Africa Action

Africa Action’s mission is to change U.S.-Africa relations, to promote political, economic and social justice in Africa. Our formula for political change, which combines research, analysis, advocacy, and communications work with broad-based grassroots mobilization, has been successful in reshaping U.S.-Africa policy as well as policies of multinational institutions.

Our current goals are to stop the genocide in Darfur, Sudan; end HIV/AIDS in Africa by promoting a more urgent response and more effective policies; and achieve the cancellation of Africa’s illegitimate debts. We have already been successful on these issues:

• Our Darfur Campaign has achieved goals many thought impossible. We convinced groups working on Darfur to describe the situation as “genocide” and pushed the Bush Administration to acknowledge it as such. We were also the first to identify the need for a multinational intervention to protect civilians; our campaigns led to the passage of two United Nations Resolutions authorizing deployment of peacekeepers.
• On the HIV/AIDS pandemic, Africa Action has publicized the disproportionate impact of this disease on the African continent. With our coalition partners we emphasized the need for access to treatment, leading to a growth of access from 1 percent to almost 30 percent.
• We are working with Jubilee USA to push legislation that would provide debt cancellation for 67 countries. Debt cancellation combined with re-prioritized spending is an effective mechanism to help countries eradicate poverty. In Zambia, debt cancellation led to the elimination of health care fees and the treatment of 100,000 people living with HIV/AIDS. In Tanzania, it led to the elimination of education fees, enabling 3 million children to go to school.