Why ‘Democratic Neutrality’ Is An Overlooked Threat To American Democracy

Protesters participate in a ‘We The People 250’ march during 2026 Fourth of July celebrations in Washington. Joe Raedle/Getty Images

BY MATHEW HALL, BRITTANY SOLOMON AND TYLER LEIGH

In recent years, a growing number of elected officials have questioned or outright denied the results of elections, sought to undermine freedom of speech, and attempted to bend electoral rules to benefit themselves.

Only a sliver of Americans say they support these kinds of antidemocratic actions. For example, just 8% of Americans support making it harder for their political opponents to vote.

So how do politicians who espouse antidemocratic views continue to win elections if these policies are so unpopular?

As scholars affiliated with the Rooney Democracy Institute at the University of Notre Dame, we analyzed surveys of over 48,000 Americans conducted by YouGov, NORC at the University of Chicago and Bovitz between September 2022 and July 2025 to try to get an answer.

A key finding emerged: A significant swath of Americans were actually indifferent toward antidemocratic practices.

This is an important distinction. Prior research tended to assume that if a person doesn’t support antidemocratic practices, then they must oppose antidemocratic practices. In other words, if only 8% of the public supports making it harder for political opponents to vote, then roughly 92% of Americans must oppose making it harder for opponents to vote.

However, our research shows that there is actually a big chunk of Americans – at times a proportion as large as 52% of voters – who neither support nor oppose antidemocratic practices. While only a small number of Americans outright support violating core democratic norms, many Americans express no opinion about politicians who undermine democracy.

We call this attitude toward antidemocratic practices “democratic neutrality,” and we believe it’s an overlooked and understudied threat to democracy.

Ambivalence is not the same as opposition

We see democratic neutrality as key to explaining the success of antidemocratic politicians in America.

To illustrate: Only about 1 in 10 Americans agree that politicians should be loyal to their political party over the Constitution. But politicians who flout constitutional norms have won races at all levels of the government.

Dozens of Republicans won 2026 primary elections despite continuing to reject the outcome of the 2020 presidential election. The group includes Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who asked the U.S. Supreme Court to invalidate the certified election results in four states won by Joe Biden. In May 2026, Paxton defeated incumbent GOP Senator John Cornyn to become the party’s nominee.

We show that this apparent contradiction has a straightforward explanation.

Around 25% of the public expresses neutrality when asked whether politicians should be more loyal to their party or the Constitution. When those who prioritize their party over the Constitution and those who are neutral toward the idea are considered together, more than one-third of Americans are open to voting for a politician who prioritizes partisan, rather than constitutional, loyalty.

One-third of the population is more than enough to win a partisan primary. And given the deeply polarized political climate and declining electoral competition in the U.S. – including increases in gerrymandered legislative districts – winning a partisan primary is often tantamount to electoral victory.

The prevalence of democratic neutrality is troubling because in survey experiments with hypothetical candidates, most Americans who express neutrality toward antidemocratic policies vote the same way as the small number of Americans who outright support antidemocratic policies.

We were also able to show that when candidates for elected office take antidemocratic stances, only Americans who explicitly oppose antidemocratic practices punish those candidates at the ballot box. Americans who are neutral toward or supportive of antidemocratic practices do not.

When we accounted for neutrality across multiple antidemocratic practices, from political violence to voter suppression, the picture became even more dire. Nearly two-thirds of Americans express neutrality or support for some form of antidemocratic practice.

In other words, a clear majority of the public is willing to tolerate a politician who undermines core aspects of American democracy.

Neutrality is not a passive stance

Using what’s called regression analysis, we were able to dig deeper into the behaviors and attitudes associated with democratic neutrality. We found that democratic neutrality appears to be tied to a variety of factors.

Some Americans appear willing to tolerate politicians undermining democracy if it means those politicians enact policies they support. Others seem ambivalent about democracy, indifferent to the issue or unsure what qualifies as an antidemocratic policy. And consistent with prior research, some people may actually support antidemocratic policies but express neutrality because of social pressure.

Regardless of why Americans express neutrality, those who do so are just as likely to vote for authoritarian politicians as the relatively small number of Americans who explicitly support undemocratic practices in some form.

Our research indicates that fringe extremists and the few politicians who actively promote authoritarian ideas are not solely to blame for America’s democratic troubles.

The millions of Americans who simply remain neutral when democracy is threatened are a greater threat to the country’s system of government. These democratically neutral voters are, in our view, complicit in the continued erosion of democratic norms in the U.S, even if they do not openly express support for antidemocratic policies.

Indeed, our research indicates that neutrality is not a passive stance. Preventing further democratic erosion requires voters to reject candidates who undermine basic democratic principles, even – and especially – if they are candidates from one’s own party. As former President Theodore Roosevelt warned, “… to be neutral between right and wrong is to serve wrong.”

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Better Parenting Starts With Knowing What Works. We Tested A Project In 8 African Countries

BY INGE VALLANCE AND GENEVIEVE HAUPT RONNIE

Raising adolescents can be difficult under the best of circumstances. On top of that, some families are also dealing with poverty, unemployment, conflict, displacement, illness and climate shocks. In these conditions, caregivers may receive very little support themselves.

Governments and NGOs are increasingly using parenting support programmes as part of efforts to reduce violence against children and improve adolescent wellbeing. These programmes help caregivers and adolescents strengthen relationships, communicate better, solve problems together and manage conflict. They are typically delivered in small groups over several weekly sessions by trained facilitators.

Many parenting programmes are first tested in rigorous studies. Families are randomly assigned to receive the programme or to a comparison group. This is a way of finding out whether a programme is the real cause of improvements. The trials usually take place under carefully managed conditions.

As researchers who study parenting programmes, we wanted to answer an important question: can a parenting programme that works in a carefully controlled trial still benefit families when it is delivered at scale through routine government and NGO services?

Our recent research examined this question across eight African countries.

Our findings

Rather than running a new experiment, we analysed data collected as part of large-scale programme delivery. We brought together information from more than 120,000 adolescents and caregivers across the eight countries. We also examined how families’ experiences changed after they took part in a programme. Existing government and NGO services in Botswana, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Eswatini, South Africa, South Sudan, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe delivered the programmes. These countries provided a variety of settings.

We found consistent associations with improvements in parenting, mental health and violence prevention. Across the eight countries, caregivers and adolescents reported lower levels of physical and emotional violence after taking part in the programme. We also found improvements in parenting practices, including more positive involvement and better supervision of adolescents. Caregivers reported lower parenting stress and fewer depressive symptoms. Also, adolescents reported improvements in depressive symptoms and behavioural problems.

Finding that programmes can make a difference under real-world conditions is important because interventions that work well in research studies often become less effective when expanded into routine service delivery.

Parenting support programmes

Parenting support programmes vary, but many share a similar approach. “Evidence-based” programmes have been rigorously evaluated and shown through research to improve outcomes for children and families.

They are practical, skills-based programmes. They help caregivers and adolescents communicate better, manage conflict at home and reduce harsh punishment. They also build more supportive relationships. Sessions may include role-play, problem-solving activities, or discussions about handling stress, peer pressure or family finances.

