Emmanuel Akyeampong
· Ellen Gurney Professor of History and Professor of African and African American StudiesHarvard University · General Management
Active 1994–2025
About
Emmanuel Akyeampong is the Ellen Gurney Professor of History and Professor of African and African American Studies at Harvard University. He joined the Harvard faculty after receiving his Ph.D. in African History from the University of Virginia in 1993. His academic background includes a master's degree from Wake Forest University, where he focused on English labor history, and a bachelor's degree in History and Religions from the University of Ghana at Legon. Professor Akyeampong's research and publications focus on West African history, social history, and eco-social history, with notable works including themes in West Africa's history, a history of alcohol in Ghana, and a recent book on African nation builders. He has served as a co-chief editor for the Dictionary of African Biography and has been recognized with several research fellowships and honors, including being named a Corresponding Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and receiving an honorary Doctor of Laws from the University of Ghana. At Harvard, he has held leadership roles such as chair of the Committee on African Studies and Oppenheimer Faculty Director of the Center for African Studies, contributing significantly to the development of African and African American Studies at the university.
Research topics
- Political Science
- Economics
- Sociology
- Social Science
- Business
- Law
- Social psychology
- Ecology
- Environmental ethics
- Environmental planning
- Accounting
- Economy
- Psychology
- Economic growth
- Environmental resource management
- Geography
- Demographic economics
Selected publications
Citizens’ Perspectives on Coastal Erosion and Inundation Along the Gulf of Guinea
Advances in global change research · 2025-01-01
book-chapterSenior authorThe Lancet Planetary Health · 2024 · 42 citations
- Political Science
- Sociology
- Political Science
Globally, more than 1 billion people with disabilities are disproportionately and differentially at risk from the climate crisis. Yet there is a notable absence of climate policy, programming, and research at the intersection of disability and climate change. Advancing climate justice urgently requires accelerated disability-inclusive climate action. We present pivotal research recommendations and guidance to advance disability-inclusive climate research and responses identified by a global interdisciplinary group of experts in disability, climate change, sustainable development, public health, environmental justice, humanitarianism, gender, Indigeneity, mental health, law, and planetary health. Climate-resilient development is a framework for enabling universal sustainable development. Advancing inclusive climate-resilient development requires a disability human rights approach that deepens understanding of how societal choices and actions-characterised by meaningful participation, inclusion, knowledge diversity in decision making, and co-design by and with people with disabilities and their representative organisations-build collective climate resilience benefiting disability communities and society at large while advancing planetary health.
Asia-Pacific Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences · 2023-12-15
articleOpen accessSenior authorPlease refer to the URL that includes this article for the abstract.
Asia-Pacific Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences · 2023-12-15
articleOpen accessSenior authorPlease refer to the URL that includes this article for the abstract.
Indiana University Press eBooks · 2023-07-18 · 5 citations
book1st authorCorrespondingAsia-Pacific Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences · 2023-12-15
articleOpen accessSenior authorPlease refer to the URL that includes this article for the abstract.
African Affairs · 2023 · 7 citations
1st authorCorresponding- Political Science
- Economic growth
- Political Science
Abstract The recent Chinese involvement in small-scale gold mining in Ghana has received wide publicity and scholarly attention. While the literature has focused on environmental sustainability, political accountability, and institutional reforms, it is yet to examine local adoption of Chinese technology and its impact on Ghana’s rural economy. We argue that it is in the interstices between the formal economy and entrepreneurship within the informal economy that opportunities for Chinese interventions emerge. Using evidence from Manso Akropong in the Ashanti region and Bole in the Savannah region, this article shows that, while Chinese technology’s impact is transformative, the outcomes are divergent in different regions. In Manso Akropong, the intensification of mining backed by Ghanaian–Chinese collaborations has led to the environmental destruction, creating competition between gold mining and cocoa farming that had underpinned Ghana’s rural prosperity. In Bole, where less aggressive Chinese technology such as Changfa and rubber mats are incorporated without direct Chinese participation, a more sustainable pattern of growth has emerged. This comparative study suggests that besides the large-scale projects and state-led training programmes, grassroots actors like informal artisanal miners are at the forefront of technology transfer in the China–Africa encounter.
Asia-Pacific Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences · 2023-12-15
articleOpen accessSenior authorPlease refer to the URL that includes this article for the abstract.
Gender differences in extractive activities: evidence from Ghana
International Journal of Social Economics · 2022 · 10 citations
Senior authorCorresponding- Demographic economics
- Economics
- Accounting
Purpose The study seeks to examine women’s participation in Ghana’s extractive growth-driven economy and the quality of this participation in terms of employment status and earnings relative to their male counterparts and establish whether these differences constitute discrimination for policy attention. Design/methodology/approach The study adopts both quantitative and qualitative methodological approaches to assess the extent of gender inequality in employment and earnings in the Ghanaian extractive sector and the sources of these differences. It computes three segregation indices to ascertain the degree of unequal gender distribution of employment based on nationally representative labour force and living standards surveys followed by quantitative analysis of gender earnings differences using Oaxaca–Blinder decomposition technique. This is complemented by the results of Focus Group Discussion to go behind the numbers and examine the sources of the employment and earnings differences between men and women in extractive activities. Findings The authors observe lower participation of women in the extractive sector, with a considerable degree of gender segregation and existence of gender earnings gap in favour of men due to differences in observable characteristics such as age, education and occupational skills. There is also evidence of existence of discrimination against women and indication of barriers that impede women’s involvement in high-earning extractive activities in Ghana. The study suggests measures to remove these barriers and improve women’s education particularly in science, technology, engineering and mathematics to address the gender imbalance in extractive activities in Ghana. Social implications Women’s low involvement in the strong extractive growth-driven process has implication for undermining the effort of empowering women economically. Originality/value The study draws argument from the literature and adopts a combination of quantitative and qualitative techniques to establish gender in terms of employment distribution and earnings in favour of males in the Ghanaian extractive sector. This has the effect of undermining women’s economic empowerment and exacerbating gender inequality in the country.
Author response for "Gender differences in extractive activities: evidence from Ghana"
2021-10-17
peer-reviewOpen accessSenior author
Frequent coauthors
- 75 shared
Carol Lynn Martin
Arizona State University
- 75 shared
Kristina Carle
Colgate University
- 75 shared
Joyce Moock
Harvard University Press
- 75 shared
Jane I. Guyer
- 75 shared
Elizabeth Schmidt
University of California, Santa Barbara
- 75 shared
Paul Tiyambe Železa
United States International University Africa
- 75 shared
Mary Johnson Osirim
- 75 shared
Babatunde Lawal
Education
- 1996
Ph.D., History
University of Ghana
- 1993
M.A., History
University of Ghana
- 1990
B.A., History
University of Ghana
Awards & honors
- Zora Neale Hurston Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Stud…
- Corresponding Fellow of the Royal Historical Society (2002)
- Nominated Fellow of the Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences
- Honorary Doctor of Laws by the University of Ghana (2018)
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