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Dr. Charles Amo-Agyemang

Dr. Charles Amo-Agyemang
Senior Lecturer
camoagyemang9@gmail.com

https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=charles+amo+agye...

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Charles-Amo-Agyemang-2

PROFILE

Dr. Amo-Agyemang is a lecturer of Politics and International Relations at Political Science Department of the University of Ghana. He was a visiting scholar in International Relations at Stellenbosch University, South Africa from June 1 to July 28, 2019. Dr. Amo-Agyemang earned his BA (Political Science) from University of Ghana, MPhil (Political Science with specialisation in International Political Economy) from University of Ghana and holds a PhD in Politics and International Relations (Eximia cum laude Approbatur) with specialisation in Global Biopolitics from University of Lapland, Finland. Dr. Amo-Agyemang has previously taught Politics and International Relations at West End University College, Ghana, from 2009-2011. He served as a PhD researcher and sessional instructor at University of Lapland, Finland, Politics and International Relations faculty from 2013-2017. Dr. Amo-Agyemang’s research interests are broadly situated within international development, international relations, biopolitics, governmentality, resilience discourse, power relations between non-state actors, Africology, postcolonial and de-colonial theories of development with a particular interest in Africa. Dr. Amo-Agyemang’s current research looks at Resilience Thinking: International Policies, Practices and Discourses in Africa.

EDUCATION

  • PhD in Politics and International Relations  -   University of Lapland, Finland
  • MPhil in Political Science  - University of Ghana
  • BA (Political Science) - University of Ghana

RESEARCH

Dr. Amo-Agyemang’s research interest is on changing liberal governing rationalities with focus on biopolitics, development and security. His research and teaching interests are broadly situated within international development, power relations between non-state actors, international organisations and institutions and development; post-colonial and de-colonial theories of development with a particular interest in Africa. His on-going research analyses the new forms of thinking that have sought to grasp the relationship between liberal/neoliberal governmentality, enabling the reproduction and extension of bio-political rule. More recently he has started exploring transformation in the conceptual understanding of the international policy intervention over the last two decades. Of most importance, for him, is the shift from grasping the state and society as interconnected but separate realms (at the heart of liberal political theorising) towards an understanding of the changing relationship between state and society and how both the interconnection and separation have changed historically. Here he is particularly interested in problematising and historicising three forms power: sovereign power, disciplinary power and governmental power or bio-power which operate in different ways and different means; and this could be understood crudely to be associated with the shifting understandings of governmental power under pre-modern regime, modernist/liberal regime (disciplinary power) and in contemporary/ neoliberal regimes (of governmental power or bio-power). His other general interests include the new forms of international intervention and regulation, particularly those projected in the therapeutic ethos of the rule of law, human security, empowerment, democratisation, state capacity-building, human rights, civil society development, anti-corruption and transparency, country ‘ownership’, post-conditionality, and ‘pro-poor’ development.

 

COURSES TAUGHT

POLI 442: Social and Political Theory (Level 400)

POLI445: Politics of International Economic Relations (Level 400)

POLI 448: Issues in African International Relational Relations (Level 400)

POLI 641: Problems of Government and Politics in Africa (MPhil 1)

 

PUBLICATIONS/ RESEARCH OUTPUT

Journal articles

  1. Amo-Agyemang, C. (2024). The Biopolitics of COVID-19: Thinking through, with and ‘beyond’Foucault. Theoria, 71(180), 49-76.

  2. Amo-Agyemang, C (2024) Reimagining indigenous African community in the Anthropocene thinking. Filosofia Theoretica: Journal of African Philosophy, Culture and Religions, Vol. 13. No. 1, pp 61-81

  3. Amo-Agyemang, C (2024). Ghana’s demand for restitution of material artifacts: a decolonial reflection. African Identities, 1- 21.   https://doi.org/10.1080/14725843.2024.2324112

  4. Amo-Agyemang, C (2024). Restitution of material objects and indigenous ontology: towards coloniality of dispossession/ theft in Africa. International Journal of Cultural Policy, 1-6.https://doi.org/10.1080/10286632.2024.2363420

  5. Amo-Agyemang, C (2024). Restitution of material objects and indigenous ontology: towards coloniality of dispossession/ theft in Africa. International Journal of Cultural Policy, 1-6.https://doi.org/10.1080/10286632.2024.2363420

  6. Amo-Agyemang,C (2023): Toward cultural narratology: Indigenous Frafra and Akan perspectives on resilience, Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural Studies, DOI:10.1080/10714413.2023.2203667

