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The East African Community (EAC) exemplifies the contradiction of independent Africa's efforts to champion regional integration and the idea of pan-Africanism, whilst maintaining the nation-state model left from colonialism. EAC I, 1967-1977, ultimately collapsed due to its inability to create a regional institutional framework that could supplant the nationalist tendencies of its member states' leaders; and failing to adopt a people-centred inclusive approach to its structure and actions. The resultant human security issues suffered throughout post-colonial East Africa at their essence have been caused by the victorious nation-state's continued failure to offer this inclusive citizenship to its peoples. Despite the EAC II's, 2001-present, espoused people-centred reincarnation, it too has so far failed to create the inclusive citizen, or people-centred approach to its development and so risks the continued insecurity of its people., 1. Introduction We are one people ... particularly in this region, the language, the culture ... we are more or less the same. So why not? If at a certain [...]

This paper does not directly engage the state-formation, political settlement and state-building debates in Africa but it foregrounds the notion of conversation as the lens through which to examine Rwanda's state-building history. In particular, it explores an overlooked perspective from Rwanda's state-building trajectory by focusing on a particular class of actors – women – whose voices also contributed to inter-elite and elite-society state-building from pre-colonial times. The paper examines how and why conversible spaces have been created in post-genocide Rwanda that are locally conceived yet given form by Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) elites. It shows that these spaces are progressions of a long history of state-building conversations in Rwanda that pre-date colonialism. The paper asks how and why have conversible spaces for peace and state-building evolved over time? To what extent do their contemporary form have the potential for being genuinely transformative? What do these processes mean for future peace and state building in Rwanda? In addressing these questions, this paper foregrounds women's agency and contributions to state-building in Rwanda over time. It shows that while there is evidence that women's agency has evolved from covert to overt spaces, limitations to women's influence of peace-building and state-building conversations still exist particularly for those whose visions of society diverge from that of the ruling party Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article revisits Buzan and Waever's Regional Security Complex Theory (RSCT), and asks what is the utility of Buzan and Waever's RSCT framework in understanding African security issues? It includes theoretical insight and criticism of RSCT whilst simultaneously providing an empirical case study of Uganda's President Museveni within East Africa. It focuses in particular on a period between 2010 and 2015 when East African security dynamics were in flux. The article argues, primarily, that Regional Security Complex Theory can be improved by including a clearer articulation of how African leaders assert influence within, and shape, regional security dynamics in Africa. Doing so allows for a better realization of how Regional Security Complexes come into being. The article draws on over four years of desktop research and over one hundred field-work interviews in East Africa and South Africa with regional security specialists, military personnel, politicians, government officials, journalists, academics, market traders and economists. The paper highlights President Museveni's uniquely active and influential role in shaping regional security dynamics in East Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article argues for a re-examination of China's engagement with Africa. Rather than offering broad continental generalisations, or concentrating only on individual country case-studies, researchers and analysts would be better served by recognising and understanding the specific and varied regional contexts in which relations occur. Utilising Hettne's conception of regionalism and regionalisation processes, and over 100 field work interviews, the paper presents a broad continental overview of China's role in Africa followed by a more detailed case study of China's role in East Africa. The paper argues that the regional reality of African security dynamics enmeshes China into intra-regional geopolitics and complex local level security issues, and sees the relationship greatly affected by the varied behaviour and agency of the African leaders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]