Importantly, these programmes are not about “perfect parenting”, nor are they about blaming caregivers. Many families are parenting under extremely difficult conditions with very limited support.

The programme we studied, Parenting for Lifelong Health for Teens, was developed with the World Health Organization and Unicef. It was first tested in South Africa before government and NGO services took it up in several African countries. It has also been delivered in Southeast Asia and Latin America.

Why scaling up is difficult

Expanding programmes sometimes means delivering them with fewer resources, less supervision or more interruptions. Staff may have varying levels of training and support. In humanitarian settings, conflict, disease outbreaks or climate disasters may disrupt delivery.

That is why we wanted to understand whether parenting programmes could still be useful when delivered in real-world conditions.

The programmes in our study were delivered in very different contexts. Some took place in areas affected by conflict and displacement, including parts of South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Others were delivered during COVID-19 lockdowns. In Botswana, South Africa and Zimbabwe, delivery moved to phone and WhatsApp. Limited internet connectivity and access to data often hampered this.

The study focused mainly on adolescent girls and their caregivers because many of the wider service programmes were designed to support girls facing risks linked to violence, HIV and social vulnerability.

What we found

Overall, physical abuse scores were around two-thirds lower after programme participation, although the extent of change varied between countries and contexts. We saw positive changes across this wide range of settings, from conflict-affected communities to pandemic situations.

Emotional abuse and approval of corporal punishment also declined across countries.

We saw similar patterns in reports from both caregivers and adolescents. This matters because it suggests the findings were not limited to one group reporting more positively after participating.

We also found substantial differences between countries in baseline levels of violence, mental health distress and family stress. This is important because there is no single “African context”, and programmes need to work across very different social and economic realities.

Why this matters

In many African countries violence prevention, mental health and family support tend to be treated as separate areas of policy and practice. But everyday family relationships connect them. Parenting support is gaining recognition as one way to prevent violence.

Our findings suggest that helping caregivers and adolescents build more supportive relationships can improve wellbeing and safety.

There are limitations to our study. We cannot conclude that the programme was the only cause of improvements. But the consistency of the findings across countries, organisations and participant groups suggests that evidence-based parenting programmes can be helpful when delivered at scale in challenging conditions.

In recent years, governments globally have made commitments to preventing violence against children. That is only the first step. Governments also need approaches that are practical, scalable and realistic to deliver through routine systems. Our findings suggest that evidence-based parenting support can be one of these approaches.

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Nigeria’s Conflict Zones: Why People Stay Even When They Can Leave

Benue, in Nigeria’s north central region. Photo by Ufoma Ojo on Unsplash

BY EZENWA E. OLUMBA

LEVERHULME EARLY CAREER RESEARCH

FELLOW, ASTON UNIERSITY

When armed groups attack a community, people often assume that everyone who can escape will leave. This belief influences news stories, public discussions and humanitarian efforts, which usually focus on those who have been forced to move.

However, while I was doing research in north-central Nigeria, also called the Middle Belt, I came across some communities that had the means to flee to safety but decided to remain, even though they faced repeated violent attacks from armed nomadic herders and got little or no help from the government.

I have been studying why people move or stay, and the violent conflicts between farming communities and nomadic herders in the Middle Belt, since 2018. I have published several studies on these issues. My research examines the history of the conflicts, what causes them to escalate, and why some people choose to remain in conflict zones. I have also studied how memories of people, places and past experiences influence decisions to remain.

In one study, my co-authors and I use the term eco-violence to describe conflicts over land and water between farming communities and nomadic herders across the dry Sahel region. These conflicts are driven partly by pressures on land and water, discrimination, and failures of government, as herders move with their livestock in search of grazing and water.

Studies show that in many crisis situations, more people stay than leave. To better understand migration and conflict, we need to ask not just why people run away, but also why some remain.

One reason is that they fear losing their ancestral land and traditional way of life.
The study

In Nigeria’s Middle Belt, communities have faced violence and the loss of homes, farms and food stores for many years.

Thousands of people are killed every year, with many communities destroyed and others deserted. According to Amnesty International, over 6,896 people were killed between May 2023 and May 2025 in Benue state alone.

These rural communities receive little or no protection from the police or military. Sometimes, attackers even warn the communities ahead of time, but the police or military still do not step in to protect them.

Hardly a week that goes without a killing in Benue, Plateau or Nasarawa states in Nigeria.

In 2022, I spoke with 54 people living in Benue and Nasarawa states. In Benue, I spoke with people who were indigenous to the location, as well as people who had fled to nearby communities. In Nasarawa State, I spoke with members of a community who had been displaced but later returned after regaining control of their village.

Why ancestral land matters

Their two main reasons for staying emerged from the research, which has since been published in Mobilities.

The first was their attachment to their ancestral land and the resources it provides. Many people in the Middle Belt are farmers who cultivate land inherited through generations. The same land contains their family homes, burial grounds and sacred sites, and provides the setting for rituals and traditional festivals.

The Middle Belt is known for its fertile land. Benue State, for instance, is often described as the country’s “food basket” because much of the food grown there is supplied to other parts of Nigeria.

The second was their desire to preserve a familiar way of life that makes living meaningful to them. For these communities, home is made up of relationships, memories, traditions and identities passed from one generation to the next. Some of them put it simply: they would rather die than leave.

One of the community members said this:

This land is where I was born, and this is my father’s land. Wherever I run to, I will become a stranger and may become destitute … If I die in my house for what belongs to me, let me die. This is why I did not flee.

Their decision is not simply about whether they could survive elsewhere. It is mostly about preserving their traditional way of life, since life away from their ancestral land may no longer feel meaningful.

These communities believe they can only keep their way of life by staying on what they call their “father’s land”. Leaving would mean surrendering their land, livelihoods and communal life to live elsewhere with little or nothing.

One of the community members said:

Another factor is that the area where we are settled now belongs to our forefathers, and if we flee and abandon this place, where are we heading to? … [S]ince this is our land, we must live on it.

Remaining does not mean that they prefer violence. They know the dangers and fear further attacks. Many have lost relatives and friends. But leaving would mean losing a way of life they believe they cannot rebuild anywhere else.

Conflict is not the only thing people fear

Understanding this can help scholars, policymakers, journalists and humanitarian groups to work more thoughtfully with people who choose to remain in conflict, for whom leaving may carry losses they consider impossible to replace.

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Nigeria’s Federal Police Force Has Failed, But What Does History Say About Local Forces?

The Dogarai police system was reformed in 1907 to become the Native Authority Police Force. Wikimedia Commons

BY SAHEED BALOGUN AMUSA

PROFESSOR OF HISTORY, OBAFEMI

AWOLOWO UNIVERSITY

The Nigerian Senate passed a bill on 24 June 2026 establishing state police in the 36 states of the country. The passage of the executive bill, sent to the National Assembly by President Bola Tinubu, officially opens the way to dismantle the decades-old structure of the Nigeria Police Force and replace it with a dual model, comprising the Federal Police Service and State Police Services. Saheed Balogun Amusa, a police historian, explains that Nigeria had regional police before a central police force. He sets out what went wrong with those formations and the lessons they offer.

