s-1980s). A First Impression from the Archives’, Workshop on East Africa and Regional integration AHRC Projects (organized by Chris Vaughan and Emma Hunter), 9 November 2021 (online).
‘Cold War asymmetries in a decolonizing Africa (1950s-1960s)’, Cold War (A)symmetries: Conflict, Cooperation and Trade, 28-19 October 2021 (online).

‘Europe’s Last Colonies’, Global and International Relations Group at Utrecht University, 28 September 2021.
Chair/commentator, “The Challenges of Writing an International History of Congo: International, Colonial or African Perspective?”, SHAFR Annual Meeting, June 17-20, 2021 (online event).
‘Moral Empire: Belgium and the Global South’, The Moral Empire at Large: Religion and the Diplomacy of Colonialism and Decolonization in Central Africa. SHAFR Annual Meeting, June 17-20, 2021 (online event).
‘Market Liberation: a History of Neoliberal Aid Programmes and the African Development Bank (1944-1989)’, ‘Workshop ‘Towards a Global Intellectual History of an Unequal World, 1945-Today’, 10-11 June 2021(online event).
‘Closing Remarks’, Workshop, Market Revolutionaries Digital Workshop: An Interdisciplinary Workshop on Neoliberalism and the Global South, by the Decolonisation Group, Utrecht University, 28-29 May 2021 (https://decolonisationgrou.wixsite.com/neoliberalismglobal).
Chair/Commentator for panel ‘PS5: Panel C: Security, Multilateral and Bilateral Diplomacy’ with Margot Tudor, Philip Dehne, Thomas Soden and Fintan Hoey, Diplomacy between Crisis and Cooperation, Fourth Conference of the New Diplomatic History Network, 26-28 May 2021 (online event).
‘South Africa, the EEC and the African Dimension of Diplomatic History (1945-1985), Diplomacy between Crisis and Cooperation, Fourth Conference of the New Diplomatic History Network, panel with Maurits Ebben, François Doppler-Speranza and Elisabeth Carbó Catalan, 26-28 May 2021 (online event).
Chair/Commentator, ‘Panel by Karwan Fatah-Black and Stephen Snelders’, Workshop Spores of Empires Workshop at Utrecht University, 21-23 April 2021 (Online Event).
Chair, ‘Imperial Artefacts. History, Law, and the Looting of Cultural Property’, 28-29 January 2021 (online event).

2020

‘Neoliberalism in the Global South: the African Development Bank and changing ideas about development’, Global History of State-Enterprises, Digital Workshop, 26-27 November 2020 (https://historysoe.net/, online).
Panel on Decolonising Teaching, ‘The Decolonisation Group Teaching Workshop: an in-house workshop to share our own teaching experiences and practices’, 15 October 2020 (online).
Chair, ‘Africa in U.S. Foreign Policy’ with Sobukwe Odinga, Yohann C. Ripert, Raquel Abimbola Adekoye and James Farquharson, the Annual Meeting of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR), "Gulfs, Seas, Oceans, Empires”, New Orleans, 18-20 June 2020. [cancelled due to COVID-19]
Roundtable Participant to, ‘Roundtable about the Roundtable: Congo’s history’, with Alex Marino, Georges Nzongola-Ntalaja, Eva Schalbroeck and Lisa Namikas, the Annual Meeting of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR), "Gulfs, Seas, Oceans, Empires”, New Orleans, 18-20 June 2020. [cancelled due to COVID-19]
South Africa, the EEC and the African Dimension of International History (1945-1985), Decolonization Workshop, Institute of Commonwealth Studies, The Court Room, Senate House, London, 16 March 2020. [postponed due to COVID-19, organized as a Zoom Meeting]

2019

'Modern’ IR Theory: How Modernisation Theory Redefined African Anticolonial Politics as Emotion (1945-1966)', Workshop of the 'Emotions in PIR' working group, London South Bank University, 9 December 2019.
Participant in ‘C6: Inclusievere voetnoten/More Inclusive Footnotes’, with Dirk Alkemade, Mineke Bosch, Frank Gerits, Norah Karrouche, Marleen Reichgelt, Larissa Schulte Nordholt, Historici Dagen/History Days, 24 August 2019

