New Africa Book of the Day - 13 August 2014

Emerging Africa: How the Global Economy's 'Last Frontier' Can Prosper and Matter, by Kingsley Chiedu Moghalu

Release Date: August 13, 2014
Publisher: Penguin Global

In this important book, Moghalu challenges conventional wisdoms about Africa's quest for economic growth in a globalized world. Drawing on philosophy, economics and strategy, his argument covers a range of subjects, from capitalism to transformation agendas, finance to foreign investment, and from innovation and human capital to world trade. Ultimately he demonstrates how Africa's progress in the 21st century will require nothing short of the reinvention of the African mindset.

Kingsley Chiedu Moghalu is author of Global Justice: The Politics of War Crimes Trials (2006) and Rwanda's Genocide: The Politics of Global Justice (2005).  He is deputy governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria. He founded Sogato Strategies SA in January 2009 and was executive director of the Swiss-Africa Business Roundtable.

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New Africa Book of the Day - 12 August 2014

Another America: The Story of Liberia and the Former Slaves Who Ruled It, by James Ciment

Release Date: August 12, 2014
Publisher: Hill and Wang

The first popular history of the former American slaves who founded, ruled, and lost Africa’s first republic

In 1820, a group of about eighty African Americans reversed the course of history and sailed back to Africa, to a place they would name after liberty itself. They went under the banner of the American Colonization Society, a white philanthropic organization with a dual agenda: to rid America of its blacks, and to convert Africans to Christianity. The settlers staked out a beachhead; their numbers grew as more boats arrived; and after breaking free from their white overseers, they founded Liberia—Africa’s first black republic—in 1847.

James Ciment’s Another America is the first full account of this dramatic experiment. With empathy and a sharp eye for human foibles, Ciment reveals that the Americo-Liberians struggled to live up to their high ideals. They wrote a stirring Declaration of Independence but re-created the social order of antebellum Dixie, with themselves as the master caste. Building plantations, holding elegant soirees, and exploiting and even helping enslave the native Liberians, the persecuted became the persecutors—until a lowly native sergeant murdered their president in 1980, ending 133 years of Americo rule.

The rich cast of characters in Another America rivals that of any novel. We encounter Marcus Garvey, who coaxed his followers toward Liberia in the 1920s, and the rubber king Harvey Firestone, who built his empire on the backs of native Liberians. Among the Americoes themselves, we meet the brilliant intellectual Edward Blyden, one of the first black nationalists; the Baltimore-born explorer Benjamin Anderson, seeking a legendary city of gold in the Liberian hinterland; and President William Tubman, a descendant of Georgia slaves, whose economic policies brought Cadillacs to the streets of Monrovia, the Liberian capital. And then there are the natives, men like Joseph Samson, who was adopted by a prominent Americo family and later presided over the execution of his foster father during the 1980 coup.

In making Liberia, the Americoes transplanted the virtues and vices of their country of birth. The inspiring and troubled history they created is, to a remarkable degree, the mirror image of our own.

Historian James Ciment is editor of Encyclopedia of Conflicts Since World War II (2007), World Terrorism: An Encyclopedia of Political Violence from Ancient Times to the Post-9/11 Era (2011), and Booms and Busts: An Encyclopedia of Economic History from Tulipmania of the 1630's to the Global Financial Crisis of the 21 st Century (2010); author of The Kurds: State and Minority in Turkey, Iraq, and Iran (1997), Angola and Mozambique: Postcolonial Wars in Southern Africa (1997), and Atlas of African-American History (2007); and co-editor (with Roger Chapman) of Culture Wars in America: An Encyclopedia of Issues, Viewpoints, and Voices (2013), among other books.

