This contribution critically explores changing relationships between diamond mining and patterns of urbanisation in Sierra Leone. In providing an historical overview of mining expansion and contraction, the paper highlights the significant impacts that mining has had on the rural–urban continuum, and how this has shaped political, economic and social change in diam...

In sub-Saharan Africa, commercial bioenergy production has been hailed as a new form of ‘green capitalism’ that will deliver ‘win-win’ outcomes and ‘pro poor’ development. Yet in an era of global economic recession and soaring food prices, biofuel ‘sustainability’ has been at the centre of controversy. This paper focuses on the case of post-war Sierra Leone, a coun...