This episode is a conversation about power, how it is created, enforced and could be disrupted by young African leaders. I was honoured to host Professor Funmi Olonisakin, an activist at heart from her days of student protest in Nigeria, a Professor of Security, Leadership and Development at King's College London and a founding Director of the African Leadership Centre (ALC). http://funmiolonisakin.com/ We delve into why Funmi believes young African leaders need to study and understand circles of power and how to leverage it even without it. Secondly, we explore the key power players at the global level for Africa and the need for a Pan-African movement to challenge the hegemony and inheritance elite.
It is a real honour to bring to you my discussion with Ruth Levine, the CEO of IDinsight - a research and advisory organization that works with global development leaders to improve their social impact. As an organisation with 6 offices spread across 5 regions in Africa and Asia, I think Ruth is keenly aware of the complexities of cultural differences and sensitivities and how they impact meaningful collaboration. So in this episode we tackle the challenges she and IDinsight faced to hiring talent across the globe, building trust with communities and then her concerns around the all too superficial shift to 'localisation' and the potential consequences. These are Ruth's opinions, not IDinsight's.
Two brilliant African graduate students Shiro Wachira and Phuthi Tsatsi are from the University of Stanford, with plenty of experience in development sector in Kenya and South Africa. The two chronicle their career journey in the sector and how they got quite disillusioned. Why do they no longer want to work in development organisations?
The Kenyan technology ecosystem is growing rapidly, countless new startups emerge and multinationals keep pouring in. What is the history of this space? Where did it come from and who benefits from the system today? In other words, who is overlooked and what needs to change? Angela Okune & Leo Mutuku bring their experiences as tech entrepreneurs, researchers as well as founding members of the Ihub to a paper they recently wrote entitled: Becoming an African Techpreneur: geopolitics of investments in "local" Kenyan entrepreneurship. Here is their great paper: https://zenodo.org/record/6582284 and folks can reach Angela on Twitter @honoluluskye or through angelaokune.me; and Leo @leomutuku or through https://www.leonida.me/ Instagram: thedevelopmentdilemma; Twitter: @dev_dilemma; Music credits: Juliani, 'Kama sa Sisi'