Staff Profiles

My formal education:

2017-2020: PhD in Environmental & Geographical Science (University of Cape Town)

2015-2016: MPhil in Environment, Society & Sustainability (University of Cape Town)

2009-2013: BA Environmental Science  (University of Botswana)

Emmanuel Mogende is a conservation social scientist whose research interests revolve around the political ecology and political economy of natural resources with a particular focus on biodiversity conservation and the politics of ecotourism in Botswana. He completed his PhD studies in Environmental and Geographical Science at University of Cape Town in 2020. His PhD research challenges the normative assumptions that informs the debates on the green state which have excluded African states from the analyses of the green state. The research draws attention to the processes that produce the green state in the African context using Botswana’s wildlife conservation policy and practices as an example. My current research interests which takes into cognizance a collaborative approach, centres around issues related to environmental resource conflicts, nature-society and state-society relations in wildlife conservation in their political, economic, social and historical contexts. I am also interested in the North-South relations embedded in international environmental diplomacy and how policies emanating from this relations impact the Global South in wildlife conservation. 

His research interest are within the sub fields of political geography and political ecology

Environmental politics

Resource conflicts

State-society relations in wildlife conservation 

Society-nature relations

Transfontier conservation areas and tourism

Power dynamics in wildlife based tourism

Water governance

Environmental Governance and politics

Environmental Resource Conflicts

Political Ecology

Hübschle, A., Kerina, K., Mogende, E., & Suping, K. 2024. Voices from the frontlines in the Okavango River Basin: towards a cooperative model of environmental activism in the Global South. International Journal of Crime, Justice and Social Democracy, 13(1):51-68.

LaRocco, A & Mogende, E. 2022. Fall from grace or back down to earth? Conservation and political conflict in Africa's "miracle" state. Environment and Planning E: nature and Space, 7(1):22-49.

Mogende, E & Ramutsindela, M. 2020. Political leadership and non-state actors in the greening of Botswana. Review of African Political Economy, 47 (165): 399-415. 

Mogende, E and Kolawole, O. 2016. Dynamics of local governance in natural resource conservation in the Okavango Delta Botswana. Natural Resource Forum, 40: 93-102.

Mogende, E & Ramutsindela, M. (2022). The violence of greening the state in Africa. In Ramutsindela, M., Matose, F. & Mushonga, T (eds), The violence of conservation in Africa: state militarisation and alternatives, pp.37-52. Edward Elgar Publishing. 

Mbaiwa, JE., Kolawole, OD. Hambira, WL & Mogende, E.(eds). 2023. Handbook on Tourism and Conservation. Edward Elgar Publishing.