May 25, 2026
It is such delight to introduce this Review Symposium on my book, The Air Transport Industry in Africa: A Legal Analysis of the Single African Air Transport Market, published by Routledge in 2025. Convened by Afronomicslaw, the leading blog on international law and international economic law issues relating to Africa and the Global South, the symposium brings together a distinguished group of scholars and practitioners in air law who constructively engage with the book’s arguments, scope, and contribution to African air transport law and regional integration debates.
This book examines the multilateral liberalization of the air transport industry in Africa within the framework of the African Union Agenda 2063 initiative, the Single African Air Transport Market (SAATM). Essentially, the book is a legal treatise that delves into the intricate African aero-politics and explores how law and policy in Africa has shaped the political economy of the air transport industry. The core message of the text is to demonstrate that air transport liberalization in Africa faces a difficult and evolutionary process, particularly considering the continent's socio-political context and the inherent challenges of integrating a continent as expansive and diverse as Africa.
The reviewers who participated in this symposium have approached the book from diverse professional backgrounds and each brings a unique disciplinary, regional and methodological perspectives. Collectively, their reviews greatly enrich this pertinent discourse on SAATM raising doctrinal questions, political economy economic considerations and comparative insights. While some of the reviewers engage with the book’s legal analysis, others approach their reviews from a regional integration, mobility and global governance of the air transport sector. Even with different approaches a general trend runs through the review, SAATM is not a settled project but a work in progress. Their reviews raise important questions about the role of law and economics in driving integration. Each contribution offers a sustained reflection that not only critiques the book but also pushes the scholarship on African air transport and regional integration forward.
I would like to express my gratitude to all the reviewers for their thoughtful and generous engagement. I hope readers will find the exchanges as stimulating and forward-looking as I have. Finally, I hope this symposium encourages further interdisciplinary engagement with air transport as a legal and institutional space in Africa. Aviation is not merely a technical or commercial sector, it is a critical site where questions of sovereignty, integration, development, and mobility intersect. If this symposium helps to deepen that conversation, it will have achieved more than I could have hoped for. I thank the editors, reviewers, and readers for their engagement, and I look forward to the discussions that will follow.