Aims of the Project The Rift Valley Forum for Research, Policy and Local Knowledge, previously the Nairobi Forum, was established in 2012 to provide a new space for critical discussion of political, economic and social issues in Eastern and…
SEARCH
PROJECT TYPES
REGION
Aims of the Project The Contested Borderlands reports are authoritative studies of borders and border communities in Eastern and Central Africa, informed by historical archive work and anthropological field research. The series brings local knowledge and academic rigour to…
The Project Since 2010, the RVI has organized an annual series of public lectures at the University of Juba. These lectures are designed to promote public discussion of emerging political and cultural issues in South Sudan. The lectures are co-hosted…
A growing youth population, high levels of unemployment and limited opportunities for vocational training have led to a steady increase in the number of young Somali men and women seeking higher education courses that will provide them with skills…
The Rift Valley Institute, with support from Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade through the Austrialian Embassy in Addis Ababa, is currently working with a group of researchers and scholars from the University of Juba, South Sudan,…
The peace negotiations which preceded the current political transition process in South Sudan brought together the warring factions, former detainees, leaders of political parties, members of the wider South Sudanese political class and representatives of the churches and…
Aims The South Sudan National Archive Project is a multiphase project for the conservation, reordering, cataloguing and digitization of the historical government records of South Sudan, implemented in collaboration with the Archive Department of the Ministry of Culture,…
Recent Publications
Commodification and Conflict in the Horn of Africa Borderlands
April 1, 2026
This report synthesizes findings from the Rift Valley Institute’s X-Border Local Research Network (2019–2025). In the surveyed studies, 25 leading local and international area specialists conducted extensive qualitative fieldwork across borderlands in South Sudan, Sudan, Ethiopia, Kenya and the Somali
Peace and Instability: Tigray since the Pretoria Agreement
March 26, 2026
CONFLICT TRENDS ANALYSIS / MARCH 2026 Summary THE ETHIOPIA PEACE RESEARCH FACILITY This conflict trends analysis was produced by the Ethiopia Peace Research Facility (PRF). The PRF is an independent facility combining timely analysis on peace and conflict from Ethiopian
Political Economy of Cash and Markets in Sudan
February 27, 2026
The research provides a snapshot of the war in Sudan in the period from February to April 2025. However, the war is dynamic, with political alliances and territorial control changing. The April 2023 conflict between the Sudan Armed Forces (SAF)