Horace Campbell

Horace G. Campbell is a Jamaican professor of African American Studies and Political Science at Syracuse University in Syracuse, New York. He specializes in peace and justice studies.

Horace Campbell
Born	Montego Bay, Jamaica
Alma mater	University of Sussex
Occupation(s)	Professor of African American Studies and Political Science
Organization	Syracuse University

Education and early academics

Born in Montego Bay, Jamaica,^[1] Campbell was educated in the Caribbean, Canada, Uganda, and the United Kingdom, where he completed his doctoral studies at Sussex University.^[2] His thesis was titled "The Commandist State in Uganda". Since 1979, he has focused on issues of militarism and transformation in Africa.

Before teaching at Syracuse University, Campbell taught in the Department of Political Science at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, and spent six years at the University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. He has also been a visiting professor in China, as well as in South Africa, Ireland, and Uganda. In the fall semesters of 2011 and 2013, he taught as a visiting distinguished professor in the Department of International Relations at Tsinghua University, Beijing, where he taught courses on Comparative Politics and International Political Economy.

Contributions to scholarship

Campbell teaches courses including Politics in Africa, African International Relations, Militarism and Transformation in Southern Africa, Introduction to Pan-Africanism, the Caribbean Society Since Independence, Caribbean Intellectual Thought, and Introduction to African American Studies. At Syracuse University, Campbell is a member of the International Relations Faculty in the Maxwell School and serves as one of the conveners for the graduate seminar on Pan-Africanism.

In 2021, he served as the director of the Africa Initiative (AI) at Syracuse University. The initiative positions Africa as a source of knowledge, emphasizing the work of Syracuse University scholars across various disciplines, including the arts, humanities, social sciences, mathematics, and engineering. AI focuses on the following areas of research and advocacy: Peace and Reconstruction, Africa and the Information Revolution, Gender and the Environment in the Pan-African World, African Orature, African Languages and Literature, and Reparations in the Twenty-First Century.^[3][4]

Global NATO and the Catastrophic Failure in Libya: Lessons for Africa in the Forging of African Unity^[5] discusses the counter-revolution in Libya and its role in the destabilization of North Africa. Rasta and Resistance: From Marcus Garvey to Walter Rodney,^[6] is now in its seventh edition. In 2014, the French edition of this book was published by Camion Blanc. Campbell's book Reclaiming Zimbabwe: The Exhaustion of the Patriarchal Model of Liberation discusses the anti-imperialist discourse of the political leadership in Zimbabwe. His Reclaiming Zimbabwe: The Exhaustion of the Patriarchal Model of Liberation (David Philip, South Africa, and Africa World Press, New Jersey, 2003)^[7] critiques liberation movements that fail to transform themselves and their societies. Pan Africanism, Pan Africanists, and African Liberation in the 21st Century (New Academia Publishers, 2006),^[8] co-edited with Rodney Worrell, presents some conceptual challenges for the unification of Africa and the emancipation of African peoples globally.^{[citation needed]}

His book Barack Obama and Twenty-First Century Politics: A Revolutionary Moment in the USA^[9] analyzes the social forces that organized to intervene in the political process of the United States during the 2008 financial crisis and the movement behind Barack Obama. The book examines the networks that facilitated the electoral victory in 2008 and discusses the importance of self-organization and self-emancipation in politics. Situated in the context of the agency of new social forces galvanized in the 2008 electoral season, the book develops a theory of politics starting with the humanist principles of Ubuntu, healing, and reparations for the 21st century, arguing that ideas such as quantum politics and a "network of networks" move away from old forms of vanguardism during a period characterized as a revolutionary moment. Campbell's work was included in the book African Awakening: The Emerging Revolutions, edited by Sokari Ekine and Firoze Manji.^[10]

Campbell has contributed more than 40 chapters to edited books and has published numerous articles and reviews in scholarly journals. He writes regularly for newspapers in the US, Southern Africa, East Africa, the Caribbean, and the United Kingdom. He has been a commentator on international politics on MSNBC, Democracy Now!, CCTV (in China), Pacifica Radio, and other radio stations in the US, the Caribbean, East Africa, and South Africa. His commentaries on international issues are circulated via Pambazuka News and CounterPunch. Campbell's interview for Blackelectorate.com, discussing the implications of September 11, 2001, for humanity, was reproduced on websites in Africa, Europe, Latin America, and North America. He is involved in opposing US Africa Command.^[11]

Affiliations and activism

Campbell is a member of the advisory board of the Syracuse Peace Council. He was a sponsor of the Committee for Academic Freedom in Africa throughout the 1990s. He is a board member of The Association of Concerned Africa Scholars (ACAS), the African Studies Association, and the National Conference of Black Political Scientists. He was a member of the African Association of Political Science and was the guest editor of the first issue of the African Journal of Political Science, where he coordinated a publication on the topic of Pan-Africanism in the 21st century.

