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24 July 2019 | Story Valentino Ndaba | Photo Valentino Ndaba
Dr Lazlo Passemiers
Dr Lazlo Passemiers spent six years conducting research across three continents.
A keen interest in unravelling transnational histories of 20th-century Southern Africa led Postdoctoral Research Fellow Dr Lazlo Passemiers to spend six years conducting extensive research across three continents. Dr Passemiers sifted through archives in Africa, Europe, and the US in order to convert his PhD thesis into a monograph.

It was on 17 July 2019 that the fruits of Passemiers’ labour were officially launched by the International Studies Group at the University of the Free State’s Bloemfontein Campus. His book, Decolonisation and Regional Geopolitics: South Africa and the ‘Congo Crisis’, 1960-1965, offers an important shift in the historiography of the Congo Crisis. It creatively centres African involvement in the debate by examining this event from a regional geopolitical angle. 

Going back in time 

By providing a three-fold perspective that examines decolonisation, apartheid diplomacy, and Southern African nationalist movements, the book offers a rounded picture of South African involvement in the Congo Crisis.

Dr Passemiers’ fascination with the transnational dynamics of Southern Africa’s history has rippled into two new research projects that respectively explore “the connection between decolonisation and white flight in the region as well as the transnational support networks of liberation movements”.

Finding the missing pieces of the puzzle

Prof Christopher Saunders, Emeritus Professor at the University of Cape Town, commended Dr Passemiers’ historiographical contribution: “He has identified a major gap in the literature and he has filled it admirably by looking across the spectrum.” As Prof Saunders noted, “what has been missing in the literature is the African angle.” 

Literature’s role in transformation

The process of undoing the profound impact of colonialism on society is long and difficult and important in this process is a clear understanding of history, which Dr Passemiers’ book enhances.

News Archive

UFS receives research grant focusing on enablement of non-profit organisations
2011-01-20

 
Prof. Mabel Erasmus

The University of the Free State (UFS) has received a research grant to the value of R1,1 million from the National Research Foundation (NRF) to conduct research on community engagement, with the emphasis on knowledge as enablement – a Non-Profit Organisation (NPO) focus.

This was the first time the NRF had requested applications for research with a focus on community engagement (CE). With the grant, the UFS has become one of the first recipients of a research grant that focuses on community engagement.

The overarching research question that will be dealt with is how Higher Education Institutions (HEI) and the NPO sector can establish long-term, research-based collaborative engagements that will be mutually empowering and enabling through joint, reciprocal knowledge-based activities and capacity building.

The contention that this proposal is based on, is that HEIs have limited knowledge of the NPO sector and thus are unable to be fully responsive to the challenges that NPOs face. What is more, it is very likely that staff and students from HEIs do not have an adequate grasp of the experiential understanding, contextual community knowledge and practical know-how that NPO practitioners have, and hence do not appreciate the crucial contributions that they can make with regard to meaning-making processes aimed at improving some of the harsh South African realities.

According to Prof. Mabel Erasmus, Associate Professor and Head of the university’s Division: Service Learning, which submitted the research proposal to the NRF and is the grant-holder, the university would like the information generated by the research to be beneficial to both HEIs and the NPOs. “Knowledge regarding NPOs, specifically their challenges and information about what they are doing, will be invaluable to HEIs. At the same time, the research must benefit the NPOs with knowledge to improve their practice and strengthen their functioning.

“The research will take place in close collaboration with the NPOs, as their inputs are crucial. The research will thus not be ‘about’ them but ‘with’ them.”

“We do not want to send our students for community-based education or as volunteers to NPOs year after year and it does not mean as much to them as these organisations would hope for. With the research process we would like to strengthen NPOs, to build their capacity and give them our whole-hearted cooperation,” she said.

Funding received from the grant will be applied over a period of three years. Except for the study grants for five Ph.D. students and four master’s students, the grant will further make provision for a number of workshops, a local conference, a publication and presentations at international conferences on this matter. The research team of 22 persons includes academics from other HEIs such as the Central University of Technology, University of Zululand, University of Johannesburg and Monash SA. Several staff members of NPOs also form part of the team, including REACH (Bfn), Childline (FS) and others.

Prof. Erasmus said that the UFS was one of a few institutions that were currently conducting research to this extent on the link between the NPO sector and HEIs within the field of community engagement.
 

Media Release
18 January 2011
Issued by: Lacea Loader
Director: Strategic Communication (actg)
Tel: 051 401 2584
Cell: 083 645 2454
E-mail: news@ufs.ac.za

 

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