Neither in Switzerland generally nor in Geneva in particular did there exist an Africanist tradition when the Geneva–Africa Institute was created in 1961. The Swiss, of course, had been in Africa—as merchants, missionaries, gunrunners—but this Swiss presence did not add up to a focus of study, nor did it create the geographical areas of special interest that had shaped African studies in France, England, or Belgium. Nor has the teaching staff of the Institute been entirely Swiss. As befits an international city such as Geneva, there have been French, Italian, Hungarian, Dahomean, and American as well as Swiss members of staff.