Introduction: Methodologies for researching Africa

African Affairs, 1–11 doi: 10.1093/afraf/adaa011 © The Author(s) 2020. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Royal African Society. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: [email protected] George M. Bob-Milliar * ABSTRACT This article ties the main issues raised in research notes that have been published by African Affairs. Research notes are dedicated to discussions of issues that arise in producing knowledge on Africa. These notes, drawn from rich experiences, tackle the above and other questions from various angles. The arguments and proposals presented are crucial for understanding the mutability of approaches and also raise important questions about how to sustain observed improvements and consolidate accrued gains towards a more fruitful, ethical, and fairer endeavour of studying Africa. These notes will inform and challenge academics in their thinking about issues ranging from methods and research design to negotiating their stakes in policy research partnerships. Africanists researchers will have to reflect deeply and selectively on what methodological approaches would best answer Africa’s peculiar problems. Africanists can engage in meaningful research when critique is deployed in selecting the methodology and possibly in getting the right research question. The insights from the notes might play a useful role on syllabi to help train and socialize the next generation of Africanists in the values of practical ethics and sustainable research engagements. Heterodox research methodologies will dominate the field of African studies for many years to come. And Africanists researchers should not allow their disciplinary or epistemic rules hold them back from using innovative methodologies to contribute to the intellectual output of the continent. The inherent complexity of Africa, as a subject of study, provokes two recurring questions: First, what is the best approach to study Africa and second, who is best suited to study the continent? Taken at face value, these puzzles may appear simple and straightforward to tackle but they have given rise to thorny debates that have yet to yield definitive answers or result in consensus. Abiodun Alao has argued that questions related to approaches *Department of History and Political Studies, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Ghana: email:[email protected] 1 Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/doi/10.1093/afraf/adaa011/5831339 by guest on 29 June 2020 INTRODUCTION: METHODOLOGIES FOR RESEARCHING AFRICA 2 AFRICAN AFFAIRS 1. Abiodun Alao, A new narrative for Africa: Voice and agency (Routledge, London and New York, 2020). 2. Michael G. Schatzberg, ‘Power, legitimacy and ‘democratisation’ in Africa’, Africa 63, 4 (1993), pp. 445–461; George M. Bob-Milliar, ‘Political party activism in Ghana: Factors influencing the decision of the politically active to join a political party’, Democratization 19, 4 (2012), pp. 668–689. 3. Franklin Obeng-Odoom, ‘The intellectual marginalisation of Africa’, African Identities (2019), pp. 1–14. doi: 10.1080/14725843.2019.1667223; Peace A. Medie and Alice J. Kang, ‘Power, knowledge and the politics of gender in the Global South’, European Journal of Politics and Gender 1, 1–2 (2018), pp. 37–53. 4. Mahmood Mamdani, ‘The importance of research in a university’ (MISR Working Paper No. 3, 2011), p. 6. 5. Mahmood Mamdani, Scholars in the marketplace: The dilemmas of neo-liberal reform at Makerere University, 1989–2005 (CODESRIA, Darkar, 2007). 6. Mamdani, ‘The importance of research in a university’, p. 3. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/doi/10.1093/afraf/adaa011/5831339 by guest on 29 June 2020 to studying Africa may never be answered.1 Given the multiplicity of methods in the major disciplines in African studies such a position is more realistic than pessimistic. This multiplicity of approaches, while potentially useful in producing comprehensive knowledge about Africa, often prompts methodological conflicts and tension. There can be inconsistencies and uncertainties within the study of Africa, which one approach alone may be unfit to resolve. Several methodological approaches are designed for research in Western societies. In this context, such approaches will require some modification before being applied to empirical studies in Africa. In the last three decades, research has shown that African politics and women studies, for example, have increasingly relied on historical and sociocultural explanations.2 The use of heterodox methodologies has become imperative because of challenges with conceptualisation. Beyond this issue of practical approaches is the ethical question of who should study Africa. This is a subject, which continues to resurface as a result of what we might term ‘capture’ that is, the predominant involvement of non-Africans in studying the continent. This has sometimes resulted in oversimplification of the subjects explored/studied and stereotypical conclusions, as well as the marginalization of African researchers.3 Mahmood Mamdani argues that Western knowledge production machineries tend ‘to relegate Africa to providing raw materials (“data”) to outside academics who process it and then re-export their theories back to Africa’.4 Yet, we must also acknowledge the role neo-liberal forces have played in creating asymmetries in knowledge production.5 In the past three decades, research on Africa has been overwhelmingly backed by foreign funding bodies, giving rise to ‘a pervasive consultancy culture’ in African institutions of knowledge production.6 But addressing asymmetries in knowledge production is complicated and often far removed from the agency of Africans. In a consideration of the research methods used to study Africa, Nic Cheeseman, Carl Death, and Lindsay Whitfield, highlight the rapid changes INTRODUCTION: METHODOLOGIES FOR RESEARCHING AFRICA 3 7. Nic Cheeseman, Carl Death, and Lindsay Whitfield, ‘Introduction: Notes on researching Africa’, African Affairs (2017), pp. 1–5. doi: 10.1093/afraf/adx005. 