Dr Michael E Odijie

I work on the history of slavery and emancipation in West Africa, and on the social, political, and economic transformations associated with abolition. I am particularly interested in local anti-slavery movements, the persistence of status hierarchies after formal emancipation, and the relationship between historical forms of coercion and contemporary debates about labour exploitation and modern slavery. My research also explores labour regimes in commodity chains, especially cocoa production.

I am Associate Professor of African History and African Studies at the University of Oxford, holding a joint appointment between the Faculty of History and the Oxford School of Global and Area Studies. My research spans slavery and abolition in West Africa, labour and exploitation in commodity value chains (including cocoa in West Africa), and the politics of development, with a further interest in EU–Africa relations from historical to contemporary periods.

Research Interests

• Slavery and abolition in West Africa (with particular attention to local slavery and local movements for abolition)
• Labour history in West Africa
• Cocoa value chains in Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana (especially labour exploitation within the chain)
• EU–Africa relations (Area Studies)
• The politics of development in Africa (Area Studies)