What was Nigeria’s regional policing system?

Nigeria used to have a federal Nigeria Police Force, established in 1930, a Native Authority Police Force in the northern region and a Local Government Police Force in the western region.

Only the eastern region did not have a regional police force, most likely because pre-colonial Igboland and other communities in the area did not have a policing system. In northern Nigeria, the pre-colonial Dogarai police system was reformed in 1907 to become the Native Authority Police Force. In western Nigeria, various police systems in Yorubaland were reformed into the Local Government Police Force during the colonial era.

These regional forces were controlled and funded by the regional governments. They were abolished in 1968 and their personnel recruited to the Nigeria Police Force. While regional police then were closer to the citizens, hence effective, they were also susceptible to control and influence by the ruling political elites.

Your research showed that the federal police were not insulated from political influence during the 1962 Action Group crisis. Are federal police good for Nigeria?

Whether federal or state police, they are agents of governments that control and fund them. However, operating a single police system in Nigeria gave the federal government the power to undermine the powers of state governors who should be the chief security officers of their states. It also reduced the effectiveness of the police in local environments.

In my view as a police historian, federal police are instruments of political attainment and consolidation. They are used, in some instances, to gain and keep political power. They are also instruments of political harassment and intimidation of the state and local governments.

The 1962 Action Group crisis was a result of ideological conflicts among the leaders of Action Group, the ruling party in the western region from the 1950s to 1965. The 1962 riot within the chamber and premises of the western region House of Assembly in Ibadan led to the declaration of a state of emergency in the region from May 1962 to January 1963. The supporters of Obafemi Awolowo, then federal opposition leader, accused the federal police of protecting the interests of the Akintola-led government. They also alleged that the prime minister, Tafawa Balewa, denied them police protection.

Other instances include the role of the Nigeria Police Force in the 1953 Kano riots, the 1959 federal elections and the recurring Tiv riots of the 1960s. The 1965 western regional elections and the 1983 general elections were others. The federal government in these instances used the police to suppress the citizens.

To give some more recent examples: A former governor of Anambra State, Chris Ngige, was abducted by policemen led by an assistant inspector-general, Raphael Ngige, in July 2003. The then inspector-general, Tafa Balogun, later ordered his release. Similarly in 2013, during a feud between Rivers State governor Rotimi Amaechi and then president Goodluck Jonathan, Amaechi and his entourage were teargassed and physically blocked from entering the Government House in Port Harcourt by federal police. In 2023, heavily armed police officers fired teargas and water cannons at Governor Siminalayi Fubara outside the Rivers State House of Assembly complex.

How could state police in Nigeria succeed, in your view?

Political influence cannot be ruled out in any government institution. Globally, there have been accusations of political manipulations of police and other security agencies at all levels. However, this does not mean that police everywhere are agents or instruments of political intimidation.

A country like Nigeria that is trying to experiment with state policing after several years of a single police system needs to put certain measures in place to ensure the dual policing structure is successful. These include constitutional frameworks, recruitment, training, equipping and remuneration. The state police must be properly engineered towards people-orientated policing.

The Police Council which advises the president on the appointment of the inspector general of police and Police Service Commission which is responsible for the appointment, promotion, discipline, and dismissal of all police officers must be legally and practically autonomous.

There must also be financial and operational independence of the state police and strict adherence to professionalism by the force.

Every reform comes with initial challenges. The governments must be ready to abide by the principle of true federalism. Citizens too must be alive to their civic responsibilities, duties and obligations. Otherwise state police will not be successful and it won’t be long before people will begin to clamour for its abolition.

Based on your research, do you think the current conditions in Nigeria are suitable for introducing state police?

The current security situation in Nigeria calls for establishment of state police. It is long overdue.

Nigeria is the only federal state in the world that has a single police system. The United States has county police, state and federal police. The French have Police Municipale, and the Chinese Chengguan. These are equivalent to city police forces.

State police will solve many security challenges in Nigeria but create new ones too, like potential political abuse and jurisdictional issues with the federal police. The country is federal in name but unitary in practice.

The socio-economic and political challenges like terrorism and banditry confronting the country will also be a major problem.

It is hoped that state police in Nigeria will be sustainable in the long run if there is strong political will from the government and greater commitment from the citizenry.

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The Gambia’s Hidden History: How A Tiny River Basin Influenced Colonial Trade And Slavery

A mural at a slave house on Janjanbureh Island, once known as Georgetown, in The Gambia. Peter van der Sluijs/Wikimedia Commons

BY PAPA CHERIF BERTRAND BASSENE

SENIOR LECTURER, UNIVERSITE

CHEIKH ANTA DIOP DE DAKAR

The Gambia is often portrayed as little more than a geographical oddity, a strip of land engulfed by its much larger neighbour Senegal. It was once the centre of Senegambia, administered by Britain between 1765 and 1779. But there is another way of looking at it which reveals its importance and adds to current reflections on reparations for slavery.

Pape Chérif Bertrand Bassène has studied the history of The Gambia and southern Senegal. He argues that British and Portuguese sources point to the existence of “Sierragambia” – a dynamic Mande-Atlantic connection and maritime corridor extending from the Gambia River basin, through the Casamance and Cacheu networks, down to the Sierra Leone River estuary, which later became the Abolitionist Laboratory Loop.

This independent coastal region played a decisive role in the Atlantic’s political, commercial and anti-slavery dynamics. Here, French-British rivalries intersected with African political agency long before the abolition of the slave trade. Whether through strategic alliances or fierce resistance, Bassène argues, African societies played an active, structuring role in transforming the Atlantic system into a network of exchange. We asked him to fill in the details.

How did you go about your research?

My research draws on two sets of European archives: British archives on The Gambia, and Portuguese sources on The Gambia and Guinea-Bissau. I analysed them alongside the historiography of Senegambia rather than in isolation.

Rather than treating these records as objective accounts, I approached them as geopolitical narratives. These require critical interpretation, informed by insights from historical linguistics; by analysing Atlantic, Mande, and Bak languages, I trace the etymologies, shifting meanings, and social realities hidden behind European denominations and colonial administrative categories.

These sources help reveal how coastal trading networks developed. They also show how waterways were controlled by “Banhüns” (Baynunks) or “grumetes/gourmets”. Europeans used these terms for the local intermediaries who connected them to the Atlantic slave trade.

The sources show African political structures remained strong and were able to negotiate, resist, or exploit imperial rivalries.

What was the crisis between the French and British colonial forces all about?

Between 1779 and 1785, “Sierragambia” was a space where Franco-British rivalries intersected with African political agency, before the abolition of the slave trade.

In 1779, French forces destroyed Fort James on the Gambia River, ending Britain’s Province of Senegambia. But the French administration could not establish lasting control. British ships quickly returned and resumed their operations.