8. Obeng-Odoom, ‘The intellectual marginalisation of Africa’, p. 7; Toby Green, ‘NorthSouth dynamics in academia’, Journal of African Cultural Studies 31, 3 (2019), pp. 280–283. 9. Mamdani, ‘The importance of research in a university’, p. 7. 10. For example, the leading journal in Political Science, American Journal of Political Science (AJPS), rarely publishes work written by Africa-based political scientist. Between 2010 and 2019, the AJPS published a total of 579 articles (in vols. 54–63), none was authored by an African-based scholar. However, out of this total, 11 articles were authored by American- and European-based Africanists (see, e.g., Kenya, 2011, vol. 55, no. 2; Ghana, 2013, vol. 57, no.2; Uganda, 2014, vol 58, no. 3; Mali, 2016, vol 60, no. 1). The AJPS is published on behalf of the Midwest Political Science Association and is available here: https://onlinelibrary.wiley. com/journal/15405907. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/doi/10.1093/afraf/adaa011/5831339 by guest on 29 June 2020 in the methodological landscape of African studies.7 In addition to tracing the shifts and evolutions of approaches across several disciplines, their article poses a set of pointed questions that impinge on the political economy of knowledge production on Africa. Is it acceptable that only a handful of Africans and Africa-based scholars publish in the top-ranked journals? How can we press non-African researchers to consider sharing their knowledge, skills, and resources with African partners? If ‘outsiders’ employ African research assistance on the ground, how can they best ensure that this relationship will be defined by intellectual dignity as opposed to exploitation? The questions posed above is informed by experience where knowledge produced in Africa is marginalized by academics in the global North. Just like many of the commodities of the continent, which are exported in their raw state or semi-processed, knowledge produced by Africa-based scholars is taken to be inferior. In this context, Franklin Obeng-Odoom notes that the ‘inferiorisation of the knowledge of the South, the process of production, and the status of the producers arise when Southern-generated knowledge is considered inferior’.8 The claim is that African scholars are heavyweights on the empirical front, but lightweight on theory. Writing on the importance of research in a university, Mamdani calls attention to the relevance of the African experience. He says ‘if we are to treat every experience with intellectual dignity, then we must treat it as the basis for theorization. This means to historicize and contextualize not only phenomena and processes that we observe but also the intellectual apparatus used to analyse these’.9 The empirical evidence generated by Africans usually serves as the basis for theory building by scholars in the global North. And in spite of the challenges faced by Africa-based scholars, many continue to produce relevant or ‘made for Africa’ knowledge. The most difficult thing for this group of African scholars is gaining access to discipline specific journals published outside the continent.10 This introduction ties the main issues raised in research notes that have been published by African Affairs. Research notes are dedicated to 4 AFRICAN AFFAIRS Africa: a diverse continent across varied disciplines Africa’s complexity and diversity manifest in several forms. Beyond the more visible elements of cultures, ethnic compositions, and geographies are varied typologies of political and economic institutions that undergird the processes of political transformation and economic development on the continent. In recent decades, the functions and outcomes of these diverse institutions have assumed a central place in scholarly analyses of Africa. To render legible these political-economic complexities in weak, fragile, and conflict-affected contexts, several analytical frameworks have emerged. In the last two decades, the political settlements framework associated with Mushtaq Khan has gained popularity in analysing the key differences in understandings of agents, economic processes, and power dynamics.11 However, as Pritish Behuria, Laars Buur, and Hazel Gray observe in their research note on political settlements in Africa, the wide usage of the political settlements framework has led to some analytical and methodological confusion.12 Their research note constitutes an effort to address this confusion by delineating the core analytical features of the approach, discussing its methodological dimensions, and putting political settlements studies on Africa in an informative dialogue with each other. To this end, the research note provides a detailed discussion of the conceptual differences and similarities between political settlements and new institutional economics theories. Moreover, the authors argue that understanding 11. Mushtaq Khan, Political settlements and the governance of growth-enhancing institutions (Mimeo, SOAS, London, 2010). 