Living for the City is a social history of the Central African Copperbelt, considered as a single region encompassing the neighbouring mining regions of Zambia and the Democratic Republic of Congo. The Haut Katanga and Zambian Copperbelt mine towns have been understood as the vanguard of urban 'modernity' in Africa. Observers found in these towns new African communities that were experiencing what they wrongly understood as a transition from rural 'traditional' society - stable, superstitious and agricultural - to an urban existence characterised by industrial work discipline, the money economy and conspicuous consumption, Christianity, and nuclear families headed by male breadwinners supported by domesticated housewives. Miles Larmer challenges this representation of Copperbelt society, presenting an original analysis which integrates the region's social history with the production of knowledge about it, shaped by both changing political and intellectual contexts and by Copperbelt communities themselves. This title is available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.

In 1964 Kenneth Kaunda and his United National Independence Party (UNIP) government established the nation of Zambia in the former British colony of Northern Rhodesia. In parallel with many other newly independent countries in Africa this process of decolonisation created a wave of optimism regarding humanity's capacity to overcome oppression and poverty. Yet, as this study shows, in Zambia as in many other countries, the legacy of colonialism created obstacles that proved difficult to overcome. Within a short space of time democratisation and development was replaced by economic stagnation, political authoritarianism, corruption and ethnic and political conflict. To better understand this process, Dr Larmer explores UNIP's political ideology and the strategies it employed to retain a grip on government. He shows that despite the party's claim that it adhered to an authentically African model of consensual and communitarian decision-making, it was never a truly nationally representative body. Whereas in long-established Western societies unevenness in support was accepted as a legitimate basis for party political difference, in Zambia this was regarded as a threat to the fragile bindings of the young nation state, and as such had to be denied and repressed. This led to the declaration of a one-party state, presented as the logical expression of UNIP supremacy but it was in fact a reflection of its weakening grip on power. Through case studies of opposition political and social movements rooted in these differences, the book demonstrates that UNIP's control of the new nation-state was partial, uneven and consistently prone to challenge. Alongside this, the study also re-examines Zambia's role in the regional liberation struggles, providing valuable new evidence of the country's complex relations with Apartheid-era South Africa and the relationship between internal and external opposition, shaped by the context of regional liberation movements and the Cold War. Drawing on extensive archival research and interviews, Dr Larmer offers a ground-breaking analysis of post-colonial political history which helps explain the challenges facing contemporary African polities.

The first comparative historical analysis - local, national and transnational - of the cross-border Central African copperbelt; a key work in studies of labour, urbanisation and African studies. The Central African Copperbelt, encompassing the mining communities of Katanga (DR Congo) and Zambia, has been central to the study of modernisation and rapid social and political change in urban Africa. This volume expands upon earlier studies of industrial mining, male-dominated formal labour organisation and political change by examining both sides of the border from pre-colonial history to the present and encompassing a wide range of economic, social and cultural identities and activities. Bringing together scholars from a range of disciplines, the contributors explore copperbelt communities' sense of identity - expressed in comic strips and football matches, their precarious and inventive ways of living, their involvement in church and education, and the processes and impact of urbanisation and development, environmental degradation and changing gender relations. A major contribution to borderland studies, in showing how the meaning and relevance of the border to the copperbelt's mixed and mobile population has changed constantly over time, the book's engagement with communities at the nexus of social, economic and political change makes it a key study for those working in global urban development. This book is available under the Creative Commons license CC-BY-NC. It is based on research that is part of a project that has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program (grant agreement no: 681657): 'Comparing the Copperbelt: Political Culture and Knowledge Production in Central Africa'.

In 1964 Kenneth Kaunda and his United National Independence Party (UNIP) government established the nation of Zambia in the former British colony of Northern Rhodesia. In parallel with many other newly independent countries in Africa this process of decolonisation created a wave of optimism regarding humanity's capacity to overcome oppression and poverty. Yet, as this study shows, in Zambia as in many other countries, the legacy of colonialism created obstacles that proved difficult to overcome. Within a short space of time democratisation and development was replaced by economic stagnation, political authoritarianism, corruption and ethnic and political conflict. To better understand this process, Dr Larmer explores UNIP's political ideology and the strategies it employed to retain a grip on government. He shows that despite the party's claim that it adhered to an authentically African model of consensual and communitarian decision-making, it was never a truly nationally representative body. Whereas in long-established Western societies unevenness in support was accepted as a legitimate basis for party political difference, in Zambia this was regarded as a threat to the fragile bindings of the young nation state, and as such had to be denied and repressed. This led to the declaration of a one-party state, presented as the logical expression of UNIP supremacy but it was in fact a reflection of its weakening grip on power. Through case studies of opposition political and social movements rooted in these differences, the book demonstrates that UNIP's control of the new nation-state was partial, uneven and consistently prone to challenge. Alongside this, the study also re-examines Zambia's role in the regional liberation struggles, providing valuable new evidence of the country's complex relations with Apartheid-era South Africa and the relationship between internal and external opposition, shaped by the context of regional liberation movements and the Cold War. Drawing on extensive archival research and interviews, Dr Larmer offers a ground-breaking analysis of post-colonial political history which helps explain the challenges facing contemporary African polities.

Three leading Africa scholars investigate the social forces driving the democratic transformation of postcolonial states across southern Africa. Extensive research and interviews with civil society organizers in Zimbabwe, South Africa, Zambia, Malawi, Namibia, and Swaziland inform this analysis of the challenges faced by non-governmental organizations in relating both to the attendant inequality of globalization and to grassroots struggles for social justice.