This rivalry reached its peak in October 1780. The French naval warship Le Sénégal boarded four English vessels at the mouth of the river. Britain responded quickly.

On 2 November 1780, the ship HMS Zephyr, supported by the privateer Polly (a civilian vessel), attacked the French ship. Twelve French sailors were killed and 28 wounded. The British lost only two men. Le Sénégal was captured and taken to Gorée, the slave trading island. It exploded shortly afterwards.

What role did Gambian communities play?

Portuguese sources describe precolonial Casamance in today’s Senegal as a territory fiercely guarded by coastal societies. There was no easy access. Europeans had to pass through the Banhuns-Grumetes, intermediaries from local communities, and Portuguese “lançados” (exiles). These various actors controlled the backwaters, filtered trade flows, and dictated the terms of barter.

The 1780 episode was shaped by an African initiative, a strategic alliance between British sailors and the Joola people of Fogni (the southern part of the Gambia River). Trapped along the river, the British sailors secured logistical and military support from the Joola. Rather than a victory decided purely by British maritime superiority, the capture of the ship Le Sénégal was engineered by a local African alliance that stripped the French of mobility and logistics. Africans created the tactical conditions that made British interception possible.

Coastal communities refused to supply the French. They harassed French rowboats, and disrupted the slave trade. On the north bank, the Niuminkés generally supported France. On the south bank, the Fogni communities allied with Britain. Their actions helped shape the territorial status quo ratified by the Treaty of Paris in 1783.

Although this treaty kept Albréda north of the river under the French flag, Paris had no real control over the river.

The agreement brought only a temporary pause to the conflict between the French and the British. It continued for decades.

How did this play out in the slave trade?

After losing its American colonies, Britain realigned its economic priorities. As it became an industrial power, it used the abolitionist movement as a tool to weaken its economic rivals. Sierragambia proved fertile ground for this project. Britain had already built strong ties with local communities.

The founding of Bathurst (present day Banjul, the capital of The Gambia) in 1816 should not be seen just as colonialism imposed from the outside. It was, rather, a legal formalisation of a preexisting political autonomy.

The colonial order that took shape in the 19th century grew out of forms of local autonomy that coastal communities had built during the slave trade era.

Even though the Barra Fort on the north bank of the Gambia River served to protect trade routes, the southern region became a space of emancipation, dissent and social change.

Freed captives, coastal communities and local authorities came together to strengthen their room for manoeuvre in the face of European powers. The Gambia developed a political identity distinct from its neighbours.

Further south of Banjul, the French attempted to replicate this model by planning to create a “village of freedom” on the Carabane island.

What does this tell us about reparations?

As debates over the memory of the Atlantic slave trade gather pace, calls for reparations are growing louder.

Yet a crucial part of west African history remains trapped in an outdated framework shaped by the types of sources historians have traditionally used.

The “Sierragambia” concept invites us to rethink borders and territories in west Africa. Borders are not simply lines drawn at European imperial conferences. They are also a result of complex interactions shaped by the Atlantic system, African diplomatic choices, and local power dynamics.

Recognising African agency also changes the way we think about reparations today. It moves us beyond a simple story of powerful oppressors and passive victims. The collapse of the Atlantic slave trade was not decided only in London or Paris. It played out on the ground, driven by local resistance and global economic shifts.

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Jobs Abroad Or Jobs In Africa? Why A Focus On Work In Other Countries Shouldn’t Replace Opportunities At Home

Thousands of African nurses are recruited to work in western countries every year. Wikimedia Commons

BY MICHAEL BOAMPONG, DANIEL ASAMAH AND MELISSA MOUTAAN

African governments are increasingly encouraging young people to work abroad. To address youth unemployment at home, for example, Ghana and Kenya have expanded labour mobility agreements with other countries. These include Spain, Qatar and Caribbean states.

Agreements with Gulf countries have largely focused on construction and service-sector jobs. But newer partnerships with Caribbean countries are targeting skilled professionals like nurses and healthcare workers.

These arrangements can create structured pathways for people to work abroad, often in sectors where labour is in high demand.

Many African countries have large and growing youth populations struggling to get decent jobs. Meanwhile, wealthier economies face ageing populations and labour shortages. Evidence suggests that 71.7% of young adult (25-29) workers in sub-Saharan Africa are engaged in “insecure” work. At the same time, countries across Europe and elsewhere need labour in sectors such as care, agriculture and construction. Matching workers to labour shortages abroad appears to offer a practical solution.

But a deeper question emerges. What are the long-term development implications of governments promoting overseas employment as an economic strategy?

We study migration governance and youth aspirations in Ghana. We have examined how governments, international actors and young people understand the role of migration in development. Drawing on documentary analysis, interviews with policymakers and migration stakeholders, and ethnographic research with young people in Ghana, our recent research found that policymakers increasingly adopt an “economic gains” lens. They view migration as a source of remittances, skills and investment. On the other hand, young people’s aspirations to migrate remain rooted in limited opportunities and broader socioeconomic realities.

Our study focused on migration governance rather than labour mobility agreements themselves. However, it raises the question of what happens when seeing migration as an economic resource begins to shape labour mobility policy.

The drivers

In Ghana, remittances account for 6% of the country’s GDP. In 2024, this was about US$4.6 billion. It was far more than foreign direct investment and official development assistance combined that year. Expanding overseas employment is therefore seen as increasing these inflows while easing pressure on domestic labour markets.

One example of the implications concerns the protection of migrant workers.

Recent research from Kenya has shown how governments may encourage overseas employment even when protections for migrant workers remain uneven. This is an important concern, but misses a larger issue.

Broader development trade-offs can receive less attention. Even where labour mobility agreements are relatively well regulated, they may still contribute to structural challenges at home, such as the loss of skilled workers in critical sectors like health and education.

Ghana provides a clear example. The country is already experiencing a significant outflow of health professionals. Records show 500 nurses have left every month in recent years to work abroad. At the same time, health systems at home remain under pressure, with high patient-to-healthcare personnel ratios and limited resources.

This has prompted wider debates about ethical recruitment from countries already facing healthcare workforce shortages. Promoting further migration, even under formal agreements, raises important questions. Can countries sustain essential services while easing the departure of skilled workers? And how do these policies affect long-term investments in human capital?

What happens when migrants return?

Our research also highlights the importance of thinking about migration as a broader development process rather than simply movement across borders. As labour mobility expands, the question of what happens when migrants return is becoming increasingly important. Many migrants eventually return home, bringing skills, experience and financial resources.

Return migration can support entrepreneurship, innovation and local development. But these outcomes are not automatic. The UN World Youth Report on Youth and Migration suggests that returnees often require effective reintegration support and access to economic opportunities to translate the skills and experience acquired abroad into local development gains. Policies such as skills recognition and access to finance can help make this possible.

Rethinking labour mobility

One implication of our research is that migration policies should be embedded within broader development strategies rather than judged only by their immediate economic returns. This does not mean labour mobility should be discouraged. Rather, it should complement (not replace) investments in decent work, skills development and strong public institutions at home. Labour mobility is therefore not inherently negative. When well designed, it can contribute to both individual and national development.