12. Pritish Behuria, Lars Buur, and Hazel Gray, ‘Studying political settlements in Africa’, African Affairs 116, 464 (2017), pp. 508–25. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/doi/10.1093/afraf/adaa011/5831339 by guest on 29 June 2020 discussions of issues that arise in producing knowledge on Africa. These notes, drawn from rich experiences, tackle the above and other questions from various angles. The arguments and proposals presented are crucial for understanding the mutability of approaches and also raise important questions about how to sustain observed improvements and consolidate accrued gains towards a more fruitful, ethical, and fairer endeavour of studying Africa. These notes will inform and challenge academics in their thinking about issues ranging from methods and research design to negotiating their stakes in policy research partnerships. Furthermore, the insights from the notes might play a useful role on syllabi to help train and socialize the next generation of Africanists in the values of practical ethics and sustainable research engagements. This introduction puts the research notes in this virtual issue in a conversation with one another in an attempt to show that rather than being ivory towers, disciplinary approaches, opportunities, and risks are complementary in reality. INTRODUCTION: METHODOLOGIES FOR RESEARCHING AFRICA 5 13. Cheeseman, Death, and Whitfield, ‘Notes on researching Africa’. 14. Justine M. Davis, ‘Manipulating Africa? Perspectives on the experimental method in the study of African politics’, African Affairs (2020), online first. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/doi/10.1093/afraf/adaa011/5831339 by guest on 29 June 2020 the patterns of power distribution in society demands in-depth historical knowledge that quantitative analyses are often ill-equipped to capture. Such a conclusion brings to the fore the shifting methodological landscape in African studies and highlights that theoretical influences like the political settlements framework are being explored through different methods across disciplinary boundaries. Despite the dominant use of qualitative approach, Cheeseman et al. in their research note, ‘Notes on Researching Africa’, observe that quantitative approaches to research puzzles are on the rise particularly in American political science scholarship.13 This development has rapidly spread to the field of African political science and fostered the practice of experimental research. A recent research note by Justine Davis explores the usefulness of experimental methods in researching African politics and discusses how future researchers can overcome the common challenges of design and implementation of experiments.14 This focus reflects the attempts of some Africanist scholars to normalize experimental research within the African context and build upon discussions, which place emphasis on the ethics of examining real world issues under controlled conditions. Drawing on the author’s experiences of working with experimental methods in the African context, it is proposed that involving local enumerators and implementers in the early stages of the research yields significant benefits such as improvements in designing survey questions that suit the social context of the research population. In addition to involving enumerators and implementers, the author argues that provision of training, specifically on volunteer mobilization strategies and fund-raising skills, deepens the knowledge of the participants as a way of making significant contributions to the lives of subjects being researched. This substantive approach can be effective in mitigating the extractive character and ethical dilemmas of North–South research endeavours. Davis’ note also highlights that while these interactions are desirable, limited resources including time and funding can hamper a researcher’s capacity to establish collaborative relationships with local enumerators, especially as most funding bodies require research designs before releasing funding. Same challenges can affect a researcher’s ability to go back and disseminate findings among the population under study. While quantitative analysis is relatively new to the study of African politics, Leila Demarest and Arnim Langer write that such approaches, particularly cross-national quantitative comparisons, are established approaches 6 AFRICAN AFFAIRS 15. Leila Demarest and Arnim Langer, ‘The study of violence and social unrest in Africa: A comparative analysis of three conflict event datasets’, African Affairs 117, 467 (2018), pp. 310–325. 16. Olajumoke Yacob-Haliso, ‘Intersectionalities and access in fieldwork in post-conflict Liberia’, African Affairs 118, 470 (2018), pp. 168–181. 17. Gediminas Lesutis, ‘The politics of narrative: Methodological reflections on analysing voices of the marginalized in Africa’, African Affairs 117, 468 (2018), pp. 509–521. