The global south as a transcalar geopolitical construction site: african profiles. – The last two years, with the post-Covid adjustments, the climate transition and two ongoing wars of global impact, have been marked by intense international attention towards the African continent, despite its vastness and diversity. On the one hand, this may please Africans, for the help that can come to the solution of their many problems; on the other hand, it worries them, given the historical precedents. There seems to be a new scramble for Africa underway due to the crumbling of the European and, more broadly, Western presence, against the backdrop of a more general reshuffling of the international order. In this reshuffling, the “Global South” seems to be playing an increasingly important role. Who will lead and how will the world’s economic, cultural and political evolution unfold? The game is complex, but Africa is certainly one of the main arenas of contention. As an immense reserve of raw materials - minerals, energy, agro-forestry - the Continent is emerging as the world’s leading area of demographic development while acquiring growing geopolitical relevance, due to the ongoing Russian-Ukrainian crisis, the Israeli-Palestinian crisis, but also, due to the conflicting profiles that are emerging in the Indo-Pacific, between China and the United States. In this fermenting context, heterogeneous events have taken place over the past couple of years (2023/24) that have recorded an impressive acceleration: two coups in Francophone Africa, three world summits that evoke a pan-African partnership (Russia-Africa, China-Africa, Piano Mattei), two geopolitical summits in Johannesburg and Nairobi (unified African position on climate change, September 2023). It is worth trying to trace a coherent geopolitical profile of this heterogeneous set of events.

Di là dallo stile personale, su cui si è insistito molto. Oltre le variopinte sub-culture che sembrano cristallizzarsi in ideologie nel “discorso” trumpiano: negazionismi, complottismi e quant’altro. Lontano da un panorama mediale dominato dalla disintermediazione mediatica e, quindi, dal peso dei social media che ha raggiunto ormai, per limitarci all’orizzonte democratico, “i 374 messaggi l’ora”, come nota l’humour columnist Alexandra Petri sul “Washington Post”1, peraltro ancora insufficienti nel determinare la vittoria di Kamala Harris.

Il volume curato da Giuseppe Bettoni si apre con una sfida assai ambiziosa, quella posta nel suo titolo e nella sua prefazione, ovvero trattare politica, democrazie e migrazioni in Africa.

The enclave of Melilla: an urban area on the edge of the Mediterranean. – The Autonomous City of Melilla as well as that of Ceuta, located on the edge of the Mediterranean, represents the only two land borders between Africa and Europe. Given the particular geographical position that covers the enclave, Melilla is considered as a peripheral territory of the European Union (Sánchez, 2022). The Spatial, cultural and linguistic conflicts are reflected in the urban geography of the enclave and in the division of the city’s neighborhoods. In districts I and II, located in the center of the city, the Spanish language and the Catholic religion are pre-dominant, while the presence of Muslims and the use of the Tamazight language, mainly characterized the peripheral districts of the cities belonging to districts III, IV and V; “Language is also a place of struggle” (hooks, 1998, p. 64). The aim of this work is to analyze the marginal role that the enclave plays between urban, linguistic and religious conflicts.

Eastern Congo: il processo di peace building del Parco Nazionale Virunga. – Sebbene la guerra in Repubblica Democratica del Congo sia ufficialmente terminata nel 2002, nella regione del Paese il conflitto è ancora in corso. Dal maggio 2021, nel Nord Kivu sia stato dichiarato lo stato di assedio e instaurato un governo militare, ma i ribelli sono oggi alle porte di Goma, capoluogo della provincia.
In tale contesto si inserisce il Parco Nazionale del Virunga, le cui attività non si limitano alla tutela delle risorse naturali, ma invece si sostanziano in un’incessante opera di peace-building, attraverso la costruzione di occasioni di sviluppo socioeconomico per la comunità locale.
Metodologia: oltre sulle più aggiornate pubblicazioni - saggistica, reportistica e media - l’articolo si basa sull’esperienza sul campo maturata dal 2017 dall’autore in quanto cooperante presso progetti di sviluppo nel Nord Kivu, uno dei quali situato a pochi metri dal quartier generale del PNV. È qui che sono state realizzate le interviste a due testimoni privilegiati: David Nezehose, ranger del PNV, per un’analisi sui profili di sicurezza; e Francesca Lanata, Africa project coordinator del Jardin botanique Meise presso il PNV.

