Like much of the globe, the African continent is in the midst of navigating numerous, interwoven environmental challenges. From climate-related risks such as crop failure and famine to longer-term concerns about sustainable urbanization, environmental justice, and biodiversity conservation, African states are charged with addressing a complex range of issues. As Carl Death demonstrates, they are doing so with innovations such as community-based conservation programs and transnational parks, rural development schemes and environmental education initiatives, carbon taxes and pricing for ecosystem services, and significant investments into hydropower, solar, and wind energy. Although much of the literature on “green states” has focused on highly developed areas in Europe and North America, Death draws on almost a decade of research to reveal how central African environmental politics are to the transformation of African states, challenge current understandings of green politics, and explore the ramifications for the rest of the global south.
