In 2010, the Malawian government prosecuted Tiwonge Chimbalanga and Steven Monjeza for contravening the colonial-era anti-sodomy law. The arrest and subsequent trial attracted international attention and marked the beginning of an intensified period of persecution of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people in the country. The incident appeared similar to anti-gay persecution in Uganda, Nigeria, Liberia and Senegal at around the same time. As such, popular media, and even some academic accounts, relied on racist and essentialist notions of African sexuality to claim these instances as part of pervasive cultural homophobia on the continent. Ashley Currier, in her engaging and persuasive book, Politicizing Sex in Contemporary Africa: homophobia in Malawi, provides an alternative understanding of the trial, its historical antecedents, and its consequences.

Based on interviews with activists and LGBT people, and analysis of decades of Malawian newspaper articles, Currier asks us to view what happened to Chimbalanga and Monjeza through the lens of ‘politicized homophobia’. This, according to Currier, ‘is a strategy used by African political elites interested in consolidating their moral and political authority’ (p. 1). LGBT persecution such as that in Malawi is not the result of animosity embedded in ‘culture’ or ‘tradition’, but reflects the calculus of elites who employ a specific strategy to achieve their desired political ends. Currier does not fall into the trap of simply demonising African politicians, a move that can perpetuate notions of African homophobia (as Neville Wallace Hoad argued in African Intimacies, University of Minnesota Press). Rather, she explains the incentives facing elites for engaging in the practice, distinguishing between reactive, proactive and preemptive politicised homophobia, and clarifies the conditions under which political elites choose each version of the strategy. Elites draw from recurrent and resonant discourses that form the ‘architecture’ of politicised homophobia. Currier discusses several of these, including the potent notion that ‘homosexuality is un-African’. Her framework is expansive, but provides scholars ample opportunity to pick up elements they find useful for understanding other contexts.

Currier's theoretical framework has obvious potential applications elsewhere. For example, it could be applied to the US or Brazilian cases to demonstrate the ways in which homophobia is deployed as part of the sexual politics of populism. Leaders such as Donald Trump or Jair Bolsonaro have mobilised many elements of the homophobic discourses Currier details. At times, their choice to do so appears incoherent. For example, the Trump administration argued against protecting LGBT employees from discrimination yet launched a global campaign to decriminalise homosexuality. Politicised homophobia is a ‘scavenger strategy’, however, whose political value ‘emerges not from its coherence but rather through its ad hoc quality’ (p. 13). It can be activated as part of a larger political programme, or piggyback on the use of other forms of repression (against immigrants, Muslims, or women of colour) when politically expedient.

In this vein, Currier's framework is especially useful for the study of democratisation. With politicised homophobia, she gives scholars a refined tool for understanding how sexualised state repression sows divisions amongst social movement organisations. Fears of becoming targets of politicised homophobia can cause some feminist or human rights organisations to shun LGBT groups, splintering pro-democracy movements. Currier also helps to clarify the limits of foreign aid on democratisation efforts. While African LGBT organisations are often starved for resources to do their important service and advocacy work, LGBT organisations’ international ties with funders can lend credence to homophobic discourses and weaken civil society's ability to demand rights or hold leaders accountable.

One criticism of this work could be that it adds another concept to the literature on social and political homophobia. However, Currier's modifier ‘politicized’ is well justified as emphasising the agency and contingency involved in the propagation of homophobia – homophobia must be ‘activated’. This connects to Currier's ethical commitment to eliminating homophobia. ‘Part of the impetus for this project’, she writes, ‘stemmed from my belief that if politicized homophobia has a beginning, then it also can and should have an end’ (p. 257). Working towards this end, her analysis dissects politicised homophobia's operation and its effects on sexual minorities and civil society organisations, and highlights resistance strategies undertaken by LGBT Malawians. Her work can thus inspire other scholars to engage in ethical and engaged research that offers analysis of and solutions to real-world problems.