For this to happen, it needs to move beyond a narrow focus on job placement abroad.

First, strategic partnerships between governments, employers, education and training institutions, recruitment agencies and international organisations are essential. This could involve jointly designed training programmes, mutual recognition of qualifications, and agreements where destination countries invest in training skilled workers in origin countries.

Second, reintegration needs to be taken more seriously. Providing access to finance, training and employment opportunities for returnees can help translate migration experiences into local economic development gains.

Third, labour mobility should not replace domestic job creation but complement it. Governments need to continue investing in sectors that can offer young people decent work at home, rather than relying on migration as the primary solution to youth unemployment or underemployment.

The key question is how migration fits into a broader development strategy.

Labour mobility can create opportunities for individuals and families. But it cannot substitute for long-term investments in decent work, education and economic transformation at home.

If treated simply as a short-term solution to unemployment, labour mobility risks deepening inequalities and weakening already fragile systems. When embedded in a broader development strategy, it can contribute to more inclusive and sustainable growth.

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Ugandan Women Work In The Middle East Even Though They Face Abuse. They Told Us Why

Migrant work, inside and outside Uganda, is one of the many things people do to cope with dire economic situations. Unsplash

BY HANNE O. MOGENSEN AND JULIANA A. OBIKA

Labour migration from Uganda to the Middle East has surged since the early 2000s, with many young women travelling for employment as domestic workers. Most of these jobs are in Oman, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia.

However, researchers, journalists and organisations like Human Rights Watch and the International Labour Organisation have documented the widespread abuse and exploitation of Ugandan migrant domestic workers by their employers.

Cases include physical, sexual and psychological abuse, and restrictions on movement. Collectively, these accounts point to conditions that have been described as “modern slavery”.

The Ugandan government has attempted to regulate recruitment agencies and negotiate bilateral agreements on working conditions. It’s had limited success.

Networks of authorised and unauthorised recruitment agencies, and rows of posters in Kampala, continue to lure women with promises of well-paid domestic work in the Middle East. This is despite reports of exploitation surfacing regularly in Ugandan media.

Governments and organisations should protect the rights of migrant domestic workers. But it’s equally important to recognise these women as active agents, not just victims.

We are social scientists who research changing gender relations in Uganda. In a recent paper, we studied women’s decisions to migrate to the Middle East for domestic work. We wanted to understand why so many do so even though they are aware of the risks.

Between 2018 and 2022, we interviewed a group of Ugandan women who had worked in the Middle East. We use the term “Middle East” broadly because our focus was on the women’s experiences rather than the differences between the countries where they worked.

We were interested in why they’d migrated and how their experiences abroad affected their lives back home.

Their stories revealed striking contradictions. They spoke of slavery, humiliation and confinement, but also about “becoming somebody” through migrant domestic work.

This points to the reforms needed to improve working conditions abroad and expand opportunities at home.

Gender shifts

In countries where a majority of the population depends on the informal sector or subsistence agriculture, migrant work offers unmarried women, in particular, a rare opportunity to earn an income.

In Uganda, family identity and social status are traced through the father. Marriage has traditionally been formalised through the payment of bridewealth by the man’s family to the woman’s family.

Formalised marriage has become less common in recent decades, however. In the 1995 census, 64% of Ugandan women aged 15-49 described themselves as “married”, while 9% said they were “co-habiting”. By 2016, only 30% of women considered themselves married, while 30% were co-habiting.

The Uganda Bureau of Statistics stopped distinguishing between marriage and cohabitation in 2022. But close to 40% of the population considers itself neither married nor cohabiting.

During our fieldwork, we found that men are finding it increasingly difficult to pay bridewealth. As a result, many women spend their adult lives in a blend of partnerships; men go in and out of their lives while they remain with their children.

Women in our study linked their decision to migrate to the Middle East to men’s failure to live up to the ideal of being providers. They saw migration as a way to gain control over resources rather than waiting for a relationship to be formalised with a man who would then provide for them.

As one of our respondents stated:


First find yourself some money – marriage will always be there.

The women saw themselves as people who had taken their future into their own hands.

They readily acknowledged the harsh realities of the work. Many spoke of losing their freedom and encountering degrading attitudes towards women and, at times, racism. Yet, as one woman put it:

First get yourself the Arab experience then maybe you will become the lucky one who manages to move on to something else.

They hoped migrant work would be the first step towards a new life. And for some women in our study it did happen. They got better jobs in other countries.

Many however, did not. They returned several times to the Middle East before eventually settling down in Uganda.

Some returned home with savings, which they couldn’t do on a Ugandan wage. Earnings in the Middle East vary widely, so getting precise amounts proved difficult. And at home, they faced competing demands, like sharing resources with relatives and trying to build a permanent home of their own.

Even though many women never marry, motherhood remains a powerful social expectation. One in three Ugandan households are headed by women, according to the 2022 demographic survey. We found that even more women are actually heads of households even if a man is around some of the time.

Ugandans may say that a woman is “fathering a home” in the sense that she is building a house for herself and her children, making decisions and controlling resources. Not everybody succeeds in doing so, even after years in the Middle East. But some do. And the hope is there.

Power dynamics of migration

Recruitment agencies and other intermediaries profit from those hopes. The women’s “Arab bosses” may make possible the lives they aspire to build, while sustaining exploitative and oppressive labour relationships.

These experiences are shaped by wider global inequalities.

European countries are part of this unequal system. They restrict opportunities for low-wage migrants through tightening immigration policies. In doing so, they reinforce inequalities in who can move, where they can work and under what conditions.

The women in our study didn’t describe themselves as trying to challenge global inequalities or transform existing power structures. Rather, they sought greater control over resources and decision-making within their families and communities.

Their main motivation was to provide for their families. Yet they are also reshaping power and gender relations in Uganda and beyond.

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THERE WAS A WARRIOR CALLED OJUKWU

BY UZOR MAXIM UZOATU

He did not deliver on his promise to write “The Book” before his death.

The fact that Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu did not publish a book on the Nigeria-Biafra War leaves a very large hole in whatever passes for Nigerian history.

“Victors write history, and the Biafrans lost,” Frederick Forsyth writes in his controversial book The Making of an African Legend: The Biafra Story.

In the absence of a book by Ojukwu on the war, a lot of actors make all kinds of claims in their narratives.

For instance, there is this viral account of Prof Sam Aluko claiming that Biafra was declared before the Aburi conference in Ghana, an obvious lie.

It helps to somewhat right some of the wrongs that there is the 373-page book General of the People’s Army, compiled and edited by Chuks Iloegbunam, and published by Press Alliance Network Limited, Lagos in 2012.

Iloegbunam understands that Ojukwu was akin to a big masquerade that cannot be fully appreciated whist standing on one spot, whence this take from the blurb: “Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu was a multi-dimensional phenomenon. Because individual effort is incapable of adequately interpreting the legend, an amalgamation of local and international voices has assembled a composite pronouncement on the man who declared the Republic of Biafra. Given the centrality of Ojukwu in the history of Nigeria, General of the People’s Army is at once the story of a courageous soldier, a record of the African continent’s bloodiest attempt at secession and a statement on the texture of relations between former Biafrans and the rest of their countrymen and women.”