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/doi/10.1093/afraf/adaa011/5831339 by guest on 29 June 2020 in the fields of conflict studies.15 By emphasizing the prominent representation of African conflicts in quantitative analyses, their research note demonstrates how using different data sets collected from different news sources can affect the conclusions about the causes or drivers of violence. They draw these conclusions by observing three data sets on conflict events in Nigeria: the Social Conflict in Africa Database, the Armed Conflict Location and Event Dataset, and a data set developed by the authors themselves from three Nigerian news sources. From this data, it was observed that selection biases came from the different conflict events across the international and domestic news sources. These biases and ‘conceptual differences’ between data sets pose considerable challenges to cross-national quantitative conflict analyses. Conscious of its central place in conflict analyses, the authors argue that quantitative analyses should be triangulated with other methods of collecting empirical research data. Demarest and Langer’s research note highlights issues associated with collecting and using cross-national comparative analysis in conflict research, but how do such issues play out when researchers approach a study in a more intimate relationship with research subjects? Olajumoke Yacob-Haliso’s research note examines how the identity of the researcher affects the type of information they are able to collect during fieldwork.16 Going beyond the dichotomy of ‘insider’ and ‘outsider’ identities, she argues that the intersection of a researcher’s identity can have both positive and negative effects on the politics of negotiating access to participants and navigating the field. Drawing on her research on female Liberian returnees, she finds that her intersecting identities of being a young Nigerian woman and a mother created what she calls a ‘minefield’ that both positively and negatively impacted her access to data. She draws attention to the limitations of the insider–outsider binary to include ‘in-between’ identities in order to fully capture the varying dynamics of how positionality and reflexivity shape data gathering in Africanist research. In a comparable vein with Yacob-Haliso’s, Gediminas Lesutis’s research note explores aspects of positionality and the issues that arose in his effort to represent the narratives of marginalized populations in Mozambique.17 From his research on enforced resettlements due to extractive activities in Tete, Mozambique, he argues that narratives are created by the researcher and interlocutors and these narratives are by-products of the social and material conditions in which they are embedded. He further posits that INTRODUCTION: METHODOLOGIES FOR RESEARCHING AFRICA 7 18. Gediminas Lesutis, ‘The politics of narrative: Methodological reflections on analysing voices of the marginalized in Africa’, African Affairs 117, 468 (2018), pp. 509–521. 19. For a discussion, see Peace Medie, ‘Introduction: women, gender and change in Africa’, African Affairs (2019), pp. 1–7, doi: 10.1093/afraf/adz025. 20. Zoe Marks and Patrycja Stys, ‘Social network research in Africa’, African Affairs 118, 471 (2019), pp. 375–391. 21. Ibid., p. 391. 22. Cheeseman, Death, and Whitfield, ‘Notes on researching Africa’. 23. Ibid. 24. Samuel Fury Childs Daly, ‘Archival research in Africa’, African Affairs 116, 463 (2017), pp. 311–320. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/doi/10.1093/afraf/adaa011/5831339 by guest on 29 June 2020 ‘these methodological aspects of the politics of narrative should be reflected upon as a way to navigate complex ontological narratives that emerge in one’s fieldwork, as well as to overcome the potential danger of fetishizing individual agency or overlooking the broader structural inequalities’.18 Reviewing these arguments, some scholars suggest that social network approaches have the potential to reach marginalized populations of society, given the centrality of networks to power distribution in African societies.19 Zoe Marks and Patrycja Stys, in their research note, provide a review of some notable interdisciplinary research on Africa that utilizes social network approaches. Similar to Behuria et al.’s concerns in relation to the political settlements framework, they note that the term ‘social network’ is ambiguous and—given its suitability to diverse disciplines and subfields— is often confused. Through this note, they aim to distil the ‘common language and new tools with which to analyze networks’.20 This, they believe, will enhance and sharpen interdisciplinary network analyses across African politics. To achieve the stated aim, they draw on recent research to demonstrate the conceptual and methodological contributions of social network approaches in Africa, where political and social lives largely revolve around networks and ties. They argue that employing social network approaches ‘can clarify how socially constructed categories of gender, ethnicity, religion, and more have material and structural impacts on lived experience’.21 Historical research has not escaped the prevailing transformation of approaches in African studies. Cheeseman et al. observe that there is a growing shift from case studies to global and comparative historical research.22 While reliance on secondary literature has accompanied these changes, the authors affirm that the archival method remains relevant to historical research.23 The research note by Samuel Fury Childs Daly addresses some pressing issues concerning the importance of the archives and how best researchers can think of and use the archives in the changing landscape of academic research.24 Drawing from his research on crime and survival during the Nigerian civil war, Daly observes from many journeys to the archives that historical knowledge on post-colonial Africa is of a ‘dispersed quality’. Consequently, researchers who aim to understand the 8 AFRICAN AFFAIRS 25. Ibid., p. 319. 26. Ibid., p. 319. 27. Rita Abrahamsen, ‘Africa and international relations: Assembling Africa, studying the world’, African Affairs 116, 462 (2016), pp. 125–139. 28. Ibid., p. 132. