The IAI was founded in 1926 to promote research and the dissemination of knowledge on African societies, cultures and languages, and to bring about a closer association of scientific knowledge with practical affairs.

The Institute has to date undertaken or sponsored the publication of over 300 original volumes in the field of African Studies, including 60 volumes in the continuing Ethnographic Survey of Africa and 44 annual volumes of the journal Africa. Information services provided by the Institute have included the quarterly publication of the International African Bibliography (now prepared at the School of Oriental and African Studies), the regional and subject volumes of the Africa Bibliography Series, African Abstracts (1950—72), and the 5—volume Cumulative Bibliography of African Studies, published in 1973. The Institute's Research Information Liaison Unit. has compiled and published the International Register of Organisations undertaking Africanist Research (1971), 3 volumes of Current Africanist Research, listing over 5,000 projects under way in the period 1971—3, and the International Guide to African Studies Research (IAI, January, 1975).