Volume 2: Knowledge in Action – The Voice Journal

Volume 2 of The Voice Journal presents a dynamic exploration of Africa’s evolving knowledge systems. In a world increasingly driven by data, innovation, and discovery, this volume asks a pivotal question: what happens when research is rooted in local realities and serves the people first?

Each article featured here confronts systemic challenges—intellectual exclusion, underinvestment in academia, and colonial paradigms—while also offering inspiring glimpses into homegrown research, policy transformation, and knowledge decolonization. This volume is a bold call to action to reimagine Africa’s place in the global knowledge economy.

From Knowledge to Impact: How African Research Is Shaping Policy and Development Practice

This article explores how African scholars are bridging the gap between academic research and public policy. From health innovations in Rwanda to agricultural reforms in Ghana, localized research is becoming instrumental in driving national development agendas.

It also highlights institutional efforts to translate academic insights into legislation and public discourse, showcasing how think tanks, universities, and civil society are pushing knowledge from ivory towers into the heart of governance and change.

Decolonizing Innovation: Rethinking What Counts as Knowledge in African Contexts

Too often, innovation is framed by Western standards—startups, patents, and lab breakthroughs. But in African communities, innovation lives in cultural practices, local materials, and ancestral wisdom that solve problems through necessity and ingenuity.

This article examines how frugal innovation, indigenous knowledge systems, and vernacular technologies are challenging the dominance of Eurocentric innovation models and offering new paradigms for progress.

The Research Divide: Barriers to Knowledge Production in African Universities and What Must Change

Why do African universities produce only a fraction of the world’s research despite immense talent? This piece identifies the key barriers: chronic underfunding, limited access to publishing platforms, exclusionary language policies, and the brain drain.

Drawing on comparative insights from Latin America and Southeast Asia, it proposes bold reforms to revitalize African research ecosystems and restore institutional capacity for meaningful knowledge generation.

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Prof. Vicente C. Sinining, PhD, PDCILM

Editor-in-Chief

Email: vsinining@vcsresearch.co.rw | ORCID: 0000-0002-2424-1234