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New Africa Book of the Day - 3 August 2014

Africa and Economic Policy: Developing a Framework for Policymakers, by Ferdinand Bakoup

Release Date: August 1, 2014
Publisher: Anthem Press

‘Africa and Economic Policy: Developing a Framework for Policymakers’ aims to fill an important gap in the current literature on economic policy in developing countries. Despite its richness and sophistication, the current economic literature has not yet succeeded in developing a framework for economic policy that is clear and intelligible to policymakers in developing countries, and which is capable of effectively delivering a sustained increase in citizens’ well-being. This ground-breaking study seeks to rectify this problem by suggesting a unique conceptual framework for designing and conducting economic policy in developing countries, particularly those in Africa.

Currently the lead economist at the African Development Bank, Ferdinand Bakoup is author of How integration into the Central African Economic and Monetary Community affects Cameroon's economy: General equilibrium estimates (1998) and Regional integration in Eastern and Southern Africa: The cross-border initiative and its fiscal implications (1995).

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New Africa Book of the Day - 31 July 2014

South Africa (Inventing the Nation), by Alexander Johnston

Release Date: July 31, 2014
Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic [Kindle Edition]

At the heart of South Africa’s ‘miracle’ transition from intractable ethno-racial conflict to democracy was an improvised nation born out of war weariness, hope, idealism and calculated pragmatism on the part of the elites who negotiated the compromise settlement. In the absence of any of the conventional bonds of national consciousness, the improvised nation was fixed on the civic identity and national citizenship envisaged in the new constitution.

In the twentieth anniversary year of the country’s democracy, South Africa reviews the progress of nation-building in post-apartheid South Africa, assesses how well the improvised nation has been embedded in a shared life for South Africans and offers a prognosis for its future. It draws up a socio-economic profile of the population which is the raw material of nation-building. It measures the contributions of the polity and the constitution, religion and values, as well as sport and the media, to building a sense of national citizenship. The book explains the abrupt discontinuity between the contributions of Nelson Mandela and Thabo Mbeki to nation-building and goes on to note the changing focus from reconciliation between black and white to include a concern for social cohesion in a society beset by violent crime, corruption and citizen deviance and dissidence.

South Africa reconsiders the short, intense life cycle of Afrikaner nationalism and portrays the ambiguous relationships between African nationalism, non-racialism, civic nationalism and ‘African tradition’ in the ideology and practice of the African National Congress. In doing so, it provides a comprehensive analysis of a crucial aspect of South Africa’s first twenty years of democracy, as well as exploring intriguing questions for the student of nationalism.

The paperback edition of this book becomes available on September 25, 2014, released simultaneously with the hardcover edition.

Alexander Johnston has contributed chapters to Violence in Southern Africa (edited by William Gutteridge and J.E. Spence, 1997), Comparative Perspectives on South Africa (edited by Ran Greenstein, 1998), and Ethnic Conflict, Tribal Politics: a Global Perspective (edited by Kenneth Christie, 1998). From 1994 to 2002, Johnston was professor of political science at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, where he is now a research associate.

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New Africa Book of the Day - 30 July 2014

Somalia in Transition since 2006, by Shaul Shay

Release Date: July 31, 2014
Publisher: Transaction Publishers

This book picks up where its predecessor, Somalia between Jihad and Restoration, left off, examining international efforts to stabilize war-torn Somalia. It analyzes major political events in Somalia in the years since 2006, examining opportunities for restoration of the country based on the United Nations-backed plan known as the "Roadmap for the End of the Transition," improved security conditions, and international economics and financial support.

The author notes that the time of transition may be over, according to the timetable of the United Nations, but it is clear that the work of transformation is just beginning. In considering whether political and social chaos in Somalia is ending, Shay sees two possible futures. One possibility is the establishment of a reform government that unifies Somali society; another is continued strife that accelerates Somalia’s descent into the endless violence of a failed state.

Shay believes the international approach to Somalia requires a thorough reassessment. He argues it has been limited to two Western priorities—terrorism and piracy—while largely ignoring domestic issues of critical concern to Somalis. As a result, many Somalis have come to view those participating in the international effort as a foreign occupation.