Although the book is divided into the six broad chapters or sections, it can be read quite seamlessly.
The inclusion of the epochal “Ahiara Declaration” in General of the People’s Army is akin to embedding a book in another book.

Dedicated “to the cause of a negotiated Nigeria”, General of the People’s Army kicks off with a robust preface from Iloegbunam thusly: “There are many like Ojukwu in the Igbo country – including Chinua Achebe, and Mbonu Ojike who died in his prime. They are the true measure of the Igbo spirit which Ojukwu exemplified in 1966. Today, people will be hard put to find sterling characters like them. Today, the dangling of an oil block or the waving of a fat dollar denominated cheque or a ministerial appointment would send many a pretender to Igbo leadership into swearing that the anti-Igbo pogrom of 1966 had not taken place. It is eternally to Ojukwu’s credit that he never posted his conscience, nor was he ever enticed by filthy lucre; he continued to the very end with the insistence that no ethnic group deserved to be cannon fodder in the Nigerian polity; no Nigerian deserved to be a second-class citizen in his own country.”

Saturday, November 26, 2011 was the red-letter day on which Emeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu passed on in London.

Governor Peter Obi of Ojukwu’s home state Anambra, in his lament, written in Igbo, mourns that “lightning and thunderbolt are silenced.”

Chinua Achebe celebrates the giant who lived for others.

For President Goodluck Jonathan, “Ojukwu’s place in Nigerian history remains assured.”

Senate President David Mark celebrates Ojukwu’s “metamorphosis from military leadership to a true democrat.”

For Senator Uche Chukwumerije, Ojukwu was “the man who saw tomorrow.”

Brigadier-General Samuel Ogbemudia who fought against Ojukwu in the war stresses that “Biafra would have been the toast of Africa” if it had succeeded.

Professor Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe sees Ojukwu as one of the greatest Igbo of all time whose death should lead to the goals of doing justice to the Igbo genocide and the restoration of Igbo sovereignty.
General Olusegun Obasanjo sees Ojukwu’s death as the end of an era.

General Ibrahim Babangida argues that Ojukwu’s understanding of the political dynamics of Nigeria was extraordinary.

Ojukwu was indeed a global phenomenon as showcased by the obituaries of The Economist, Associated Press, Time World, Washington Post, The Guardian of London etc.

The Nigerian newspapers counted too with their editorials.

The many dimensions of Ojukwu are showcased by ex-soldiers, intellectuals, columnists, deans and dons etc.

With the space available to me it is well-nigh impossible going into details as per each contribution.
It suffices that Wole Olaoye, for instance, reveals that Ojukwu bears the English name Christopher.
Is’haq Modibbo Kawu supplies the dimension that they were trained during the war to curse Ojukwu with passages from the Koran.

Of course there are the exclusive vistas of Ojukwu’s life in exile and the arrangement of his pardon and return supplied by his aide, the inimitable Kanayo Esinulo.

Iloegbunam’s General of the People’s Army comes with a good dose of contentious issues like this deposition by Igwe Alex Nwokedi: “When you look at it, while the Hausa were talking about education imbalance, the Igbo, instead of complaining, didn’t but rather they strived to catch up with the Yoruba so much so that today there are more lawyers, doctors and engineers in Igboland than there are in Yorubaland.”

Iloegbunam takes charge to correct errors of fact, like insisting that the Aburi peace talks did not fail but rather Gowon’s Federal Government reneged on the accord.

The errors in the rendering of the Daily Trust editorial are duly pointed out by Iloegbunam.
Prof Aluko’s sequence of events is inaccurate, according to Iloegbunam, because Aburi antedated Biafra’s secession by five months.

Iloegbunam asserts that TY Danjuma did not command a Division during the civil war.
There is no escaping the fact that Ojukwu is a very controversial subject, but then he ended up being the one Nigerian given the greatest burial in the nation’s history.

Given the absence of a book on the war by Ojukwu, Chuks Iloegbunam has done a landmark duty in putting together the many dimensions of the man’s life in General of the People’s Army.

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‘I Promised People I Would Do Something’

Broadcast Journalist Antonio Sanchez (Facebook)

When Antonio Sánchez lost his job—and Oregon lost its only Spanish news station—he started his own daily YouTube broadcast. The show now reaches tens of thousands.

BY GRACE BENNINGHOFF

Last June, Kenia Jackeline Merlos, her four children, and her sister were at a park in Washington State when they were arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers. The children and Merlos’s sister spent two weeks in custody, but Merlos was detained for months. At a loss for how to help, her sister contacted an independent journalist, Antonio Sánchez, a reporter who for nearly a decade had been the lead anchor for Univision Portland—the area’s only Spanish-language news outlet—before starting his own broadcast on YouTube. He broke the story of Merlos’s detention and continued to cover her case until she was released.

The story was later picked up by national outlets. “I trusted Antonio to share my story because of his professionalism, his reputation in the community, and the respect he has shown for others in similar situations,” Merlos told me. “He took the time to understand the details, and he kept sharing until I got released. He followed my story until the end.”

Sánchez, who is forty-five, grew up in Calexico, California, near the border with Mexico, where he spoke Spanish at home. His newscast, tailored to the Spanish-speaking community in the Portland area—“Están cayendo como moscas muertas” (They’re dropping like flies), he reported of turnover in President Trump’s cabinet—reaches about fifty thousand people per week and has nearly ten thousand subscribers. His reports cover everything from local politics to crime to weather, broadcast from a basement in Southeast Portland. Acoustic foam is checkered across the ceiling, turquoise carpet covers the vinyl flooring, and a television screen behind the desk bears the name of his show: Noticias Noroeste.

Going solo hadn’t been part of his career plans. But in September of 2024, he was laid off from Univision Portland, and the station, KUNP-TV, announced it was severing ties with Univision and transitioning to English-language news and sports coverage. “I started getting all these messages asking what’s going to happen,” he said.

A few weeks later, Trump won the presidential election. The messages kept coming. “They were asking, ‘What’s going to happen to us? A new government is about to take over.’ I felt like maybe I could create something while I look for a job,” Sánchez said.

He ordered a teleprompter, a microphone, and lights on Amazon; soundproofed the basement; and asked a friend to create a logo. Startup costs ran about fifteen hundred bucks. He produced his first broadcast on Inauguration Day. “Even if it looked bad, it was always going to air,” he said, “because I promised people that I would do something.”

Since then, he has dedicated twelve or more hours each day to reporting, producing, and editing. “I want to preserve that tradition of doing everything they watched on television,” he said. Sánchez wears a suit and sits at a desk as he runs through the top stories. But he has made changes, too. “I talk in sayings—that’s very typical in Spanish, and that’s something you don’t do in English news,” he told me. His style also differs from most Spanish-language news in the United States, where Univision and Telemundo operate under the umbrella of an English-language parent company and tend to align with American broadcast standards. “The media in general has a problem with finding real connection with the audience,” Ismael Nafría, an independent journalist and former board vice president of Sembra Media, a nonprofit that supports Spanish-language media, told me. “The language issue is so important if you want to build something authentic and something real.”