"Carlo Piaggia. From the Lucchesia to Africa (1851-1882)"

Migrants, abandonment and reuse of historical centers. The case of Riace in Calabria. – Italy, a migratory crossroads between Europe, Africa and Asia, has always been affected by migratory movements that have affected its regions in different ways. In recent decades, they have assumed a synergistic demo-graphic dimension between population and depopulation, which modifies the structure and composition of the population, mitigating the unstop-pable demographic decline along with the depopulation of historic cen-ters. This is possible through urban redevelopment and socio-economic revitalization paths linked to the reception of migrants. The contribution analyzes possible causes and effects of migratory processes on the Cala-brian population, using the Riace case study as a model in which the “wel-come path” has had positive results and revitalized the historical center with the return of residents and the construction of a society with high values of cultural pluralism.

Covid-19 and the spread in African spaces. A geo-anthropological overview. – It is not yet known how Covid-19 will spread in the African continent; many genetic, climatic, sociological, demographic factors can influence its evo-lution. There is no doubt that less developed countries such as the African ones have a weak capacity to respond. According to data provided by the WHO, UN-OCHA and other accredited sources, the spread of the Virus in the Continent appears limited compared to other areas of the Planet; the most affected country is South Africa. The governments of some countries have reacted by implementing, on the European mod-el, procedures such as curfew (Egypt) or lockdown (South Africa and Nigeria). The research aims to develop a framework on the spread of Covid-19 in Africa and the socio-economic impact of the measures im-plemented in the emergency. Another aim is to highlight the changes in the socio-anthropological aspects, considering that many African socie-ties define themselves on the basis of ethnicity, interaction with other communities and therefore social distancing measures will not be as ef-fective as elsewhere.

Smart: Opportunities and Risks for Urban Development and Challenges for the African Continent. – In recent decades there has been a proliferation of studies, research and approaches to the “smart” theme, viewed with interest as the “new” frontier of sustainability, which seeks to combine technological development with territorial development, social inclusion with environmental protection. This seems very stimulating for the develop-ment of the poorest regions of the Earth, which, following political instability, or economic difficulties, or structural and infrastructural back-wardness, are lagging behind the richest and most stable regions, although in recent years they are witnessing a very fast GDP growth rate. Starting from some definitions of “city”, I will examine the concept of “smart city” and will try to identify the approaches that best respond not only to objective needs for the development of a territory, but also to its qualitative characteristics, in so that “smart” urban and territorial planning projects represent a real and effective instrument of integrated and lasting development, also in urban and rural Africa.

The CAR (Central African Republic) crisis. Transcalarity between violence and resilience. – The Central African Republic has been experiencing a sequence of political-military crisis starting from its constitution (with the death of B. Boganda) to the collapse of Séléka regime (2013) and the current transitional phase, which is leading by K. Samba Panza. The ingredients of this crisis are cross-scale, with mobile factors that easily pass from a scale to another. On the "domestic" scene, as it is in itself very complex and marked by a plurality of actors even foreigners, take place regional, pan-african and global dynamics. Facing this changing framework plagued by violence, the development of a cultural resilience assures the endurance of Central African Republic as political and social entity.

Mauritius island has been nearly uninhabited until XVIth Century, when firstly Portuguese, then Dutch, French and Eng-lish powers took possession of it. The island’s population growth was due to two main causes: in the first moment to the commerce, then to the exploitation of resources, with important environmental transforma-tions.Until the independence was declared in 1968, the main economic source was the cultivation of sugar cane, for which African slaves, and then In-dian and Chinese workers was used.Starting from the independence period the economic structure of the is-land has changed, with a significant diversification of the productive ac-tivities. Beach tourism is now a vital economic sector of the island, but it hasn’t changed the population distribution of the island, mainly concen-trated in the internal areas.The aim of this article is to analyze the evolution of the populating dy-namics of the island and the economic trends and finally observe their territorial and environmental impacts.