Peter Dwyer is a tutor in economics at Ruskin College in Oxford.

Leo Zeilig Lecturer at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies, University of London.

A team of scholars examine the radical political changes that have taken place since 1990 in eleven key countries in Africa. Radical changes have taken place in Africa since 1990. What are the realities of these changes? What significant differences have emerged between African countries? What is the future for democracy in the continent? The editors have chosen eleven key countries to provide enlightening comparisons and contrasts to stimulate discussion among students. They have brought together a team of scholars who are actively working in the changing Africa of today.Each chapter is structured around a framing event which defines the experience of democratisation. The editors have provided an overview of the turning points in African politics. They engage with debates on how to study andevaluate democracy in Africa, such as the limits of elections. They identify four major themes with which to examine similarities and divergences as well as to explain change and continuity in what happened in the past. Abdul Raufu Mustapha is University Lecturer in African Politics at Queen Elizabeth House and Kirk-Greene Fellow at St Antony's College, University of Oxford; Lindsay Whitfield is a Research Fellow at the Danish Institute of International Studies, Copenhagen.

A team of scholars examine the radical political changes that have taken place since 1990 in eleven key countries in Africa. Radical changes have taken place in Africa since 1990. What are the realities of these changes? What significant differences have emerged between African countries? What is the future for democracy in the continent? The editors have chosen eleven key countries to provide enlightening comparisons and contrasts to stimulate discussion among students. They have brought together a team of scholars who are actively working in the changing Africa of today.Each chapter is structured around a framing event which defines the experience of democratisation. The editors have provided an overview of the turning points in African politics. They engage with debates on how to study andevaluate democracy in Africa, such as the limits of elections. They identify four major themes with which to examine similarities and divergences as well as to explain change and continuity in what happened in the past. ABDUL RAUFU MUSTAPHA is University Lecturer in African Politics at Queen Elizabeth House and Kirk-Greene Fellow at St Antony's College, University of Oxford; LINDSAY WHITFIELD is a Research Fellow at the Danish Institute of International Studies, Copenhagen.

Valentine Musakanya played a leading role in Zambia's first post-independence government as Secretary to the Cabinet and Head of the Civil Service. He was subsequently a Member of Parliament, a Government Minister and Governor of the Bank of Zambia. Musakanya is however better known today as one of those convicted of the 1980 coup attempt against the one-party state of Kenneth Kaunda's United National Independence Party (UNIP) government. Although Musakanya was subsequently acquitted of involvement in the coup, questions have persisted: was Musakanya involved in the coup attempt? If so, why did he become involved? This volume, making Musakanya's writings available in public for the first time, provides a glimpse into one of Zambia's most brilliant minds. Musakanya's memoirs chart his personal and intellectual journey from a childhood in rural Northern Province and the mining township of Wusakile, to outstanding educational success and a glittering career in the civil service of newly independent Zambia. They describe his significant achievements, but also his disillusionment with the politicisation of state structures, the growth of patronage and corruption, and the growing authoritarianism and centralisation of political power in the hands of the President. Musakanya provides an insider's insight into the failings of post-independence government, articulating his personal disillusionment with UNIP and Kaunda, and explaining his involvement with those accused alongside him of involvement in the 1980 coup attempt. Musakanya describes in detail his arrest and interrogation at the hands of the intelligence services, and the publication sheds substantial new light on the organisation of the coup and the motivations of those involved. This volumes is the first in a planned series of publications which will place the writings of Valentine Musakanya in the public domain, in Zambia and internationally.

Erik Kennes and Miles Larmer provide a history of the Katangese gendarmes and their largely undocumented role in many of the most important political and military conflicts in Central Africa. Katanga, located in today's Democratic Republic of Congo, seceded in 1960 as Congo achieved independence and the gendarmes fought as the unrecognized state's army during the Congo crisis. Kennes and Larmer explain how the ex-gendarmes, then exiled in Angola, struggled to maintain their national identity and return "home." They take readers through the complex history of the Katangese and their engagement in regional conflicts and Africa's Cold War. Kennes and Larmer show how the paths not taken at Africa's independence persist in contemporary political and military movements and bring new understandings to the challenges that personal and collective identities pose to the relationship between African nation-states and their citizens and subjects.

Erik Kennes and Miles Larmer provide a history of the Katangese gendarmes and their largely undocumented role in many of the most important political and military conflicts in Central Africa. Katanga, located in today's Democratic Republic of Congo, seceded in 1960 as Congo achieved independence and the gendarmes fought as the unrecognized state's army during the Congo crisis. Kennes and Larmer explain how the ex-gendarmes, then exiled in Angola, struggled to maintain their national identity and return "home." They take readers through the complex history of the Katangese and their engagement in regional conflicts and Africa's Cold War. Kennes and Larmer show how the paths not taken at Africa's independence persist in contemporary political and military movements and bring new understandings to the challenges that personal and collective identities pose to the relationship between African nation-states and their citizens and subjects.

The received view of Zambia's mineworkers is of a reactionary body unable and unwilling to shape progressive politics in post-colonial Zambia. Miles Larmer seeks to use a whole range of little-used sources to dispel this myth. Extensive interviews with mineworkers and their wives reveals a working-class consciousness and a whole host of social and economic expectations that shaped their attitude towards political change. "Mineworkers in Zambia" gives this misunderstood group a place in the movement for political reform which culminated in the transition to multiparty democracy in 1991, and in so doing draws important lessons for the wider social and political history of post-colonial Africa.