Shaul Shay is author of Islamic Terror and the Balkans (2006), The Shahids: Islam and Suicide Attacks (2004), The Red Sea Terror Triangle: Sudan, Somalia, Yemen, and Islamic Terror (2006), and Somalia between Jihad and Restoration (2010), among others. He is a senior research fellow of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies and the International Policy Institute for Counter Terrorism (ICT) at the Interdisciplinary Center Herzeliya (IDC).

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New Africa Book of the Day - 22 July 2014

Citizenship between Empire and Nation: Remaking France and French Africa, 1945-1960, by Frederick Cooper

Release Date: July 21, 2014
Publisher: Princeton University Press

As the French public debates its present diversity and its colonial past, few remember that between 1946 and 1960 the inhabitants of French colonies possessed the rights of French citizens. Moreover, they did not have to conform to the French civil code that regulated marriage and inheritance. One could, in principle, be a citizen and different too. Citizenship between Empire and Nation examines momentous changes in notions of citizenship, sovereignty, nation, state, and empire in a time of acute uncertainty about the future of a world that had earlier been divided into colonial empires.

Frederick Cooper explains how African political leaders at the end of World War II strove to abolish the entrenched distinction between colonial "subject" and "citizen." They then used their new status to claim social, economic, and political equality with other French citizens, in the face of resistance from defenders of a colonial order. Africans balanced their quest for equality with a desire to express an African political personality. They hoped to combine a degree of autonomy with participation in a larger, Franco-African ensemble. French leaders, trying to hold on to a large French polity, debated how much autonomy and how much equality they could concede. Both sides looked to versions of federalism as alternatives to empire and the nation-state. The French government had to confront the high costs of an empire of citizens, while Africans could not agree with French leaders or among themselves on how to balance their contradictory imperatives. Cooper shows how both France and its former colonies backed into more "national" conceptions of the state than either had sought.

Frederick Cooper is professor of history at New York University. He is co-author (with Jane Burbank) of Empires in World History: Power and the Politics of Difference (2011) and (with Ann Laura Stoler) Tensions of Empire: Colonial Cultures in a Bourgeois World (1997), as well as author of Africa since 1940: The Past of the Present (2002), Colonialism in Question: Theory, Knowledge, History (2005), and On the African Waterfront: Urban Disorder and the Transformation of Work in Colonial Mombasa (2014).

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New Africa Book of the Day - 19 July 2014

Bush War Rhodesia 1966-1980, by Peter Baxter

Release Date: July 19, 2014
Publisher: Helion and Company

It has been over three decades since the Union Jack was lowered on the colony of Rhodesia, but the bitter and divisive civil war that preceded it has continued to endure as a textbook counterinsurgency campaign fought between a mobile, motivated and highly trained Rhodesian security establishment and two constituted liberations movements motivated, resourced and inspired by the ideals of communist revolution in the third world.

A complicated historical process of occupation and colonization set the tone as early as the late 1890s for what would at some point be an inevitable struggle for domination of this small, landlocked nation set in the southern tropics of Africa. The story of the Rhodesian War, or the Zimbabwean Liberation Struggle, is not only an epic of superb military achievement, and revolutionary zeal and fervor, but is the tale of the incompatibility of the races in southern Africa, a clash of politics and ideals and, perhaps more importantly, the ongoing ramifications of the past upon the present, and the social and political scars that a war of such emotional underpinnings as the Rhodesian conflict has had on the modern psyche of Zimbabwe.

The Rhodesian War was fought with finely tuned intelligence-gathering and -analysis techniques combined with a fluid and mobile armed response. The practitioners of both have justifiably been celebrated in countless histories, memoirs and campaign analyses, but what has never been attempted has been a concise, balanced and explanatory overview of the war, the military mechanisms and the social and political foundations that defined the crisis. This book does all of that. The Rhodesian War is explained in digestible detail and in a manner that will allow enthusiasts of the elements of that struggle - the iconic exploits of the Rhodesian Light Infantry, the SAS, the Selous Scouts, the Rhodesian African Rifles, the Rhodesia Regiment, among other well-known fighting units - to embrace the wider picture in order to place the various episodes in context

Peter Baxter is author of Biafra: The Nigerian Civil War 1967-1970 (2014), MAU MAU: The Kenyan Emergency 1952-60 (2012), France in Centrafrique: From Bokassa and Operation Barracude to the Days of EUFOR (Kindle edition, 2012), Somalia: US Intervention, 1992-1994 (2012), and other works about recent African military history.