Sánchez built trust quickly. Last fall, reporting on ICE arrests around Portland, he drew a record eighty thousand viewers. He also found himself pushing back against misinformation from local social media influencers who had told audiences they’d witnessed ICE raids—which Sánchez’s reporting revealed were actually local drug raids. “I’m almost like their 211,” he said of his relationship with viewers. “The language barrier makes it harder for them to pick up a phone and call a helpline. But they can message me, and I’ll respond quickly.”

Sánchez initially envisioned Noticias Noroeste as temporary—something to fill the gap left by Univision until a larger station resumed local Spanish-language coverage. But then he thought, “I had to keep doing it.” A new channel, Telemundo Portland, started up about six months ago, but its broadcast is anchored out of Kansas City and includes only a two-minute local segment.

Sánchez said he supports his broadcast through advertising. He brings in at least three thousand dollars per month through ads, sometimes more, and funds are paid to him directly. His ads come from Multnomah County, the Tualatin Valley Water District, and the City of Portland, among others; most are PSAs. “I can’t be worried about, ‘Oh my God, my views went down, my views went up.’ I don’t care. I’m not an influencer, I’m a journalist,” he said. Once revenue allows, he hopes to hire interns. Eventually, he said, he’d like to move into a bigger space.

In January, Merlos was invited to celebrate Noticias Noroeste’s first anniversary party. She said she was nervous—she expected a roomful of “fancy people”—but was surprised to find Sánchez had invited other Portlanders who had been detained by ICE. It was a chance to connect with others who understood firsthand what she and her family had been through. “It’s important to get connected,” she told me. “No one else is going to understand your situation.”

Private Matters

Catherine Herridge

Catherine Herridge, a former Fox News reporter, is being compelled to pay $800 a day until she reveals confidential sources.

BY RIDDHY SETTY

In 2003, Toni Locy, a former reporter for USA Today, published a series of articles about the FBI’s investigation into the 2001 anthrax attacks that left five people dead and seventeen infected. Along the way, she reported on Steven Hatfill, a former Army scientist who was the initial focus of the FBI’s probe. In 2003, Hatfill filed a civil lawsuit under the Privacy Act, a federal law that restricts government agencies from sharing private information about individuals without their consent. As part of his legal efforts, in 2004 he pressed Locy and other journalists to testify and reveal their sources.

In February of 2008, a federal judge held Locy in contempt of court for refusing to do so. Notably, Hatfill had sued not Locy but the federal government, arguing that his reputation had been ruined due to law enforcement officials leaking to the media and linking him to the attacks. By then, Locy was working as a journalism professor at West Virginia University. She was subject to a fine of five hundred dollars for seven days, one thousand dollars for the next seven, and five thousand dollars for the seven days after that. The judge also barred anyone from helping her pay this fine—her students couldn’t even hold a bake sale to fundraise for her.

Cases like Locy’s—those brought by individuals against the government, resulting in journalists being subpoenaed and held in contempt—are unusual. But they haven’t gone away.

In 2017, Catherine Herridge, then a reporter for Fox News, published a story about Yanping Chen, a Chinese American scientist who was the subject of an FBI counterintelligence investigation. In 2018, Chen, who was never charged, filed a civil lawsuit against the government under the Privacy Act and subpoenaed Herridge to reveal her sources. In 2024, a Washington, DC, district court ordered Herridge, by then an independent journalist, to pay a fine of eight hundred dollars for each day she did not reveal her sources.

As with Locy’s case, Herridge is not a named party in the lawsuit. Her reporting is not in dispute, and she does not currently face the threat of jail time. But the DC court is asking her to reveal her sources in litigation brought against the government for violating the Privacy Act. “In these Privacy Act cases, the plaintiff needs to establish that the government leaker or alleged leaker acted willfully, and so that’s why you can see plaintiffs in these cases, which are ordinary civil cases, going after journalists,” Gabe Rottman, the vice president of policy at the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, said. Complicating Herridge’s case is the fact that documents about the FBI’s investigation of Chen were filed under seal, and all of the appellate arguments about those documents were held in closed court. The Freedom of the Press Foundation has filed a motion to unseal the documents and hearing transcript.

Core to the litigation is the question of whether Herridge should be protected from being compelled to testify through reporter’s privilege. While most states, as well as the District of Columbia, have enacted shield laws protecting a reporter’s right not to reveal their confidential sources, recent attempts to create a federal version have failed. Much of the current case law dates back to Zerilli v. Smith, a 1981 case concerning an investigation into organized crime where the government, without a warrant, had planted a listening device. The resulting logs were sealed, but some of their contents were reported on by the Detroit News. In that case, a DC district court judge and court of appeals found that the reporter did not have to reveal their sources. The DC Circuit Court of Appeals judge also ruled that a plaintiff must prove that the information they are requesting goes to “the heart of the matter” and that they have exhausted all other reasonable means to get it before a court can compel a reporter to reveal a source—a test that became crucial in subsequent decisions.

Rottman pointed out that if a court considers only these two factors, a judge can almost always find reason to rule against a reporter’s right to protect their sources in privacy cases. “There’s other things that the court could conceivably do to strengthen the privilege,” he told me. “They can test whether the person’s claim would even survive without the information. So, in other words, if there was an independent source for the potential harm to the plaintiff, the court could rightly look at that and say, ‘Well, you’re going to likely lose anyways, and so we’re not going to pierce the privilege.’”

In Herridge’s case, the DC district court judge held that Chen had cleared the bar put forth in the Zerilli test—getting to the heart of the matter and exhausting all other reasonable means to get the information—and ordered Herridge to reveal her sources, holding her in contempt when she refused to do so. In his 2024 decision, Christopher R. Cooper, a judge in the US District Court for the District of Columbia, stayed the fine until an appeals court ruled on her case; in September of 2025 the appeals court ruled against Herridge.

In June of 2026, after the appeals court declined to rehear the case, it refused to stay the fine Herridge has been ordered to pay while she prepares her next appeal—this time to the Supreme Court. On July 2, the Supreme Court denied her emergency request to stay the fines (while it considered the request, the fines were stayed); notably, Justice Brett Kavanaugh supported granting the application for a stay. “We’re pleased with the Supreme Court’s decision and hope that it will help bring a close to this matter. It follows complete vindication for Dr. Chen in the district and circuit courts,” Andrew C. Phillips, an attorney for Chen, told CJR in an emailed statement.

In Locy’s case, a three-judge panel of the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit—which included Kavanaugh—stayed the fines pending a decision by the court. But the appeals court never wound up making a decision, because Hatfill’s case was settled. This rendered Locy’s contempt issue irrelevant, effectively canceling her fine. Locy had hoped to push the appeals court to make a decision. “They didn’t think there was a need to decide anything,” Locy, who is now a professor of journalism and mass communications at Washington and Lee University, told me. “I wish they had. Because I think I wasn’t going to win on everything, but I think I was going to win on some stuff,” she said. “And it might have helped Catherine.”

