The Social Science Research Council has announced three new fellowship opportunities for African faculty researching topics related to peace, security, and development. The Next Generation Social Sciences in Africa program “responds to a shortage of well-trained faculty now reaching crisis proportions in African higher education”:

The program offers fellowships to nurture the intellectual development and increase retention of early-career faculty in Ghana, Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania, and Uganda. The program assists fellows to develop research opportunities and skills, obtain doctoral degrees, and participate in robust research communities. Toward this end, the project features a thematic focus in order to renew basic research agendas addressing peace, security, and development topics as well as strengthen interdisciplinary social science research capacity on these issues.

This program also offers two workshops each year to help fellows master research methodologies, engage key literature in their fields, and produce scholarly publications. The workshops will be held in January and June each year. The Next Generation African Social Sciences program will support approximately 45 fellows each year across all three fellowship opportunities.

The program assists fellows to develop research opportunities and skills, obtain doctoral degrees, and participate in robust research communities. Toward this end, the project features a thematic focus in order to renew basic research agendas addressing peace, security, and development topics as well as strengthen interdisciplinary social science research capacity on these issues. Funded by Carnegie Corporation of New York, this project complements foundation initiatives to develop and strengthen the next generation of African scholars.

The program features three distinct competitive fellowship opportunities for early-career social science faculty who hold positions in accredited colleges and universities in Ghana, Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania, and Uganda:

• Doctoral dissertation proposal fellowship: Supporting short-term research costs of up to $3,000USD to develop a doctoral dissertation proposal.

• Doctoral dissertation research fellowship: Supporting 9-12 months of dissertation research costs of up to $15,000USD on a topic related to peace, security, and development.

Doctoral dissertation completion fellowship: Supporting a one-year leave from teaching responsibilities with a stipend of up to $15,000USD to permit the completion of a dissertation that advances research on peace, security, and development topics.

The program encourages innovative research on peace, security, and development topics. These issues can be broadly conceived to include, for example, work on civil society, humanitarian intervention, human security, law and political practice, media and human rights, peace and reconciliation, public culture and associational life, religion and conflict resolution, social movements and democratic participation.

The next deadline for fellowship applications is August 31, 2011. Find more information on the program’s three fellowship opportunities as well as details concerning the application process here.