This new Handbook examines the issues, challenges, and debates surrounding the problem of security in Africa.

Africa is home to most of the world’s current conflicts, and security is a key issue. However, African security can only be understood by employing different levels of analysis: the individual (human security), the state (national/state security), and the region (regional/international security). Each of these levels provides analytical tools for understanding what could be called the African security predicament and these debates are animated by the new security issues: immigration, small arms transfers, gangs and domestic crime, HIV/AIDS, transnational crime, poverty, and environmental degradation. African security therefore not only presents concrete challenges for international security but provides a real-world context for challenging conventional conceptions of security.

Drawing together contributions from a wide range of key thinkers in the field, the Routledge Handbook of African Security engages with these debates, and is organized into four parts:

Part I: The African security predicament in the twenty-first century;

Part II: Understanding conflict in Africa;

Part III: Regionalism and Africa;

Part IV: External influences.

This Handbook will be of great interest to students of African politics, human security, global security, war and conflict studies, peacebuilding, and IR in general.