There have been major works on Africa (hereafter labelled Africanist literature) that are critical of International Relations as an academic discipline. The discipline is labelled ‘provincial IR’ or ‘Eurocentric’ rather than universal. This description is based on an assumption that IR reflects western experience and values and that IR concepts and theoretical postulates are ‘parochial views that rarely correspond to the lived experiences of African people and politics’. All this has led to calls to understand IR from an African perspective. This article is a reflection on the arguments behind the growing critique of IR theory and concepts by Africanist scholars and the counter arguments. Against the assertion that IR theory has limited validity, the article demonstrates that existing body of IR theories provide the tools to adequately explain Africa’s international relations. The study questions notions of Afro-centric or Eurocentric perspectives on grounds that the idea assumes an uncontaminated African or Western world and ignores the fact that in many places the local and the exotic ‘co-exist simultaneously’. Significantly the study moves beyond the parochial reading of IR and contributes to the emerging alternative position that sees international norms, values and practices as the result of continuing interactive process among cultures.

Keywords: Reflection, critique, International Relations, African perspective, cultural interactions.