‘The Politics of Pity: Johnson’s Policy Towards Africa (1963-1969)’, British International History Group Annual Meeting, as part of ‘The African Cold War’ panel with Poppy Cullen, Jan Koura and Natalia Telepneva, University of Lancaster, 5-7 September 2019
Chair, ‘Brainstorm Session: Towards a Knowledge Consortium: Decolonization/Empire/Colonialism’, Rise Up. Take a Knee: Popular Culture and Protest in Decolonizing Societies, Uglobe UU Workshop, 27-28 June 2019.
Participant Roundtable, ‘Writing Multi-centric History: The Future of International History and its Multiple Perspectives’, with Erez Manela, Cindy Ewing, Stella Krepp and Ryan Irwin, the Annual Meeting of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR), Arlington, VA, 20-22 June 2019.
Chair/commentator, ‘Global Networks of White Rage: Right Wing Internationalism in the Cold War and Beyond’, with Alex Marino, Kyle Burke, Augusta Dell’Omo, the Annual Meeting of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR), Arlington, VA, 20-22 June 2019.
‘Brainstorming/network session - Consortium grant possibilities/future work together: Led by Rachel Gillett and Frank Gerits’, Workshop "Rise UP, take a knee: Popular Culture and protest in decolonising societies", Utrecht University, Utrecht, 27-28 June 2019.
‘The Afterlives of the European Security Culture in the Global South: the long history of the relationship between Eurafrica and the OAU (1885-1963), as part of ‘The Global South during the Cold War’ panel with Emma Hunter, Alessandro Iandolo and Alanna O’Malley, International History and Diplomacy in the Twentieth Century, Liverpool John Moores University, 31 May 2019.
‘Roundtable discussion on Africa: Africa and the Cold War’, ‘Organizing the Cold War’: Workshop on the Encyclopedia of the Cold War, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, 24 May 2019.
‘The Ideological Scramble for Africa (1945-1966)’, Médias, propagande et décolonisations africaines (1946-1975), Workshop at Université de Lille, 25 April 2019.
‘The Future of pan-African history’, Workshop, ‘Visions of African Unity’, University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa, 4 March 2019.

2018

‘The Ideological Scramble for Africa’, Seminar of the Center for Global Development, Shanghai University, Shanghai, 20 September 2018.
‘African conceptions of the international system (1950s-1960s)’, the Annual Meeting of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR), Philadelphia, PA, 21-23 June 2018.
‘LBJ and Africa (1963-69)’, HOTCUS Annual Conference, Madingley Conference Centre, Cambridge, 13-15 June 2018
‘Conferencing the Third World’, Workshop Challenging the Liberal World Order: the history of the Global South, decolonization and the United Nations, 1955-2000’, Leiden University, 8-9 May 2018.
'Things Fall Apart: The Congo Crisis and The Ideological Scramble for Africa 1960-1961', Research meeting of international and political history at Utrecht University, Utrecht, 15 May 2018.
‘Amílcar Cabral, the Diplomat and the PR threat (1964-1974)’, Amílcar Cabral: The “Anonymous Fighter” for the Mankind Fundamental Freedoms, Lisbon, 1-2 March 2018.
‘Bandung and Afro-Asian Competition’, Annual Meeting of the American Historical Association (AHA), Washington DC, 4-7 January 2018.

