RESEARCH

Emmanuel Balogun, PhD researches African regional organizations and multilateralism.

Emmanuel is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Skidmore College. He researches African politics and international organizations. Emmanuel focuses on how African countries engage with multilateralism to position themselves in international policy and trade.

 
 

Current and Recent Affiliations

  • Emmanuel is an International Affairs Fellow serving a 1 year appointment as a policy advisor with the Department of State.

  • Emmanuel serves as a Multilateral Affairs Officer and Policy Advisor. His portfolio covers US-Africa engagement with International Organizations, Strategic Competition, and Health.

  • Emmanuel was the inaugural Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) fellow for Bridging the Gap.

Current Research

 

  • I am developing a new book project that calls for a renewed and just multilateral system that centers African governance. I show how central Africa is to global governance. This project emphasizes the impact African regional institutions have in making and maintaining global governance.

  • In this project, co-authored with Alice Ba, we ask why regional institutions in post-colonial regions would pursue different approaches to non-interference given their similarities in global position. We find that it is important to illuminate local and social sources of variation to explain contrasting practices of non-intervention.

  • This project, co-authored with my student Anissa Joseph, examines the United States’ policy toward Africa from Obama to Biden. We explain the trajectory of relations between the US and Africa as a region, through the leadership traits and bureaucratic capacity of each administration.

 

Areas of Research

 

  • I am interested in the different strategies African institutions use to position themselves in global affairs. My previous work with Amy Patterson, shows the ways African countries and regional organizations responded to the early wave of Covid-19 in 2020.

  • I’ve surveyed the comparative regionalism literature to identify current trends in the field. Along with my colleague Aarie Glas, we study how regional organizations such as ASEAN and ECOWAS recognize a need to shape regional policies based on the direct participation and benefit of the public. Read More

  • In what ways do African countries work together to solve governance challenges? This question motivates my research into how African regional organizations work. My previous work finds that African regional organizations rely on networking and autonomy to overcome governance challenges.

Professional Memberships