Within the Pan-African movement, he worked with Tajudeen Abdul Raheem to articulate a concept of Pan-African emancipation in the 21st century.

In 2005, he chaired the Walter Rodney Commemoration Committee, whose members seek to extend the work and ideas of Walter Rodney about emancipatory politics.

Campbell was the first director of the Syracuse University Abroad Program in Harare, Zimbabwe. During this period, he worked with youth to emphasize the importance of emancipation in the post-independence era. His interaction with the youth, particularly radical African feminists, influenced his book Reclaiming Zimbabwe: The Exhaustion of the Patriarchal Model of Liberation. He has also participated in debates on African unity in Southern Africa and continues to research peace and reconstruction in Africa. In 2007, he was the keynote speaker at the Africa Beyond Borders Conference in Durban, South Africa.^[12]

He has continued to engage in African politics, campaigning against impunity on the continent. In 2011, he delivered the Strini Moodley Memorial Lecture in Durban.^[13] . That same year, at the Kwame Nkrumah Centenary Celebration in Accra, Ghana, he presented the lecture "Towards an Africa without Borders in the 21st Century: The Inspiration of Kwame Nkrumah".

In 2001, Campbell conducted research on peace in Central Africa while based at the Global Pan-African Movement in Kampala, Uganda. He gave presentations on Peace and Reconstruction before the Uganda Society in Uganda, the Nairobi Peace Initiative (Nairobi, Kenya), and the Desmond Tutu Peace Center (Cape Town, South Africa). Campbell was a presenter on Globalization at the NGO Forum of the World Conference Against Racism (WCAR) in Durban, South Africa and served for five years as the chairperson of the International Caucus of the Black Radical Congress.

Campbell has maintained contacts with progressive sections of the Rastafari movement, and in 2013, he presented a paper on the "Coral Gardens Uprising in Jamaica" at the Rastafari Conference in Kingston, Jamaica.

In August 2023, Campbell denounced a possible intervention by the United States and France in Niger to restore Mohamed Bazoum to his post, saying that "The French are excessively dependent on the exploitation and plundering of Africa".^[14]

Personal life

Campbell is married to Makini Zaline Roy, a Professor of Education at Syracuse University.

Publications

Books

• 1985: Rasta and Resistance: From Marcus Garvey to Walter Rodney, Hansib Publications (French translation published by Camion Blanc in 2014, foreword by Jérémie Kroubo Dagnini).
• 2003: Reclaiming Zimbabwe: The Exhaustion of the Patriarchal Model of Liberation, New Jersey: Africa World Press; South Africa: David Phillip.
• 2006: Pan Africanists and African Liberation in the 21st Century, New Academia Publishers.
• 2007: "China in Africa: challenging US global hegemony", in Manji, F., and S. Marks (eds), African Perspectives on China in Africa, Oxford: Pambazuka Press.
• 2010: Barack Obama and 21st Century Politics, Pluto Press. Archived 23 February 2014 at the Wayback Machine.^[15]
• 2013: Global NATO and the Catastrophic Failure in Libya: Lessons for Africa in the Forging of African Unity, Monthly Review Press.
• 2018: "Nelson Mandela: Ubuntu and the Universalist Spirit", in Shubin, V., and Zelenova, D. (eds), South Africa: Pages of History and Contemporary Politics, Moscow: Institute of African Studies.
• 2018: "The Pan African Experience: From The OAU to the African Union", in Falola, T., and Shanguhyia, M.S., (eds): The Palgrave Handbook of African Colonial and Postcolonial History, New York: Palgrave, Macmillan.

Articles

• 2009: "Obama and US Policy Towards Africa" Archived 25 April 2015 at the Wayback Machine, Pambazuka News, Issue 415 (15-01-2009).
• 2009: "Reparations and regrets: Why is the US Senate apologising now?", Pambazuka News, Issue 440 (2009-07-02.)
• 2009: "Tajudeen Abdul-Raheem and the tasks of Pan-Africanists", Pambazuka News, Issue 442 (2009-07-16).
• 2009: "Zimbabwe: Where is the Outrage? Mamdani, Mugabe and the African Scholarly Community"^[usurped], Association of Concerned Africa Scholars (16 March 2009).
• 2013: "The Military Defeat of the South Africans in Angola", Monthly Review, Vol. 64, No. 11 (April 2013).
• 2024: "Fighting Racism in the U.S. Military: Dismantling the United States Africa Command". The African Review, 2024.