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/doi/10.1093/afraf/adaa011/5831339 by guest on 29 June 2020 period under review must draw on formal and informal internal sources as well as transnational archives held by international actors that have been, and are still, involved in Africa’s post-colonial life. While the paucity of African archives can be easily viewed as a problem, Daly implores historians of Africa to consider this as an invitation to think about the nature and function of the post-colonial state. From this point of view, he is sceptical of the heavy reliance on digitized archival materials, which discourages historians to ‘seek out materials that are scattered or difficult to access’.25 For him, historians’ fetishization of the digital threatens the ability to paint a comprehensive portrait of political and social life in post-colonial Africa. He argues that ‘some of a document’s meaning is contained in its physical location and in the negotiations that go into accessing it’.26 The ‘global turn’ in historical research, as noted above, signals an important fact—that is, Africa’s growing insertion into global systems. This necessitates the consideration of how Africa, with the historical baggage of colonialism and a marginalized role in global political interactions, should be incorporated into the ever-changing global architecture. Rita Abrahamsen’s research note on Africa’s tenuous relationship with international relations tackles this complicated issue head-on and effectively sets the agenda for Africa’s healthy and enduring incorporation into, and participation in, global affairs.27 She argues that given the impact of geopolitics on the structure of values of the modern university and the knowledge economy, Africa’s place within the discipline of international relations cannot simply be ‘add Africa and stir’. To address these challenges deeply rooted in power structures, Abrahamsen suggests an assemblage approach, which makes ‘visible the complicities, silences and unspoken value judgements or many taken-for-granted analytical concepts . . . ’28 This approach complicates concepts and theories that too often subject complex realities to predetermined patterns without accounting for differences and changes in social transformation. By assembling Africa and its place within international relations, researchers oppose the tendency for knowledge about the continent to be absorbed into, and reproduced from, Western-centric perspectives. Thus, methodologically and epistemologically driven approaches to incorporating Africa into international relations offer Africanists a potent tool to deprovincialize their object of study. Beyond the theoretical discussions of Africa’s ‘addition’ into the international system is the more daunting task of shaping how these dynamics of power and structural interactions play out in practice and the resul- INTRODUCTION: METHODOLOGIES FOR RESEARCHING AFRICA 9 29. Susan Dodsworth and Nic Cheeseman, ‘The potentials and pitfalls of collaborating with development organizations and policymakers in Africa’, African Affairs 117, 466 (2017), pp. 130–145. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/doi/10.1093/afraf/adaa011/5831339 by guest on 29 June 2020 tant impacts. This largely hinges on the research–practise collaboration, where knowledge is co-produced beyond mere information sharing. In their research note, Nic Cheeseman and Susan Dodsworth draw on firsthand insiders’ perspectives to flesh out the ethical, practical, and political forms these interactions take.29 The authors adduce evidence from the collaboration with the Westminster Foundation for Democracy. Putting aside potential tensions arising from different objectives and time horizons between researchers and policymakers, they argue that research-practice collaborations tend to weaken objectivity of research outcomes and deviations from established ethical standards. And in the African context where inequalities are pronounced, these result in more serious limitations than other contexts. Their research note suggests how these challenges can be minimized or mitigated. One such suggestion is maintaining a ‘critical distance’ from the funding body, leaving the university with the power to assess researchers involved in the collaborations. Another suggestion is that the lead researcher of such projects should not receive any direct benefits from the funding bodies. Finally, they urge academics in these collaborations not to assume that development practitioners prefer biased research outcomes rather than critical findings that challenge their organizational interests. On ethical issues Cheeseman and Dodsworth point to the concerns of power imbalances in North–South research collaboration, particularly viewing Africa merely as a site for data extraction to test Western theories, and also limiting the role of Africa-based partners to data collectors rather than active co-designers of the research and co-authors of reports. In addition to the above listed suggestions, the authors conclude that these suggestions should operate with legal agreements and memoranda of understanding that guarantees intellectual rights and properties of academics and, by extension, deepens their influence and stake in collaborative arrangements. Discussions on knowledge production about Africa must, out of necessity, include the multiple ways of knowing as suggested in Abrahamsen’s note on assemblages. This is the theme of Grace Musila’s research note on how unquestioned belief in, and reliance on, Western