RW Johnson's bestselling book How Long Will South Africa Survive? was published at the height of the Zuma presidency. Since then, Cyril Ramaphosa has taken over as president and there have been some attempts to clean up government. But the brief period of 'Ramaphoria' is over and the threat to both the economy and the dream of a non-racial democracy is as real as ever.

As national elections loom, Johnson examines the state of the nation with pinpoint accuracy. On the one hand state-owned institutions are near collapse, municipalities are defunct and civil strife is rampant. On the other, Ramaphosa and his team have come up with a plan to curb corruption and create growth and prosperity.

But will it work?

In 1977, RW Johnson’s best-selling How Long Will South Africa Survive? provided a controversial and highly original analysis of the survival prospects of apartheid. Now, after more than twenty years of ANC rule, he believes the situation has become so critical that the question must be posed again.

‘The big question about ANC rule’, he writes, ‘is whether African nationalism would be able to cope with the challenges of running a modern industrial economy. Twenty years of ANC rule have shown conclusively that the party is hopelessly ill-equipped for this task. Indeed, everything suggests that South Africa under the ANC is fast slipping backward and that even the survival of South Africa as a unitary state cannot be taken for granted. The fundamental reason why the question of regime change has to be posed is that it is now clear that South Africa can either choose to have an ANC government or it can have a modern industrial economy. It cannot have both.’

Johnson’s analysis is strikingly original and cogently argued. He has for several decades now been the senior international commentator on South African affairs, known for his lucid analysis and complete lack of deference towards the conventional wisdom.

R.W. Johnson's articles and essays travel far beyond Southern Africa, reaching readers across continents. Their appeal lies not only in their acuity but also in his exceptional range of subjects – political, historical and cultural. As a former Oxford don and a leading international commentator, Johnson remains unmatched as an interpreter of national and world events.

Whether he's writing about politics in South Africa, Europe or the United States, the new space race, the leading personalities of our time, or even soccer, his views are always sharp, clear, deeply informed and original.

These essays belong unmistakably to the tradition of George Orwell. Orwell aspired to make political writing an art form, but his finest essays – even those on seemingly trivial subjects such as boys' comics – revealed both a penetrating intelligence and remarkable breadth. Johnson's writing is similar in spirit: like Orwell's, his essays can be read consecutively or dipped into at random, each one offering something striking and original.

The result is A Roving Eye, a book that is not just distinctive but truly unique, marked by depth, range, humanity and a rare sophistication.

R.W. Johnson, author of 17 books and innumerable articles, attended schools in the UK and South Africa, did his first degree at the University of Natal and was then a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford. For 26 years he was a Fellow and Tutor at Magdalen College, Oxford and he remains a Fellow of the College. An expert in French, British, American and South African politics, his books have ranged over all these interests and for many years he also wrote for The (London) Times, Sunday Times, the London Review of Books, Le Monde Diplomatique and other titles in the international media. Johnson's writings have been widely praised and have often excited controversy. He is a master of the essay form and his essays have had a wide circulation. He is married to the Russian scholar, Irina Filatova, and they live in Cape Town.

In 1977, Johnson's best-selling How Long Will South Africa Survive? offered a controversial and highly original analysis of the survival prospects of apartheid. Now, after more than two decades of the ANC in government, he believes the question must be posed again. 'The big question about ANC rule,' Johnson writes, 'is whether African nationalism would be able to cope with the challenges of running a modern industrial economy. Twenty years of ANC rule have shown conclusively that the party is hopelessly ill-equipped for this task. Indeed, everything suggests that South Africa under the ANC is fast slipping backward and that even the survival of South Africa as a unitary state cannot be taken for granted. The fundamental reason why the question of regime change has to be posed is that it is now clear that South Africa can either choose to have an ANC government or it can have a modern industrial economy. It cannot have both.'

In Foreign Native, RW Johnson looks back with affection and humour on his life in Africa. From schooldays in Durban – fresh off the aeroplane from Merseyside – to later years as an academic, director of the Helen Suzman Foundation and formidable political commentator, he has produced an entertaining and occasionally eye-popping memoir brimming with history, anecdote and insight.

Johnson charts his evolution from enthusiastic, left-leaning Africanist to political realist, relating the episodes that influenced his intellectual worldview, including time spent among the exiled liberation movements in London during the 1960s, a sojourn in newly independent Guinea and more recent forays into Zimbabwe. There are wonderful stories, some hilarious, others filled with pathos, about the multitude of characters – Harold Strachan, Tom Sharpe, Ronnie Kasrils, Helen Suzman, Frederik van zyl Slabbert, among many others – that he met along the way.

Perceptive, critical and full of verve, Foreign Native is leavened with a deep humanity that makes it a pleasure to read.

In Foreign Native, political commentator and author RW Johnson looks back with affection and humour on his life in Africa. From schooldays in Durban to later years as an Oxford don, director of the Helen Suzman Foundation and formidable political commentator, Johnson has produced an entertaining and occasionally eye-popping memoir brimming with history, anecdote and insight. Johnson charts his evolution from enthusiastic, left-leaning Africanist to political realist, relating episodes that influenced his intellectual worldview, including time spent among the exiled liberation movements in London during the 1960s, a sojourn in newly independent Guinea and more recent forays into Zimbabwe. There are wonderful stories, some hilarious, others filled with pathos, about the multitude of characters that he met along the way. Perceptive, critical and full of verve, Foreign Native is leavened with a deep humanity that is a pleasure to read.

Orogenesis, the process of mountain building, occurs when two tectonic plates collide - either forcing material upwards to form mountain belts such as the Alps or Himalayas or causing one plate to be subducted below the other, resulting in volcanic mountain chains such as the Andes. Integrating the approaches of structural geology and metamorphism, this book provides an up-to-date overview of orogenic research and an introduction to the physico-chemical properties of mountain belts. Global examples are explored, the interactioning roles of temperature and deformation in the orogenic process are reviewed, and important new concepts such as channel flow are explained. This book provides a valuable introduction to this fast-moving field for advanced undergraduate and graduate students of structural geology, plate tectonics and geodynamics, and will also provide a vital overview of research for academics and researchers working in related fields including petrology geochemistry and sedimentology.

Scholars from all over the world contributed to the Festschrift volumes presented as a tribute to Thomas Hodgkin on his sixtieth birthday. This book contains a selection from those contributions, reflecting the wide scope of Hodgkin's own interests, work and influence in the field of African and Tiers Monde studies. All the contributions represent original and previously unpublished work in the fields of African history, Islamic studies and the sociology of religion, and also of contemporary political and economic studies. They are particularly concerned to examine questions of a general and theoretical importance, often by means of detailed case studies. Among the countries thus discussed are Ghana, Guinea, Nigeria, Senegal, Guine Bissao, Zambia, Ivory Coast, Tanzania, Gambia - and, as part of the African diaspora, Jamaica. Fittingly, these essays share one of the main features which have distinguished Thomas Hodgkin's own work - they take a critically evaluative view of some of the established interpretations and conventional wisdoms surrounding their subjects. This book will provide an introduction in depth to the whole field of African studies as well as being essential material for specialists in many disciplines.

This complete verse translation of Ovid's classical work is illustrated with extensive notes and an index and glossary. To help the reader contend with Ovid's frequent leaps both ahead and back in time, the principle episodes are listed at the beginning of each book and the subsections and digressions marked with indentations. Some footnotes also refer to mythological material Ovid has derived from Greek epic or drama or, occasionally, from later sources. Specific authors referred to in these notes are briefly identified in the index and glossary