Joël Glasman is Professor of Contemporary African History at the University of Bayreuth. His research focuses on the colonial and postcolonial state in Africa, the history of humanitarian action, and the theory and methods of global history.
His first monograph, Les corps habillés au Togo. Genèse coloniale des métiers de police (Paris, 2015), examines the history of soldiers and police officers in Togo, a social group that ultimately seized power in the 1963 coup d’état.
His second book, Minimal Humanity: Humanitarianism and the Quantification of Human Needs (London, 2020), traces the emergence and quantification of ‘basic needs’, a concept that has become central to humanitarian expertise and practice.
His most recent book, Les humanités humanitaires. Petit manuel d’autodéfense à l’usage de volontaires (Paris, 2023), seeks to make academic research more accessible to aid workers. It introduces key debates on humanitarian aid, neoliberalism, war, corruption, genocide, refugee camps, epidemics, racism, feminism, statistics, and climate change. The book was awarded the 2024 Research Prize of the Fondation de la Croix-Rouge française (French Red Cross Foundation).
A further strand of his research explores the theory and methods of global history. His work has examined the application of Actor–Network Theory (ANT) to global history, notably in Techniken der Globalisierung: Global History Meets Actor-Network Theory (co-edited with D. Gerstenberger, Bielefeld, 2016), as well as the methodological possibilities and limitations of global historical approaches.
CV
Since 2025: Chair of history with a focus on Africa, University of Bayreuth
2024: Research Prize of the French Red Cross Foundation
2023: Fellow at the Käte Hamburger Research Center Global Dis:connect Munic
2022: Fellow at the Center Norbert Elias EHESS Marseille
2018: Professor of history with a focus on Africa, University of Bayreuth
2016-2018: Researcher, Centre Marc Bloch, Berlin
2015-2017: Researcher, DFG project ‘Global refuge camps’, Humboldt University Berlin
2009-2014: Lecturer (Wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter), IAAW, Humboldt University Berlin
2011: PhD, Leipzig University, Institute for African Studies & Université Paris VII
2004-2007: Secondary school teacher, Lycée International des Pontonniers, Strasbourg
2004: MA degree International Humanitarian Action (NOHA), University of Bochum
2002: MA degree Modern and Contemporary History, Medieval History, Geography University of Tübingen & Université d’Aix-Marseille
Institutional responsibilities
Since 2024: Member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the German Historical Institute Paris
Since 2024: Member of the jury of the Gerda Henkel Prize (Düsseldorf)
Since 2023: Member of the Board of Trustees of the Historisches Kolleg (Munich)
Since 2023: Member of the Scientific Advisory Board of Developing Humanitarian Medicine (DHM), (Manchester)
Since 2023: Member of the Steering Committee of the Institute of African Studies (IAS) (Bayreuth)
Since 2022: PI in the BMBF-Network ‘Postcolonial Hierarchies in Peace and Conflict’
Since 2020: Co-coordinator of the MA program Global History
Since 2020: Co-editor of the series Africa in Global History at DeGruyter
Since 2020: PI at the Research Center Society, Technology and Ecology in Africa, Challenges in the 21st
Since 2019: PI in the Cluster of Excellence Africa Multiple: Reconfiguring African Studies