2017

‘The unexpected turn in international history: multi-centrism and the ambivalent place of the postcolonial archive in rethinking the international history of the 20th century’, invited seminar presentation, Cold War Group, Charles University, Prague, 13 December 2017
Commentator of Artemy Kalinovsky, ‘Laboratory of Socialist Development’, Cold War History Seminar, Utrecht University, 23 November 2017
‘The American Politics of Pity: CARE and NGOs in Africa (1945-2015)’, NAAS, the Twenty-Fifth Biennial Conference of the Nordic Association for American Studies, “American Colors: Across the Disciplinary Spectrum”, Odense, Denmark, 22-24 May 2017.
‘The Reluctant Soft Power: The EEC’s self-perception in light of its Africa Policy’, 1989 and the West, Utrecht University, 20-21 April 2017.
Discussant of panel ‘Travelling beyond the Eastern Bloc’, Crossing the Iron Curtain: Tourism and Travelling in the Cold War, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, 7-8 April 2017.
‘Unravelling the Belgian Colonial Ideology: the Belgian Civilizing Mission in a Comparative Perspective (1945-1966)’, Benelux: Europe and the Cold War: The Power of non-powers and perspectives on the economic, social and political aspects of European Security Strategy in the early Cold War, Luxembourg, 30-31 March 2017.
‘French Cultural Diplomacy in the Ideological Scramble for Africa (1953-1963)’, Beyond Françafrique: France outside of its traditional sphere of African influence (19th – 21th centuries), University of Portsmouth, 22 February 2017.
‘The Ideological Scramble for Africa: How the Dream of Development reshaped a Continental Cold War’ (1945-1966), Seminar of the Modern History Group, University of Amsterdam, 10 January 2017.

2016

‘The Brown Man’s Burden: Developmental Thought and the Bandung Conference (1955-1956)’, Global dynamics, national economies, and statehood in Africa and Asia, 1945-1979 Workshop, Osaka University, Osaka, Japan, 28-30 September 2016.
Decolonization Capstone Conference, Washington D.C., 5-7 July 2016.
‘The American Politics of Pity (1960s-1980s)’, biennial conference of the European Association for American Studies, Constanta, Romania, 22-25 April 2016.
Decolonizing the African Mind, Building the Nkrumaist Man: The Kwame Nkrumah Ideological Institute in Ghanaian and Global Context, 1961-1966 (together with Gerardo Serra), ‘African Socialism/Socialism in Africa’, Paris, 7-9 April 2016.
Competing Continental Agendas: European Integration and African Union through African Eyes (1945-1969), Conference From Empires to Empire? European Integration in Global Context, 1950s to 1990s, Berlin, 7-8 April 2016.
Chair/Commentator Panel: “Lumumba in Theatre”, Raoul Peck and the Iconography of Lumumba, University of Antwerp, Antwerp, 17-19 February 2016.
‘Nkrumah’s Critique, Macmillan’s Fears: The Export of a Western Concept and the African Nationalist Rejection of a Western Concept’, ‘Reconsidering Democracy and the Nation State in a Global Perspective’, Leiden University, Leiden, 14-16 January 2016.

2015

‘The International Politics of Pity: American NGOs and the Struggle to Control Development’, the Historical Network Research International Conference, Lisbon, Portugal, 15-18 September 2015.
‘The International Politics of Pity: American NGOs and the Struggle to Control Development’, Trans-Atlantic Studies Association, 14th Annual Conference, Middelburg, The Netherlands, 6-8 July 2015.
Chair and commentator, ‘Panel: Public Faces Private Places: Advocating Change in Domestic and International Politics’, Trans-Atlantic Studies Association, 14th Annual Conference, Middelburg, The Netherlands, 6-8 July 2015.
‘Kennedy, Nkrumah and the pan-African Definition of Non-Alignment’, panel on Non-Alignment with Robert Vitalis, Jason Parker, Robert Rakove, Rinna Kuulla and Michelle Reeves, Annual Meeting of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR), Arlington, VA, 25-27 June 2015.
‘The Ideological Scramble for Africa: How Shifting Ideas about Development Shaped the Cold War’, New York University-Tamiment Library Center for the United States and the Cold War, New York, 30 April 2015.
Chair and commentator of Christopher Dietrich, ‘Oil Elites, State Rights, and the Cold War: The Case of Libya, 1968-1971’, New York University-Tamiment Library Center for the United States and the Cold War, New York, 16 April 2015.

