Africa’s international relations beyond the state

Since the end of the East–West Cold War in the late 1980s, increased attention has been paid to the emergence of non-state actors in international relations. The transformations in post-Cold War international relations were both linked to increased globalization, the prominent role of transnational, trans-territorial and non-state actors operating in an evolving world order. Given the marginalization of Africa in International Relations (IR) theory, it is apposite to begin to address the contributions of the continent to ongoing global transformations as a step towards promoting an acknowledgement of, and a balanced understanding of, its contribution to the field. ¹ This is a reaffirmation of an earlier observation by Dunn, to the effect that ‘the continent is the ever-present and necessary counterpart that makes dominant theories complete’. ²