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What has confounded African efforts to create cohesive, prosperous and just states in postcolonial Africa? What has been the long-term impact of the Berlin Conference of 1884-5 on African unity and African statehood? Why is postcolonial Africa haunted by various ethno national conflicts? Is secession and irredentism the solution? Can we talk of ethno-futures for Africa? These are the kinds of fundamental questions that this important book addresses. Sabelo J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Brilliant Mhlanga's book introduces the metaphor of the 'northern problem' to dramatise the fact that there is no major African postcolonial state that does not enclose within its borders a disgruntled minority that is complaining of marginalization, domination and suppression. The irony is that in 1963 at the formation of the OAU, postcolonial African leaders embraced the boundaries arbitrarily drawn by European colonialists and institutionalised the principle of inviolability of 'bondage of boundaries' thereby contributing to the problem of ethno-national conflicts. The successful struggle for independence of the Eritrean people and the secession of South Sudan in 2011 have encouraged other dominated and marginalised groups throughout Africa to view secession as an option. Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Mhlanga successfully assembled competent African scholars to deal exhaustively with various empirical cases of ethno-national conflicts throughout the African continent as well as engaging with such pertinent issues as Pan-Africanism as a panacea to these problems. This important book delves deeper into complex issues of space, languages, conflict, security, nation-building, war on terror, secession, migration, citizenship, militias, liberation, violence and Pan-Africanism.
The book discusses the idea of African identity in the twenty-first century, calling into question and deconstructing any understanding and representation of the idea of African identity as being based exclusively on the notion of ‘Blackness’, or the Black race. In countering such an idea of African identity as a flawed notion, the text propounds the idea of intermediality as a new modality of thinking about the importance of embracing the primacy of tolerance for the difference of identity. The notion of intermediality promotes the need for people of all races across the African continent to embrace the idea of difference as the defining feature of African identity so that the geographical locality called Africa is seen as a vibrant, open, and cosmopolitan continent which is accessible to people of all races and identities.
This collection of essays analyzes different iterations of African unity, exploring the political and cultural visions that informed projects aimed at African unification. It explores the cultural, economic and non-state aspects of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) as the principal institution dedicated to the cooperation of African states, from its establishment in 1963 to its transformation into the African Union (AU) in 2000, as well as how ideas of African unity shaped the Cold War and African liberation struggles. Bringing together contributors from a diverse range of disciplinary backgrounds across Africa, Europe and the US, this book investigates the ideological origins and historiography of Pan-African and unification projects, and considers how African intellectuals, leaders and populations engaged with these ideas.
This volume is a multi-disciplinary contribution to contemporary and historical dynamics that shape the vibrant cultural, political, economic and social world of Mozambique. Comprising a global range of scholars, the book serves as a generous introduction to Mozambique.
"Beyond Identities -- Rethinking Power in Africa" was the general theme of the biennial "Nordic Africa Days" organized in October 2001 by the Nordic Africa Institute in Uppsala. The plenary presentations by three invited African scholars are included in this Discussion Paper. They centre on aspects of the event’s general theme and provide a variety of stimulating reflections and insights from different disciplines.
Collected papers from the first Scramble for Africa conference held from 25-27 May 2011.
Beyond Belief is a bold rethinking of the formation and consolidation of nation-state ideologies. Analyzing India during the first two decades following its foundation as a sovereign nation-state in 1947, Srirupa Roy explores how nationalists are turned into nationals, subjects into citizens, and the colonial state into a sovereign nation-state. Roy argues that the postcolonial nation-state is consolidated not, as many have asserted, by efforts to imagine a shared cultural community, but rather by the production of a recognizable and authoritative identity for the state. This project—of making the state the entity identified as the nation’s authoritative representative—emphasizes the natural cultural diversity of the nation and upholds the state as the sole unifier or manager of the “naturally” fragmented nation; the state is unified through diversity. Roy considers several different ways that identification with the Indian nation-state was produced and consolidated during the 1950s and 1960s. She looks at how the Films Division of India, a state-owned documentary and newsreel production agency, allowed national audiences to “see the state”; how the “unity in diversity” formation of nationhood was reinforced in commemorations of India’s annual Republic Day; and how the government produced a policy discourse claiming that scientific development was the ultimate national need and the most pressing priority for the state to address. She also analyzes the fate of the steel towns—industrial townships built to house the workers of nationalized steel plants—which were upheld as the exemplary national spaces of the new India. By prioritizing the role of actual manifestations of and encounters with the state, Roy moves beyond theories of nationalism and state formation based on collective belief.
Focusing on politics and society in India, this book explores new areas enmeshed in the complex social, economic and political processes in the country. Linking the structural characteristics with the broader sociological context, the book emphasizes the strong influence of sociological issues on politics, such as social milieu shaping and the articulation of the political in day-to-day events. Political events are connected with the ever-changing social, economic and political processes in order to provide an analytical framework to explain ‘peculiarities’ of Indian politics. Bidyut Chakrabarty argues that three major ideological influences of colonialism, nationalism and democracy have provided the foundational values of Indian politics. Structured thematically and chronologically, this work is a useful resource for students of political science, sociology and South Asian studies.