The ANTHUSIA EJD offers an innovative, interdisciplinary and multi-sectoral approach to the analysis of crises and opportunities in contemporary Sub-Saharan Africa. These dynamics are critical to Europe and beyond. On the one hand, human creativity and innovation feed growing economies across the African continent. At the same time, severe disruptions in human safety are caused by multiple and interweaving factors, including the economy, the environment and politics with significant consequences for social relations, gender and generational dynamics. Growing economic inequalities create tensions reaching beyond local, regional and national borders and make human security a global issue for African as well as for European countries. Human security problems, as well as population growth rates in Africa have obvious ramifications for European home security and economy. Refugee and migration crises due to insecurity in the African continent are likely to continue evolving in the future, and they call out for long-term analysis and engagement.
Now that he project has come to its end, the ANTHUSIA EJD has fulfilled its objectives:
- It has established a sustainable EJD programme between the four universities: Aarhus, Edinburgh, Leuven, and Oslo. Joint degrees between these institutions have been awarded.
- It has provided training to 16 excellent Early Stage Researchers who are all well on track in their career paths.
- The ESRs have conducted anthropological empirical research in various parts of Africa on urgent Human Security issues.
- A European and International research network has been established that has effectively supervised the ESRs, organised joint training and has collaborated closely with a wide range of African partners and academic colleagues. The collaboration in this network continues beyond the current project.
- The ANTHUSIA has been successful in creating and maintaining research collaborations with partners in Africa both through the secondments that the ESRs have undertaken but also through the joint training events, where African partner organisations have been invited to join as trainers, co-organizers or representatives of their organisation. The collaboration with non-academic organisations has been essential for ensuring that the research findings of the ESRs will have an impact on the human security problem areas they are dealing with.
-The ESRs have been disseminating their research since the start of the project and it has been a focus area of all training events where training in using visual methods and in writing policy briefs among other things have been taught. Research findings have been presented at all training events and at national and international conferences and workshops. The ESRs have also returned to their research sites to disseminate their research findings to interlocutors and policy makers. The ones who haven’t been able to go yet, still have plans to do so in 2023. PhD dissertations, peer-reviewed articles, visual products and policy briefs have been produced. One edited volume and an edited ANTHUSIA online journal are underway.
