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The West African states have reached maturity. This new volume -
appearing a decade after the successful West African States:
Failure and Promise - provides up-to-date studies of nine states,
including Chad, Burkina Faso and Cameroon, which were neglected in
the earlier volume, and introduces contemporary theories of West
African politics. The book reflects changes on the ground and also
in academic debate, notably the remarkable retreat of dependency
theory and Marxian analysis and the rise of free-market theorising
by both governments and scholars. The volume also contains
important observations on the political importance of religious
fundamentalism in the region, and the growth of sub-national forms
of political activity. The writers are well-known scholars in the
field, and include contributors to the influential journal
Politique Africaine. This will be a useful textbook for everyone
interested in African politics, but it is also a provocative
contribution to the debate on the nature of the state and political
processes in Africa.
This Very Short Introduction looks at Africa's past and reflects on
the changing ways it has been imagined and represented, both in
Africa and beyond. The author illustrates important aspects of
Africa's history with a range of fascinating historical examples,
drawn from over 5 millennia across this vast continent. The
multitude of topics that the reader will learn about in this
succinct work include the unity and diversity of African cultures,
slavery, religion, colonial conquest, the diaspora, and the
importance of history in understanding contemporary Africa. The
book examines questions such as: Who invented the idea of "Africa"?
How is African history pieced together, given such a lack of
documentary evidence? How did Africa interact with the world 1,000
years ago?
Africa has been known as 'the cradle of mankind', and its
recoverable history stretches back to the Pharaohs. But the idea of
studying African history is itself new, and the authors show why it
is still contested and controversial. This VSI, the first concise
work of its kind, will prove essential reading for anyone
interested in the African continent and the diversity of human
history.
Charts the governments frustrated attempts to democratize local
government and the long campaigns by many southern chiefs to resist
being marginalized. A study of a radical nationalist government's
attempts to destroy chieftaincy in Ghana. It shows how chiefly
resistance to their destruction forced the government to seek
control over rural areas by redefining chieftaincy. It should
provide a context for understanding Ghana's political topography.
North America: Ohio U Press
In 1943, ritual murder was committed in a large African kingdom in
the south of Ghana, then a colony of Great Britain. Palace
officials and close kin of a recently deceased king had reputedly
killed one of his chiefs in order to smooth the king's passage into
the afterlife. This riveting study tells the story of the murder,
the trials and appeals of those accused of the crime, and the
effect of the case on politics in Ghana and Great Britain. In
recounting this fascinating case, the book also provides important
insights into law and politics in the colonial Gold Coast, the
clash between traditional and modern values, and the nature of
African monarchy in the colonial period. Drawing on newly available
oral and written evidence from Ghana and Britain, Richard Rathbone
builds a detailed picture of the leading characters in the case, as
well as of the thirty-year rule of Nana Ofori Atta, the king. He
shows how the death of the king destroyed the economic, social, and
moral fabric of the kingdom, and how this destruction was further
exacerbated by legal proceedings resulting from the murder. The
case set the indigenous royal family against the colonial
government, challenging the authority of each. Close kinsmen of the
accused, hitherto in the vanguard of moderate nationalism, were
radicalized by their extended confrontation with the colonial
justice system. It was their political initiatives that accelerated
the formation of the Gold Coast's first national political party in
the late 1940s, and which led in turn to the struggle for
self-government and to the achievement of Ghanian independence in
1957.
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