In honour of Women’s Month, the National Institute for Humanities and Social Sciences (NIHSS) proudly presents the Women of Impact Series. This series celebrates the outstanding achievements of our female graduates, partners, and project leaders in the Humanities and Social Sciences. We showcase the groundbreaking research, extraordinary dedication, and inspiring visions of these accomplished women. Through their innovative work and unwavering commitment, they have advanced in their respective fields and shaped a more inclusive and diverse future. Join us in celebrating their remarkable contributions and stories.
- Can you share a bit about your journey and experiences as a project leader with the NIHSS, and how this has influenced your work and personal growth?
The opportunity offered by the NIHSS to develop a research programme on ‘Seeing the Sea’ in relation to opportunities for BRICS to contribute to the various threats, challenges, and opportunities in our ocean regions, coupled to the fact that this is of particular importance to South Africa as a tri-oceanic country (the Indian, South Atlantic, and Southern oceans), has been of great significance to me. From the start, I received encouragement and guidance from the NIHSS team, and they were particularly supportive of my efforts to focus on student development, mentorship, and youth. Being part of the NIHSS as a project leader also provided me with a strong basis from which to forge relations with like-minded scholars nationally and internationally, as well as with decision makers in government and in regional organisations. Throughout, I have received strong encouragement from the team at the NIHSS who continue to show an interest in the work that we are doing. The time spent thus far on this project has been exciting, interesting, and deeply informative. Having an opportunity to focus on ocean regions and politics has meant a broadening of my research interest and expertise in security studies and foreign policy. This project has allowed me to introduce my students to a ‘whole new world’ of maritime security, transnational crime, food security, human security, (blue) economic development, and regional maritime and coastal cooperation through regional organisations and issue-based regimes, as well as through ‘informal’, such as BRICS.
- How does your research and projects address the unique challenges and opportunities in your field, and what key insights or findings do you believe can drive meaningful change and impact in society?
This project had its origin in an invitation that I received from two universities—Paramadina in Indonesia and the University of Western Australia—in 2018 to join them in developing and presenting a course on the international relations of the Indian Ocean Region. In 2024 the postgraduate module will be presented for the sixth time (during the COVID lockdown in 2020 we did not run the module), and by now our number of participants has grown to include universities from Kenya, Mauritius, Bangladesh, India, and Reunion—member countries of the Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA). My involvement in this programme made me aware of an important new development in the international system, viz. the evolution of ocean regions and the need for political scientists and students to study and research this phenomenon, also within the context of global South relations and, more recently, the expansion of BRICS. For South Africa in particular, these aspects are of great importance—we have one of the largest oceanic territories in the world in terms of our exclusive economic zone—and given the increasing involvement of great powers in our ocean spaces, including the militarisation of oceans, we need to pay much more attention to ways in which we can build peace and cooperation. The (potential/possible) role of BRICS to utilise new opportunities (think ‘blue economy’ and maritime security) and to address some of the evolving challenges in these new ocean regions—ranging from climate change, through transnational crime (including the scourge of illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing), to threats to our maritime environment, international sea lines of communication, and extraction activities on the seabed—are of crucial importance to the security-development nexus on our continent and in its oceans. This project allows me to bring together a group of young, bright postdoctoral fellows and doctoral and master’s students who are keen to contribute to knowledge and to solutions to the many ocean-related challenges facing us. Thus far, I think it is especially our insights on the need for government to support the expansion of our Navy, the importance of South Africa ratifying the recently signed High Seas Treaty (also known as the BBNJ Treaty), the need for closer regional cooperation to address the specific challenges of IUU fishing and of domestic conflict in littoral states spilling over into ocean regions, and the plight of African island states faced by climate change and ‘disappearing land’ that are of importance.
- What does the celebration of Women’s Month mean to you?
I am first and foremost an academic and a researcher. Women’s Month, to me, offers an opportunity to celebrate the incredible talent and scholarly abilities of our emerging and young women researchers in this country. It also offers a focused opportunity to consider the needs of, and the many challenges faced by, young women who would want to build careers in the world of research and policy development, often under very difficult circumstances, and to explore opportunities for providing them with mentorship, support, and tangible means to chase their dreams.
- What role do you see interdisciplinary collaboration playing in your work, and how has it enhanced the outcomes of your research and projects?
Interdisciplinary collaboration has been invaluable. Colleagues in Brazil and India have been cooperating with us on this project and have been making contributions to our research, particularly in participating in our annual ocean governance colloquia. But collaboration goes beyond the confines of BRICS—we have forged close relations with other littoral and island states researchers and regional organisations, particularly in Cameroon, Mozambique, Kenya, Mauritius, the Seychelles, Morocco, the Maldives, Portugal, Greece, the UK, and Australia, and with the Indian Ocean Commission (IOC) and the Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA). We have also moved beyond collaboration with social scientists to include scholars from the humanities, particularly in the field of literature studies—their perspectives and insights on the importance and role of ‘the seas’ in international relations, particularly in the Indian Ocean Region, have enriched our understanding and work immensely. In this regard, I want to mention very specifically the Kenyan author, Yvonne Owuor, whose prize-winning novel, The Dragonfly Sea, has been instrumental in our team’s understanding of the long historical interactions across the Indo-Pacific and the often ‘invisible’ connections that exist and are flourishing, even in the face of serious threats to the livelihoods, if not survival, of many of our coastal communities along the eastern seaboard of our continent. Yvonne has become a firm friend of our team and regularly shares her insights around African approaches to and the lived experiences of people in our ‘oceans world’. Another young researcher on a dedicated maritime security programme with a well-known research institution (ISS) who, also through his studies as a Master’s student in our NIHSS project, should also be mentioned: David Wilima, whose work goes beyond research to encompass involvement in and to contribute to the truly African-driven roadmap, Great Blue Wall, to achieve a nature-positive world by 2030. Collaboration with these colleagues—and many others—has resulted in joint publications—with several more in the pipeline—and in opportunities to engage with policymakers and community leaders involved in efforts to build and sustain our ocean regions.