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Sub-Saharan Africa has made tremendous progress on health since the beginning of the 2000s. Mortality rates, for example, have decreased rapidly, and, as a consequence, the average life expectancy has increased from 50 to 60 years in the last 15 years. Yet, our new study on border cities found that health infrastructure are very unequally … Continue reading Towards a more regional approach to health in West Africa

Wait times at borders make cities far less accessible. Between Mali, Burkina and Côte d’Ivoire, or in the Futa Jalon, for example, the population that could be reached decreases by 25% because of wait times at borders. This is one of the main findings of our new study on border cities in West Africa, in … Continue reading Delays and checkpoints reduce accessibility in West Africa

Mali has a new government. But have things really changed all that much? The table below compares the ministers appointed by Prime Minister Soumeylou Boubèye Maïga in September 2018 with the list published by the government of Boubou Cissé on May 5, 2019. It shows that the newly appointed government counts 36 ministers (and two … Continue reading The new Malian government

Last month, a Dogon militia massacred 160 Fulani near Bankass in central Mali, more than 1000 km from Bamako. Condemned by the international community, this incident led the Malian President to sack two generals and dissolve Dan Na Ambassagou, the group suspected of originating the attack. Amid growing pressure on insecurity in the country, this event … Continue reading Rivalries between Dogon and Fulani in Central Mali

Women play a crucial role in the West African food economy. Yet, their trade networks remain often unknown. Our new study contributes to fill this gap by providing the first comprehensive analysis of the structure of West African social networks in which women play a particularly central role. Our report published by the OECD last … Continue reading Women and trade networks in West Africa

The OECD just released a series of four papers on West African border cities. These papers are part of the "Cities and Borders" project that my colleague Leonardo A. Villalón and I coordinated from 2017-2018 in the region. The papers provide a systematic analysis of the role West African border cities play in the process … Continue reading Border cities in West Africa

West Africa is urbanizing at one of the fastest rates in the world. Between 2015 and 2040, the population of the region will double and cities will absorb most of this demographic growth. To better understand urban growth in West Africa, the UF Sahel Research Group will contribute towards the flagship report “Atlas on Cities in … Continue reading An Atlas of African Cities

From 2019-2020, I will be coordinating the new research program on political insecurity of the OECD in collaboration with my colleagues Steve Radil and David Russell. In this new project, our first goal is to develop reliable data on the spatial patterns and social networks of violent extremist organizations in the Sahara-Sahel from the late … Continue reading Foreign interventions and networks of violence in the Sahel

Call for papers: American Association of Geographers Annual Meeting, Washington D.C., 3-7 April, 2019 Session title: Space and social networks Organizers: Steven Radil, University of Idaho; Olivier Walther, University of Florida Session description: The spatial metaphor of the network along with its accompanying abstractions, such as flow, movement, and connectivity, have been central themes throughout … Continue reading AAG 2019 – Space and social networks

In Syria, hundreds of factions operate under dozens of separate organizational command structures. Rather than coalescing into a unified rebel front, rebel groups continue to compete for power, thus failing to develop structures of governance and political authority that cut across factional divides, enclaves and provincial boundaries. Despite the fact that inter-rebel violence is a … Continue reading Why so many rebel groups in Syria?