modes of knowing often negate potentially rich archives from which truth can be ascertained and reality unravelled. One of such avenues is the genre of rumour. Based on her research on the Julie Ann Ward murder case in Kenya, she demonstrates that the different social imaginaries of Kenyan and British societies resulted in blind spots, ‘opacities’ and deceits that hindered successful unearthing of the truth behind the murder. These ‘epistemic disarticulations’ as she terms it, emanates from the ‘inability to acknowledge multiple ways of knowing and the accompanying indices 10 AFRICAN AFFAIRS Conclusion This virtual issue focuses on research notes that discuss the topics that come out of the process of, producing knowledge about, and representing, Africa. The publications in this series draw on and contribute to methodological debates and discussions on the politics of producing knowledge on the political, economic, and social realities of Africa. The individual research notes offer much needed insights that enrich our perspectives. Together they themselves constitute a body of knowledge aimed at improving the processes and politics involved in Africanist research. In a broad explication of the methodologies for researching Africa, it is important to go beyond the scope of the research notes that this introduction has examined. Africanists researchers will have to reflect deeply and selectively on what methodological approaches would best answer Africa’s peculiar problems. Africanists can engage in meaningful research when critique is deployed in selecting the methodology and possibly in getting the right research question.33 The old strategy for researching African problems looked for answers outside the problem context. Researchers sympathetic to the African cause ‘must look for answers within the parameters of the problem’.34 The challenge is that the dominant trend in contemporary knowledge production is for ‘research to be positivist and primarily quantitative, carried out to answer questions that have been formulated outside of the continent, not only in terms of location but also in terms of historical perspective’.35 Similarly, the methodologies for researching Africa that are in vogue are the products of particular Western experience. In the interest of universalization and compliance, we tend 30. Grace Musila, ‘Navigating epistemic disarticulations’, African Affairs 116, 465 (2017), pp. 692–704. 31. Ibid., p. 703. 32. Ibid., p. 704. 33. Mahmood Mamdani (ed.), Getting the question right (Makerere University, MISR Book Series, Kampala, 2013). 34. Mamdani, ‘The importance of research in a university’, p. 4. 35. Ibid., p. 6. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/doi/10.1093/afraf/adaa011/5831339 by guest on 29 June 2020 of credibility’.30 Musila’s note, while focusing on a murder case in Kenya, questions the production of knowledge about Africa through a Eurocentric gaze. This note serves as a much-needed reminder to researchers of Africa to dislodge ‘the academy’s embeddedness in particular epistemic logics’ of what constitute knowledge, data, and evidence—a monologic conception that renders African ways of knowing as deficient.31 As Musila articulates it: ‘whatever their seeming deficits, such genres occupy an authoritative place in Africans’ lives as credible intelligence that lends Africans a conceptual handle on their lives and times’.32 INTRODUCTION: METHODOLOGIES FOR RESEARCHING AFRICA 11 36. Ibid. 37. Kate Meagher, ‘Reflections of an engaged economists: an interview with Thandika Mkandawire’, Development and Change 50, 2 (2019), p. 520. 38. Patrick Chabal, The politics of suffering and smiling (Zed Books, London, 2009), p. 177. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/doi/10.1093/afraf/adaa011/5831339 by guest on 29 June 2020 to emphasize the robustness of Western methodologies because they can achieve quantification. By all means, quantification or so-called LargeN studies is a key component of the research process as it can lead to theory building. Nevertheless, quantification as Mamdani caution us has the tendency ‘to dehistoricise and decontextualize discordant experiences, whether Western or non-Western’.36 In the absence of quantification, original knowledge produced in Africa is devalued. How should Africanists respond to the challenge of the quantification of knowledge in the broader context of research methodologies? Africanists researchers can best address the issue of quantification through innovative interdisciplinary research approaches. As Thandika Mkandawire argues, interdisciplinarity is ‘intellectually demanding’. But it is ‘not enough to bring together a little economics, a little politics and a little history to concoct interdisciplinary scholarship. You have to build interdisciplinary approaches and interdisciplinary institutions’.37 Indeed, the inherent complexity of social phenomenon in Africa will demand the full application of interdisciplinary research methods. More so because Patrick Chabal reminds us that concepts are not universal: ‘all concepts are historically and contextually generated and, therefore, bounded by the historical circumstances in which they appear. Paradoxically, therefore, they are in this sense local and not universal’.38 Heterodox research methodologies will dominate the field of African studies for many years to come. And Africanists researchers should not allow their disciplinary or epistemic rules hold them back from using innovative methodologies to contribute to the intellectual output of the continent.