Since its inception in 2001, the International Criminal Court (ICC) has been met with resistance by various African states and their leaders, who see the court as a new iteration of colonial violence and control. In Affective Justice Kamari Maxine Clarke explores the African Union's pushback against the ICC in order to theorize affect's role in shaping forms of justice in the contemporary period. Drawing on fieldwork in The Hague, the African Union in Addis Ababa, sites of postelection violence in Kenya, and Boko Haram's circuits in Northern Nigeria, Clarke formulates the concept of affective justice—an emotional response to competing interpretations of justice—to trace how affect becomes manifest in judicial practices. By detailing the effects of the ICC’s all-African indictments, she outlines how affective responses to these call into question the "objectivity" of the ICC’s mission to protect those victimized by violence and prosecute perpetrators of those crimes. In analyzing the effects of such cases, Clarke provides a fuller theorization of how people articulate what justice is and the mechanisms through which they do so.

"Kamari Maxine Clarke’s superb ethnographic and critical study of the place of the International Criminal Court (ICC) within African history and politics demands a fundamental reevaluation of the meaning of “justice” against a background of colonial and neocolonial violence, postcolonial critique, and enduring inequalities of international power." - Opinio Juris

"“In Affective Justice, Clarke innovatively explores the making of international criminal justice from the standpoint of affects and emotions and, in doing so, offers an unprecedented and indispensable theorization of international criminal justice which—after reading this book—can simply not be ignored any longer.”" - Law & Society Review

"“Through an ethnographic interrogation of the predicament of identifying and reacting to acts of injustice in Africa (at different levels) and the politics of law, Clarke has provided a compelling read…. This book is strongly recommended to technocrats in the ICC itself and to academics and policy makers in Africa and the rest of the world.”" - Anthropology Southern Africa

"“Affective Justice is a signifi­cant achievement in the anthropology of international law and a welcome addition to human rights and African studies. It should be, and I expect it to be, widely read and debated.”" - Anthropological Quarterly

"“Clarke’s groundbreaking new book comes out in the context of renewed debate about the International Criminal Court (ICC) and prospects for the global anti-impunity movement.... Affective Justice is a must read for those following these events and for anyone interested in international justice more broadly.”" - Law, Culture and the Humanities