This is the second edition of the Yearbook on the African Union (YBAU). It is befitting that this Yearbook is being published during the twentieth anniversary of the founding of the African Union (AU), a momentous event in the annals of African integration. More significant, the anniversary underscores the need for knowledge production about the AU that is accessible to both academic and policy audiences. The anniversary also coincides with growing disenchantment across Africa regarding the ability of African regional institutions to deliver on their many promises. Such a context is increasing the demand for knowledge that not only benefits scholars but also informs policy-makers in helping to manage the expectations about their roles. Drawing on the successful inauguration in 2021 of the first Yearbook, this Yearbook continues to be an academic project that provides in-depth evaluation and analysis of the AU as an institution, its processes, and its engagements. With the conviction that understanding the annual workings of the AU furnishes perspectives that ‘insiders’ should find useful, it also speaks to the wider policy and practitioner constituency. Despite the challenges of establishing a yearbook as an academic resource that appeals to both scholarly communities as well as policy-makers, the richness of the contributions demonstrate the careful straddling of the two domains.
For consistency, this Yearbook retains the previous organisation of chapters and thematic areas. The first part presents a synoptic overview that examines the leadership of a compelling continental issue-area (in this respect, financial and institutional reforms), a rendering of the overall state of the union, and an investigation into the performance of the holder of the position of chairman of the AU in the particular year. Since the leadership of issue-areas and the holders of the chair are bound to change every year, the Yearbook’s annual coverage provides an interesting, comparative perspective that should be useful to academics and policy-makers. Moreover, it is extremely valuable that the Yearbook investigates these two dimensions in order to highlight distinctive policy issues that animate the AU and the leadership that propels them. The second part reflects upon both changes and continuities in the thematic areas that inform each Yearbook. The chapters on education, science, and technology; governance; health; infrastructure; peace and security; as well as women and youth remain the same from the previous year, and the authors are also the same. For the chapters on regional integration and trade as well as strategic partnerships, new authors joined the enterprise. For the authors, this continuity facilitates
Linnéa Gelot, Cheryl Hendricks, Gilbert M. Khadiagala, Paul Nugent, and Thomas Kwasi Tieku (Editorial Board)