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All recent books on international social work mention Africa only briefly and few engage with the broader field of development studies. This book focuses solely on the unique African context engaging with issues relating to social work and development more broadly thus enabling a deeper examination and more complex and nuanced picture to emerge. Unlike most academic works, this book highlights multiple practitioner voices, with authors or co-authors that have recently been or are currently practising social workers. As an edited book, it draws from both academic research as well as lived practice experience, supported by strong theoretical positioning and guidance in introductory chapters, drawing on African literature, wherever possible. Looking at case-studies from Lesotho, Botswana, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Ethiopia, Namibia, Uganda, Nigeria, Kenya, South Africa, Rwanda, Zambia and Tanzania and covering established areas of practice such as child protection; working with older people; working with people with disabilities; mental health; and mainstream services targeting women as well as emerging areas of developmental social work practice, such as humanitarian assistance in post-conflict situations; work with immigrants and refugees; and the training of community-based workers, this book takes a future-oriented perspective that aims to move beyond well-worn critiques to envision constructive and sustainable futures for social work and social development in Africa from a critical perspective.
Despite three decades of preoccupation with development in Africa, the economies of most African nations are still stagnating or regressing. For most Africans, incomes are lower than they were two decades ago, health prospects are poorer, malnourishment is widespread, and infrastructures and social institutions are breaking down. An array of factors have been offered to explain the apparent failure of development in Africa, including the colonial legacy, social pluralism, corruption, poor planning and incompetent management, limited in-flow of foreign capital, and low levels of saving and investment. Alone or in combination, these factors are serious impediments to development, but Claude Ake contends that the problem is not that development has failed, but that it was never really on the agenda. He maintains that political conditions in Africa are the greatest impediment to development. In this book, Ake traces the evolution and failure of development policies, including the IMF stabilization programs that have dominated international efforts. He identifies the root causes of the problem in the authoritarian political structure of the African states derived from the previous colonial entities. Ake sketches the alternatives that are struggling to emerge from calamitous failure--economic development based on traditional agriculture, political development based on the decentralization of power, and reliance on indigenous communities that have been providing some measure of refuge from the coercive power of the central state. Ake's argument may become a new paradigm for development in Africa.
This book presents a snapshot of a major challenge, and shares subjective views on various areas of conflict in Africa and the diverse – theoretical and practical – efforts to achieve peace. Following an essential review of several real-world conflict contexts on the African continent and attempts to come to terms with them critically as a first step, the book explores the lessons learned to date with regard to peace studies in Africa.
In this book, Franklin Obeng-Odoom seeks to debunk the existing explanations of inequalities within Africa and between Africa and the rest of the world using insights from the emerging field of stratification economics. Using multiple sources - including archival and historical material and a wide range of survey data - he develops a distinctive approach that combines traditional institutional economics, such as social protection and reasonable value, property and the distribution of wealth with other insights into Africa's development. While looking at the Africa-wide situation, Obeng-Odoom also analyses the experiences of inequalities within specific countries; he primarily focuses on Ghana while also drawing on experiences in Botswana and Mauritius. Comprehensive and engaging, Property, Institutions, and Social Stratification in Africa is a useful resource for teaching and research on Africa and the Global South.
Africa’s Development Dynamics uses lessons learned in the continent’s five regions – Central, East, North, Southern and West Africa – to develop policy recommendations and share good practices. Drawing on the most recent statistics, this analysis of development dynamics attempts to help African leaders reach the targets of the African Union’s Agenda 2063 at all levels: continental, regional, national and local.
This book explores the plethora of social-justice issues facing teacher education and development in Africa. Using both theoretical and empirical perspectives, it considers the need for teacher education to be transformational and address conventional pedagogy as well as the rights and duties of all citizens. The edited volume focuses on a wide range of relevant aspects, such as decolonisation, economic models, environmental concerns, as well as multilingual and multicultural aspects of education. Evidence-based chapters cover strategies used to support preservice and in-service teachers on how best to tackle issues of social justice through induction activities, pedagogy and discipline content, involving local communities, and the role of technology, including the use of open educational resources. The principles underlying these strategies are being used in the COVID-19 pandemic and will be equally relevant in the post-COVID-19 world. This book will be of great interest for academics, researchers and postgraduate students in the fields of teacher education, African education, educational policy, international education and comparative education.
Every political system, either developed or adopted, has an impact on the structure of society and the level of development. This book analyzes the evolution and nature of political institutions and their effect on Africa’s development. The challenges Africa face in developing viable institutions are not limited to the adoption of foreign institutions, but are also rooted in domestic norms that define society itself. Sometimes, these challenges have to do with the incompatibility between foreign and domestic institutions. The fundamental issue then is to understand the African societies, cultures, and other dynamics that have ensured stability in the past and that need to be recognized when adopting contemporary foreign institutions. This comprehensive text examines three key issue areas in Africa: politics, society, and economy. It demonstrates how the lack of consideration for domestic norms and societal realities explain the weaker institutions and lack of development on the African continent. The chapters examine critical issues such as gender, ethnicity and constitution development, legitimacy and the state, the correlation between abundant resources and instability, the dilemmas of political dynasties, international economic regimes and Africa’s economy, and more. Featuring many case studies, including Kenya, South Africa, Senegal, Ghana, Nigeria, Tanzania, Morocco, Togo, DRC, Ethiopia, Rwanda, the book provides some explanation of underdevelopment in Africa, linking the historical and colonial realities that hinder democratic consolidation to contemporary African politics, society and economy.
This first edition explores the dynamics of growth, jobs, and inequalities. It proposes ten decisive actions to promote sustainable economic and social development and to strengthen institutions in Africa.
Why has Africa remained persistently poor over its recorded history? Has Africa always been poor? What has been the nature of Africa's poverty and how do we explain its origins? This volume takes a necessary interdisciplinary approach to these questions by bringing together perspectives from archaeology, linguistics, history, anthropology, political science, and economics. Several contributors note that Africa's development was at par with many areas of Europe in the first millennium of the Common Era. Why Africa fell behind is a key theme in this volume, with insights that should inform Africa's developmental strategies.
Sub-Saharan Africa's turnaround over the past couple of decades has been dramatic. After many years in decline, the continent's economy picked up in the mid-1990s. Along with this macroeconomic growth, people became healthier, many more youngsters attended schools, and the rate of extreme poverty declined from 54 percent in 1990 to 41 percent in 2015. Political and social freedoms expanded, and gender equality advanced. Conflict in the region also subsided, although it still claims thousands of civilian lives in some countries and still drives pressing numbers of displaced persons. Despite Africa’s widespread economic and social welfare accomplishments, the region’s challenges remain daunting: Economic growth has slowed in recent years. Poverty rates in many countries are the highest in the world. And notably, the number of poor in Africa is rising because of population growth. From a global perspective, the biggest concentration of poverty has shifted from South Asia to Africa. Accelerating Poverty Reduction in Africa explores critical policy entry points to address the demographic, societal, and political drivers of poverty; improve income-earning opportunities both on and off the farm; and better mobilize resources for the poor. It looks beyond macroeconomic stability and growth—critical yet insufficient components of these objectives—to ask what more could be done and where policy makers should focus their attention to speed up poverty reduction. The pro-poor policy agenda advanced in this volume requires not only economic growth where the poor work and live, but also mitigation of the many risks to which African households are exposed. As such, this report takes a "jobs" lens to its task. It focuses squarely on the productivity and livelihoods of the poor and vulnerable—that is, what it will take to increase their earnings. Finally, it presents a road map for financing the poverty and development agenda.