Locy told me that, in Privacy Act cases that seek to force journalists to reveal their sources, plaintiffs’ lawyers often appear to be using them as a shortcut: “They want the journalists to do their work for them, and federal judges are allowing these plaintiffs’ attorneys to go after journalists, and in Privacy Act civil lawsuits, which is a cheap, dangerous way for civil litigators who are looking for a payday.”

Though the reporters subpoenaed in Privacy Act cases are not the ones being sued, news organizations have participated in settling these lawsuits alongside the government. In former nuclear weapons scientist Wen Ho Lee’s lawsuit against the government, five journalists from publications including the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Washington Post, and ABC were subpoenaed and refused to reveal their sources. These organizations agreed to pay Lee seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars as part of a settlement that the government also participated in to end the contempt-of-court proceedings against their reporters.

While independent reporters are particularly vulnerable in these cases, Seth Stern, the chief of advocacy at the Freedom of the Press Foundation, said this is a fight that corporate media organizations may not want to take on either. “When you look at corporate media, you’ve got to wonder if they value the First Amendment at all, given how they’ve capitulated to attacks on the First Amendment lately,” he said. “Certainly, you know corporate outlets can afford to pay eight hundred dollars a day. That’s not a question, but they could also afford to litigate with Donald Trump, and they chose not to.”

Cases like Herridge’s may be relatively rare, Rottman said, “but when they do occur, they’re really consequential for press freedom.”

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Alcohol, Sex And Violence: A Dangerous Cocktail That Makes Young Women Vulnerable To HIV

Alcohol consumption is embedded in South African society. Maor Attias/pexels

BY ZOE DUBY AND KATE BERGH

South Africa has the largest HIV epidemic in the world, with adolescent girls and young women aged 15-24 at the highest risk of getting HIV. HIV prevalence among girls and women in this age group is roughly double that of their male peers.

Research has identified numerous factors that increase vulnerability among women and girls. These include unequal power dynamics in relationships, challenges in negotiating condom use, as well as exposure to violence. Heavy alcohol consumption or binge drinking can amplify these situations, thus increasing HIV vulnerability.

Binge drinking is defined as consuming five or more drinks in one sitting. This behaviour is widespread and normalised in many South African communities with 54% of male drinkers and 35% of female drinkers reporting that they binge drink.

As socio-behavioural scientists our interests lie in the areas of sexual and reproductive health, and sociocultural norms and structural barriers to HIV prevention.

Our recent research sought to explore the intersection between alcohol use, HIV risk and HIV acquisition among adolescent girls and young women living in high HIV-burdened communities in South Africa. We used data from the HERStory3 study, an impact evaluation of the My Journey programme. My Journey is a combination HIV prevention intervention that aims to reduce HIV, teenage pregnancy and gender based violence, as well as keep girls in school and improve their access to economic opportunities.

We found that hazardous drinking was common and strongly linked to sexual violence and condomless sex. But it was not directly associated with HIV acquisition in this study. That does not make alcohol irrelevant. It suggests the pathway from drinking to HIV is indirect, layered, and shaped by other social conditions.

Our findings suggest that HIV prevention for adolescent girls and young women cannot focus only on condoms or individual behaviour change. It needs to confront the conditions that make risk possible.
How the study was done

Our team conducted the HERStory3 study, which was an external evaluation of the My Journey programme. The programme has been delivering services in schools, colleges, dedicated safe spaces and mobile clinics since 2016.

Services start with an HIV risk and vulnerability assessment. Then depending on their needs, girls are offered HIV testing, prevention and treatment services as well as pregnancy testing and contraceptives.

The programme is being implemented in 12 sub-districts with a high HIV burden across eight provinces in South Africa.

To evaluate the programme, we conducted a post-intervention household survey in 2024 with 5,025 adolescent girls and young women. The survey was conducted in the 12 intervention sub-districts, and 12 matched sub-districts that didn’t receive the intervention, for comparison. To complement the survey, our study also included in-depth telephonic interviews with 68 young women from seven provinces.

Those interviews were important because they gave girls the chance to tell us their stories, and help to explain two things. First, whether alcohol was associated with risk. Second, how alcohol fitted into girls’ social worlds.

What we found

We tested the relationship between hazardous drinking and specific sexual risk behaviours. Our analysis showed no statistically significant association between alcohol use and HIV status. However, we found it was associated with sexual violence and condomless sex. Hazardous drinking also appeared to be linked to transactional sex. But this relationship was not strong or consistent once the other risk behaviours were considered.

The interviews helped provide a backdrop to why alcohol consumption among women and girls in South Africa is increasing.

In the narratives of the young women we spoke to, alcohol was woven into peer culture, family and community drinking spaces. Girls described engaging in age-disparate and transactional relationships. These commonly end up in situations in which girls obtain alcohol from older men who expect sex in exchange. The interviews showed that alcohol is not just a drink but a social currency that shapes how girls navigate bars and other drinking venues.

In the social context of bars and informal drinking venues, this exchange can blur consent because alcohol may be used to initiate or pressure sexual access. And the power imbalance created by age, money and intoxication makes it harder for girls to insist on condoms or leave safely.

The risk does not end with sexual coercion.

When girls refuse sex after receiving alcohol, they may face anger, intimidation, or physical violence. This shows how alcohol-related exchange can escalate from social interaction into gender-based harm. This pathway helps explain why alcohol use among adolescent girls and young women cannot be separated from transactional sex, coercion and violence in high HIV-burden settings.

The HIV link

The lack of a direct statistical link between hazardous drinking and HIV infection is not surprising once the broader context is considered. HIV acquisition is the result of repeated exposures over time. Our survey measured drinking and HIV acquisition at a single point in time.

If alcohol increases HIV risk gradually through exposure to sexual violence and condomless sex as a result of transactional or age-disparate relationships, that effect may not appear as a simple one-to-one association in cross-sectional data.

The findings from the interviews make that chain of influence more visible. They show how alcohol can weaken bargaining power, place girls and young women in unsafe settings, and make negotiations for condom use harder.

In the interviews, girls described being expected to have sex after men bought them drinks, and that refusal could lead to rape, threats, or physical violence. The interviews also show that alcohol use among adolescent girls and young women is socially embedded rather than purely individual. This is important for interpreting the study findings.

What the findings mean

HIV prevention for this population needs to address the settings in which alcohol is accessed, the gendered power relations that shape sexual decision-making, and the violence that can follow from those relationships.

The findings point to the importance of safer recreational spaces, community-level alcohol harm reduction, and interventions that reduce women’s dependence on transactional exchanges with older men.

There is also a message here for programme design. Multi-component HIV prevention interventions are more likely to work when they are tailored to the social realities of young women’s lives, not just their knowledge of risk.

Future research should follow participants over longer periods, use stronger causal designs where possible, and test whether reducing hazardous drinking also lowers violence and condomless sex over time.

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