2014

‘On a Gathering Mission for Power: Belgian Public Diplomacy and the Cold War (1943-1964)’, Workshop: the Cold War in the Benelux, Leuven, 19 December 2014.
‘Postcolonial Europe: French and British Public Diplomacy in Africa (1945-1963)’, Oxford-Leuven Modern European History Workshop, 7 November 2014.
International Seminar on Decolonization, National History Center, An Initiative of the American Historical Association, 9th ed., Washington D.C., 6 July-2 August 2014.
‘The Politics of Memory: the United States Information Agency Brussels (1945-1960)’, Dag van de nieuwste geschiedenis/Modern History Day, Ghent, 9 May 2014.
‘Decolonizing African Minds: Kwame Nkrumah and Pan-Africanism as an Interventionist Ideology (1957-66)’, The Role of the Neutrals and Non-Aligned in the Global Cold War, 1949-1989’, Lausanne, 13-15 March 2014.
Chair and commentator of ‘Alanna O'Malley, Ghana, India and the Transnational Dynamics of the Congo Crisis at the United Nations’, Leuven Centre for Global Governance Studies Seminars Series, 6 March 2014.
‘Hungry Minds: Eisenhower and Cultural Assistance in Africa (1953-1961)’, the Cold War History Seminar (HY510) of the London School of Economics, 5 March 2014.
‘Nkrumah and Pan-African Propaganda (1957-63)’, Imperial History Working Group Conference of the EUI with Fredrick Cooper and Jane Burbank, Florence, 9-10 January 2014.

2013

‘The Counterinsurgency of Public Diplomacy and Texts as Tools to Fight Insurgency (1961-1963)’, the Conference of the American Studies Association Norway (ASANOR), Oslo, 25-27 October 2013.
‘A New Field of Study: Africa and International History’, Reframing Diplomacy: New Diplomatic History in the Benelux and Beyond, Leiden, 6-7 September 2013.
‘Eisenhower and the Psychological Scramble for Africa (1953-1963)’, Annual Meeting of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR), Arlington, VA, 20-22 June 2013.
‘USIA and Kennedy: A Strange Relationship’, the 21th NASA Amerikanistendag, Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen, 22 March 2013.
‘The Psychological Scramble for Africa: the Ideological Competition over Africa’s Future and the Making of the Global Cold War’, the departmental seminar of the research unit Society and Modernity/Moderniteit en Samenleving 1800-2000, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, 20 March 2013.
‘Africa as International History’, the European University Institute Workshop on Africa, Florence, 18 March 2013.
‘JFK & The counterinsurgency of public diplomacy’, Fifty Years without JFK: Rethinking Global Diplomacy, Institute for the Studies of the Americas and LSE, Senate House, University of London, London, 13 March 2013.
‘The Political Economy of Americanization, a Historical Critique’, the Dutch AIO PhD seminar of the Roosevelt Study Centre (RSC), Middelburg, 6 February 2013.

2012

‘Pushing the Conceptual Envelope: Internationalizing Nkrumah and the Cold War in Africa’, the 55th Annual Meeting of the African Studies Association, Philadelphia, PA, 29 November - 1 December 2012.
‘The Psychological Scramble for Africa: Eisenhower’s Diplomacy Towards the New Africa (1953-1963)’, the 37th Annual ASANOR American Studies Conference, Østfold University College, Halden, 19-21 October 2012.
‘Power shifts and Decolonization: The American and Ghanaian Cultural Assistance for Africa (1953-1963)’, the 7th LSE International History PhD Conference and Workshop, London, 28-29 September 2012.
‘Decolonizing the African Mind: The American and Ghanaian Ideological Struggle for Africa After Empire (1953-1961)’, the 4th European Summer School on Cold War History Organized by the Università di Trento, LSE IDEAS-Cold War Studies Programme, and the European University Institute, Trento, 5-8 September 2012.
‘The Gospel of Stability: Eisenhower and American Public Diplomacy towards Africa (1953-1961)’, the 5th Annual Conference of the Historians of the Twentieth Century United States (HOTCUS), Middelburg, 20-22 June 2012.
‘The Gospel of Stability: Eisenhower and American Public Diplomacy towards Africa (1953-1961)’, the Dutch AIO PhD seminar of the Roosevelt Study Centre (RSC), Middelburg, 13 June 2012.

2011

‘The Challenge of Revision, assessing the public diplomacy network’, the European University Institute Workshop, Florence, 1 March 2011.