  7. Akoeda, J, Boafo-Arthur,K, Amo-Agyemang,C,  and  Agbodzakey,J(2023) The Politics of Trade Disputes in the Fourth Republic: The Case of Ghana and Nigeria. Journal of Economics and Sustainable Development,14, 10:1-8

  8. Amo-Agyemang, C. (2022) Climate Migration, Resilience and Adaptation in the Anthropocene: Insights from the Migrating Frafra to Southern Ghana. The Anthropocene Review, 1–20. https:// doi.org/10.1177/20530196221109354

  9. Amo-Agyemang, C. (2021) Unmasking Resilience as Governmentality: Toward an Afrocentric Epistemology.  Journal of International Politics. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41311-021-00282-8.
  10. Amo-Agyemang, C. (2021). Understanding African states in International Affairs: On the Analytics of Sovereignty Versus Elite Governmentality. Cogent Social Sciences Journal.  Forthcoming. Manuscript No. 215841843.R1.
  11. Amo-Agyemang, C. (2021). De-colonising the Discourse of Resilience. International Journal of African Renaissance Studies -Multi-,Inter-and Transdisciplinarity, 16:1, 4-30 DOI:10.1080/18186874.2021.1962725
  12. Amo-Agyemang, C. (2021). The Role of the State in Sino-Ghanaian Relations: The case of Bui Hydroelectric Dam. Cogent Social Sciences 7:1, DOI.10.1080/23311886.2021.1963575
  13. Amo-Agyemang, C. (2019). Valorising University Education in Ghana. International Journal of African Renaissance Studies 14(2), 55-80.
  14. Amo-Agyemang, C. (2017). Understanding Neoliberalism as Governmentality: A Case Study of the IMF and World Bank Structural Adjustment Regime in Ghana. Finland. Lapland University Press. Acta Universitatis Lapponiensis 346 ISBN 978-952-484-984-5. ISSN 0788-7604.

Books chapters

  1. Amo-Agyemang, C (2024). ''Reconceptualizing the Neoliberal “Good Governance” Discourse and the Complexity of Global Self-policing'' in Joseph R.A. Ayee, Lloyd G.A. Amoah and Seidu M. Alidu (eds.) Public Sector Management and Economic Governance in Ghana: Three Decades of the Fourth Republic. ISBN 978-3-031-56963-0. London: Palgrave MacmillanAmo-Agyemang, C (2024). ''Reconceptualizing the Neoliberal “Good Governance” Discourse and the Complexity of Global Self-policing'' in Joseph R.A. Ayee, Lloyd G.A. Amoah and Seidu M. Alidu (eds.) Public Sector Management and Economic Governance in Ghana: Three Decades of the Fourth Republic. ISBN 978-3-031-56963-0. London: Palgrave Macmillan

  2. Amo-Agyemang, C. (2021). Governmentality of Aid in Six Decades of Ghana-China Relations, IN Amoah, L.G (Ed) Sixty years of Ghana-China Relations Friendship, Friction, and the Future. Accra. University of Ghana Press, pages 115-143.
  3. Amo-Agyemang, C. Institutional Response to COVID-19 in Ghana: An analysis, IN Gyekye-Jandoh, M.A, Alidu, S (Eds) Elections in Uncertain Times:  The 2020 General Elections in Ghana in Perspective. Forthcoming.

Working papers

  1. Amo-Agyemang, C. Africa and Neoliberal Governmentality: The Case of the IMF and World Bank Structural Adjustment Regime in Ghana.
  2. Amo-Agyemang, C. Democratising Development? The Politics of Good Governance and Development Policy Reforms in Ghana.
  3. Amo-Agyemang, C. Politics of Good Governance and the Reproduction of Power in Postcolonial Africa
  4. Amo-Agyemang, C. Reinventing Conditionality? A Critique of the World Bank and IMF structural adjustment programme
  5. Amo-Agyemang, C. IMF and World Bank and the Remaking of Governable State Actors.
  6. Amo-Agyemang, C. The Limits of Good Governance Agenda:  International Regulation and Civil Society Development in Ghana.
  7. Amo-Agyemang, C. Africanising resilience? Rethinking Global Governance.
  8. Amo-Agyemang, C. Interrogating Human Security in a Neoliberal State. A Biopolitical Perspective.
  9. Amo-Agyemang, C. Dynamics of Governance in Ghana Over Six Decades: Re-examining the Recent Neoliberal Paradigms from a Biopolitical Perspective.
  10. Amo-Agyemang, C. Making sense of Neoliberal Subjectivity: A Discourse Analysis of Good Governance Agenda in Ghana.

