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 Elizabeth Nyibol Malou
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I became involved in the Cross-border Conflict Evidence, Policy, and Trends (XCEPT) programme’s Local Research Network (LRN) at its inception in 2018. During the following years, the network introduced me to a wider community of researchers who share a similar…
- 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…
- By Mawal Marko Gatkuoth
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This blog is part of the XCEPT project carried out by the Rift Valley Institute between May and June 2024. In this blog, the researcher draws heavily on his data from field observation and conversations with the respondents during…
South Sudan and Sudan’s borderlands are run by a patchwork of armed authorities. Since early 2019, when opposition forces were effectively wiped out, these zones of control have remained relatively fixed, even as the war in Sudan drew close…
Recent Publications
Minor Demarcations, Micro-Dams—Major Drama? Ethno-territorial expansionism and precarious peace in the Oromia–Somali borderlands of eastern Ethiopia
May 20, 2025
The report highlights the overlapping claims to and distributive struggles over territory and resources in the Oromia-Somali borderlands which animated inter-regional competition between the Oromia Regional State (ORS) and Somali Regional State (SRS), resulted in the brief 2023 uptick in
When Women Sing: How Murle women use arts and cultural mediums to communicate
May 16, 2025
This research explores how Murle women in the Greater Pibor area of central eastern South Sudan use not just songs but dance, hairstyles, body marks and beads to express themselves. Its objective is to draw attention to the ways Murle
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