Event Date: May 13, 2026 - 10:30am to 12:00pm
Location: FSS 4006, 120 University Private, University of Ottawa

Presented by CIPS

“You cannot live within the lie of mutual benefit through integration when integration becomes the source of your subordination. Let me be direct. We are in the midst of a rupture, not a transition.” 

The Davos speech by Prime Minister Mark Carney was a watershed moment in the history of Canada. It was the public affirmation that the global order constructed over the post-war period which facilitated US hegemony and benefited Canada was being weaponized as a tool of domination and subordination.  However, this was not news to many Africans.  The continent, for too many decades, has been the exporter of raw materials at the bottom of the international value chain. Commodity dependence has led to few jobs and has been subject to boom and bust cycles generated by exchanges in the US and other Northern countries. They also find themselves at the bottom of the hierarchy of international currencies and hence must constantly earn or borrow US dollars or other hard currencies to sustain their economies. Since 2020, many African are again in a debt crisis and subject to the imposition of punishing austerity by the IMF and a framework for debt relief (G20 common framework) that has performed poorly and does not address underlying structural causes. The deteriorating situation is compounded by Trump’s abandoning of instruments of soft power toward coercion.  African countries have been subjected to a roller coaster of tariffs along with massive aid cuts and a delayed and limited extension of the African Growth Opportunity Act. Trump’s overt expansionism, militarism and growing belligerence toward historical allies is breaking down the power configurations of the old order and expediting the movement toward multipolarity. The talk will document how trade and financial flows over time have impacted African countries while exploring new opportunities in a multipolar world to challenge and change the patterns of the past.

Brief Description:

The seminar will examine the impact of African integration into the world economy with a focus on trade and financial flows under the existing global order. The talk will discuss the impact of Trump’s abandonment of soft power and his increasing use of instruments of coercion on the movement toward multipolarity. It will also explore the possibilities for the continent to challenge the forces of domination and subordination to create new models of trade and finance that will better serve the continent. 

Speaker:

Howard Stein is a Professor in the Department of Afroamerican and African Studies (DAAS) and the Dept. of Epidemiology at the University of Michigan. During his sabbatical in 2025-26, he is a Visiting Fellow at the Balsillie School of International Affairs and Visiting Researcher at the School of the Environment, Resources and Sustainability at the University of Waterloo.  He is a development economist educated in Canada, the US and the UK. He has published more than a dozen books and edited collections and more than 150 journal articles, book chapters and reviews. He has held various academic appointments at places like the University of Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania; Hitotsubashi University, Japan; Sussex University, UK; Trinity College, Ireland; University of Lisbon, Portugal; and University of Leiden, Netherlands. His research and publications have largely focused on African countries and have covered a variety of topics including foreign aid, World Bank and IMF lending, finance and banking, neoliberalism, problems with Randomized Controlled Trials, health and gender, climate change, Covid-19, industrial policy, export processing zones, agricultural policy, African overpayment on sovereign bond issues, poverty and rural property right transformation, income and wealth inequality, Chinese economic relations and the institutionalization of neoclassical economics. 

Chair:

Nisha Shah is an Associate Professor of Political Studies at the University of Ottawa and the Associate Director of CIPS.