Preface / Voorwoord

Abstract

This special issue is unique in the sense that it sets out to engage on issues within the gambit of African diplomacy, a theme that deserves constant focus given its centrality in Africa’s quest for influence in global affairs. Against a backdrop of Africa’s marginalisation in knowledge production and dissemination in what appears to be an increasingly unilateralist world, this issue is topical and timely. This is the gap in the conversation on diplomacy that the SARChI Chair in African Diplomacy and Foreign Policy at the University of Johannesburg seeks to fill in supporting this special issue, and it is the context in which the authors of the  articles were invited to contribute their analyses in taking the discussion on African diplomacy forward.