Do the ways in which policymakers and national governments view borderlands reflect how the communities living there experience them? Building on this, can a better understanding of the characteristics of borderlands help in promoting development, improving governance and making…
RVI publishes books, research reports, research papers, briefings and meeting reports in a range of formats. Publications cover policy, research, arts, culture and local knowledge in the countries of eastern and central Africa. Research publications—books, reports and papers—are peer-reviewed. Some RVI publications are also available in French and/or Arabic.
The RVI is a signatory of the Budapest Open Access Initiative (2001); all publications are free for download in PDF format under Creative Commons licences. The views expressed in books and reports published by the RVI are those of the authors, not the Institute.
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While digital finance—including mobile money—has developed unevenly across Somalia, Ethiopia and Kenya, such technologies are nevertheless transforming everyday economic activities. In some cases, borderlands and cross-border financial flows are central to these digital developments and are driving further innovation….
In the Mandera triangle—a pastoralist region encompassing the point at which the borders of Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia meet—the reality of local and cross-border trade often diverges widely from official state policies of control. This disjunction has created a…
This think piece is an extract of a longer paper taking stock of the roughly 40 X-Border studies carried out between 2019 and 2025 under the auspices of the Rift Valley Institute’s XCEPT programme. If we are to fully…
The Horn of Africa is a region marked by complex infrastructural interdependencies, where the decline and emergence of trade corridors continue to reshape the economic and political relations within and between states. This study draws on the Memorandum of…
- By Joseph Diing Majok
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I was first invited to join the Cross-border Conflict Evidence, Policy, and Trends (XCEPT) programme in 2019, having previously worked with the Rift Valley Institute (RVI) on research in South Sudan. This innovative project brought together international experts and early career…
- By Sahra Ahmed Koshin
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In 2019, I became a local researcher with the Cross-border Conflict Evidence, Policy, and Trends (XCEPT) programme, run by the Rift Valley Institute (RVI), an independent non-profit organization seeking to foster local knowledge on social, political and economic development in Eastern…
Tax revenue collection in Somalia has, during the past decade, been hampered by—among other things—weak institutional capacity, lack of sound tax administration systems and a fragmented administrative structure that has often placed the Federal Government of Somalia (FGS) at…
During the past decade, northern Kenya’s peripheral border counties have become key to the central state’s political and economic agenda. This synthesis report therefore uses the concept of ‘restructuring the margins’ to unpack the findings of two case study…
This report examines the effects of infrastructure development and shifting political conditions on trade and conflict at the Kenya–Ethiopia border, including on gender dynamics. In doing so, it focuses on how small-town cross-border traders in the town of Moyale,…
Recent Publications
Effectiveness of Women in Politics and Improving Gender Equality in South Sudan
May 2, 2025
This report argues that, in order to improve women’s participation in politics and promote gender-responsive policies in the country, there is a need to enlarge government capacity for women’s leadership by introducing equal gender quotas for decision-making positions. Summary Women’s
The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church in Post-2018 Ethiopia: Navigating church–state and inter-religious dynamics
April 4, 2025
This report examines the complex and shifting situation of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church (EOTC) in post-2018 Ethiopia, highlighting its struggle to maintain influence amid political, social and religious changes. In addition to examining both the current EOTC relationship with
Thinking about Borderlands: Observations and implications from XCEPT programme research
March 31, 2025
Do the ways in which policymakers and national governments view borderlands reflect how the communities living there experience them? Building on this, can a better understanding of the characteristics of borderlands help in promoting development, improving governance and making more