Didier Péclard
Didier Péclard is a Senior lecturer in Political Science and Director of the newly created MA in African Studies at the Global Studies Institute at the University of Geneva. He holds a PhD in Political Science from Sciences-Po Paris (2005). He has worked at the History Department of the University of Basel, and in 2012-2013, he was guest professor at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor (Department of Afroamerican and African Studies). He is an associate researcher with the Swiss Peace Foundation (swisspeace, a conflict research institute located in Bern, Switzerland). He is the co-editor of the Paris-based journal Politique africaine.
His research interests include religion and politics, nationalism, as well as the dynamics of peacebuilding and state formation in Africa. An expert on Angola, he has worked on the impact of Christian missions on nationalism and state formation during the last decades of colonial rule, as well as on the politics post-civil war transition. His current research work focuses on civil war and state formation in Angola, Côte d’Ivoire and South Sudan, as well as on the role of the state in development. His recent publications include Les incertitudes de la nation en Angola. Aux racines sociales de l’Unita (2015) and Negotiating Statehood. Dynamics of Power and Domination in Africa (2011).