Human Rights and the Judicialisation of African Politics shows readers how central questions in African politics have entered courtrooms over the last three decades, and provides the first transnational explanation for this development.


The book begins with three conditions that have made judicialisation possible in Africa as a whole; new corporate rights norms (including the expansion of indigenous rights), the proliferation of new avenues for legal proceedings, and the development of new support structures enabling litigation. It then studies the effects of these changes based on fieldwork in three Southern African countries – Zimbabwe, Namibia and Botswana. Examining three recent court cases involving international law, international courts and transnational NGOs, it looks beyond some of international relations’ established models to explain when and why and legal rights can be clarified.


This text will be of key interest to scholars and students of African politics and human rights, and more broadly to international relations and international law and justice.