In this week’s episode, we speak with Dr. Kennedy Opalo (@kopalo), an assistant professor at Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service. His research focuses on the political economy of development, legislative development, and electoral politics in emerging democracies. Ken blogs regularly at his blog, An Africanist Perspective, and currently is writing a weekly column for Kenya’s major daily newspaper The Standard. We talk this week about the upcoming Kenyan elections. 

 

Our featured song this week is “Winning in Life” by the Kenyan group Just a Band. Find them on Twitter, Facebook, and SoundCloud.  

 

Books, Links, & Articles

• “Lesotho Prime Minister Thomas Thabane’s wife shot dead.”   
• “Are African footballers more likely to die on the pitch?” 
• “Kenya Election Watch 7.”   by BBC 
• “Kenyans will vote in August. Why are NGO-government relations an issue?” Analysis by Jennifer N. Brass 
• “Price Of Corn, A Kenyan Staple, Soars.” by Eyder Peralta 
• “Biometric Identification Machine Failure and Electoral Fraud in a Competitive Democracy.”  by George Ofosu  
• “Domestic election observers and election day fraud in Malawi’s 2014 elections.”  by George Ofosu and Dan Posner 
• “Election Integrity and Political Responsiveness in Developing Democracies: Evidence from Ghana.” by George Ofosu  
• Changing the Rules: The Politics of Liberalization and the Urban Informal Economy in Tanzania by Aili Mari Tripp 
• The God of Small Things: A Novel  by Arundhati Roy

Previous Episodes We Mentioned

• Ep. 22: A conversation with Dr. John Aerni-Flessner on the recent Lesotho elections
• Ep. 20: A conversation with Dr. Adia Benton on global health, Ebola as a ‘charismatic disease,’ and more
• Ep. 17: Conversations with Dr. Rachel Beatty Riedl and Dr. Jennifer Brass about two new books on African politics