This course examines some of Africa’s greatest kingdoms and empires, focusing on the following themes: vision and long-range planning, alliance building, resource scarcity and innovation, negotiations and legitimacy and symbolic and spiritual strategy .Through historical case studies of figures such as Sundiata of Mali, Hannibal of Carthage, Shaka Zulu of South Africa and Queen Nzinga of Angola, students will explore how Africa leaders navigated military challenges, shifting technologies and scarce resources, negotiated alliances, and upheld community values. The course culminates in developing proposals to make a small urban branch campus more cost-effective, build partnerships, address distance learning needs, and foster a vibrant cultural center by drawing on Africa’s legacy of leadership, statesmanship and strategic excellence and the campus’ historical mission and founding values.
By the end of the course, students will be able to:
- Identify and describe major African leaders and analyze their achievements, strategic designs, resource management, and alliance building.
- Explain how these leaders used systems thinking to address cultural, ecological, and technological challenges
- Assess the importance of ecosystem knowledge, resiliency mindsets, diplomacy, and cyclic understanding in sustaining communities
- Apply lessons from African kingdoms to inform culturally rooted community responsive leadership.
- Develop evidence-based proposals that use historical, adaptive, ecological, and systemic strategies to address institutional longevity and situational challenges