 

CONFERENCE PROCEEDINGS

  • Conference

    Amo-Agyemang, C. (2024). Discussant. National Sustainability Society Inaugural Conference - Adaptations Symposium. University of Washington, Husky Union Building (HUB) 4001 E Stevens Way NE, Seattle, WA 98195. September 9-11

    Amo-Agyemang, C. (2024). Discussant. Fall ’24 Institute on Teaching Social Action at the University of Washington, Sept 7-8

    Amo- Agyemang, C. (2024). Discussant. Approaching climate complexities in the south: Global climate action and its actual effects). DSA2024 Conference. SOAS University of London, June 26–28

    Amo-Agyemang, C. (2024). Discussant. Private Consultancies and Sustainability. (Re)thinking Private Consultants: Exploring Their Future (Re)directions Towards Just Transformations at the upcoming WCSG Conference, Wageningen, 16-19 October.

    Amo-Agyemang, C. (2024). Discussant. New-type of Urbanization in Multi-scale: China and Africa’s Perspective. Organizer: Tsinghua University, China; University of Cape Town, South Africa; University of the Western Cape, South Africa. Arts & Humanities Building, L1& L2, University of the Western Cape, Robert Sobukwe Road, Bellville, Cape Town.  25-26 November

    Amo-Agyemang, C. (2024). Discussant. Resilience and development in the context of decolonization. University of Juba, South Sudan, 28 -29 November.

    Amo-Agyemang, C. (2024). Presenter. Decolonizing the discourse of resilience. University of Ghana, Legon-Accra, 25-27 May.

    Amo-Agyemang, C. (2023). Keynote speaker. Decolonizing discourses of resilience: Dialogues and new directions beyond Western conceptualization.  United Nations Office of the Special Adviser on Africa (OSAA) Academic Conference on Africa Affairs. United Nations Headquarters, New York, New York 10017, 5-7 December

  • Amo-Agyemang, C.  The Logic of State Reproduction in Ghana and Japan: Insights from Population and Management Strategies from the Perspective of Biopolitics. A paper presented at the 60 years of Ghana-Japan relations: Reflections on an enduring partnership for development. Centre for Asian studies. University of Ghana.  November 2017.
  • Amo-Agyemang, C. The Anthropocene Epoch of Mining in Ghana: Re-naturalising the Politics of Galamsey, a paper presented at the Maiden Biennial Conference Center for Climate Change and Sustainability Studies, Theme: Engaging the Artisanal Mining Industry in Ghana: Practical Ideas toward Sustainable Livelihoods and Ecological Stability, 23rd -24th November, 2017, University of Ghana, Legon.
  • Amo-Agyemang, C. The Biopolitics of International Relations a paper presented at the Lancaster University Ghana, Ghana Monthly Seminar Presentations, 3rd October, 2018, Ghana.
  • Amo-Agyemang, C. Expert Workshop for University Lecturers, organised by United Nations Office on Drugs and Crimes in collaboration with the Nigerian Institute of Advanced Legal Studies (NIALS). Lagos, Nigeria, 8th to 9th May 2019.
  • Amo-Agyemang, C. Understanding the African States in International Affairs: On the Analytics of sovereignty Versus Elite Governmentality on the Theme Global International Relations:Emerging Approaches to Theory and Practice. A paper presented at the International Studies Association Conference from August 1st - 3rd, 2019 at Legon Center for International Affairs & Diplomacy, University of Ghana, Accra, Ghana
  • Amo-Agyemang, C. Understanding Resilience as Governmentality: Toward an Afrocentric Epistemology. A paper presented at Stellenbosch University, Arts and Social Science Seminar Series, June 25th, 2019, South Africa.
  • The article publishing process: An Elsevier author webinar, June 1, 2020, Harare and Pretoria.

 

OTHERS

Affiliations

  • Ghana Studies Association
  • International Political Science Association (IPSA)
  • Global studies and Science Communication
  • Finnish Political Science Association (FPSA)
  • African Association of Political Science (AAPS)

Fellowships

  • Visiting scholar in International Relations at Stellenbosch University, South Africa from June 1 to July 28, 2019. 
  • University of Ghana-Carnegie Project Banga-Africa Project: Civil Society and Political Extremism in Ghana’s Fourth Republic (Team Research Grants).