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New Africa Book of the Day - 14 July 2014

Different Shades of Green: African Literature, Environmental Justice, and Political Ecology, by Byron Caminero-Santangelo

Release Date: July 16, 2014
Publisher: University of Virginia Press

Engaging important discussions about social conflict, environmental change, and imperialism in Africa, Different Shades of Green points to legacies of African environmental writing, often neglected as a result of critical perspectives shaped by dominant Western conceptions of nature and environmentalism. Drawing on an interdisciplinary framework employing postcolonial studies, political ecology, environmental history, and writing by African environmental activists, Byron Caminero-Santangelo emphasizes connections within African environmental literature, highlighting how African writers have challenged unjust, ecologically destructive forms of imperial development and resource extraction.

Different Shades of Green also brings into dialogue a wide range of African creative writing—including works by Chinua Achebe, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, Bessie Head, Nadine Gordimer, Zakes Mda, Nuruddin Farah, Wangari Maathai, and Ken Saro-Wiwa—in order to explore vexing questions for those involved in the struggle for environmental justice, in the study of political ecology, and in the environmental humanities, urging continued imaginative thinking in effecting a more equitable, sustain¬able future in Africa.

Byron Caminero-Santangelo teaches English at the University of Kansas. He is co-editor (with Garth Myers) of Environment at the Margins: Literary and Environmental Studies in Africa (2011) and author of African Fiction And Joseph Conrad: Reading Postcolonial Intertextuality (2004).

New Africa Book of the Day - 13 July 2014

The African Garrison State: Human Rights and Political Development in Eritrea, by Kjetil Tronvoll and Daniel R. Mekonnen

Release Date: July 17, 2014
Publisher: James Currey

When Eritrea gained independence in 1991, hopes were high for its transformation. In two decades, however, it became one of the most repressive in the world, effectively a militarised "garrison state". This comprehensive and detailed analysis examines how the prospects for democracy in the new state turned to ashes, reviewing its development, and in particular the loss of human rights and the state's political organisation. Beginning with judicial development in independent Eritrea, subsequent chapters scrutinise the rule of law and the court system; the hobbled process of democratisation, and the curtailment of civil society; the Eritrean prison system and everyday life of detention and disappearances; and the situation of minorities in the country, first in general terms and then through exploration of a case study of the Kunama ethnic group. While the situation is bleak, it is not without hope, however: the conclusion focuses on opposition to the current regime, and offers scenarios of regime change and how the coming of a second republic may yet reconfigure Eritrea politically.

Kjetil Tronvoll is professor of peace and conflict studies at Bjoerknes College and author of War and the Politics of Identity in Ethiopia (2009) and Mai Weini: A Highland Village in Eritrea : A Study of the People, Their Livelihood, and Land Tenure During Times of Turbulence (1998). 

His coauthor, Daniel R. Mekonnen, is senior legal advisor at the International Law and Policy Institute in Oslo. He cowrote (with Mirjam van Reisen) a chapter entitled "EU Development Cooperation: The Contours of Global and National Engagement" in Human Rights and Development in the new Millennium: Towards a Theory of Change (edited by Paul Gready and Wouter Vandenhole,2013). He also translated Gene Sharp's From Dictatorship to Democracy: A Conceptual Framework for Liberation into Tigrigna for the Albert Einstein Institution.

New Africa Book of the Day - 9 July 2014

African Brew: Exploring the Craft of South African Beer, by Lucy Corne and Ryno Reyneke

Release Date: July 8, 2014
Publisher: Random House Struik

Join a pint-studded journey through seven provinces to meet the brewers, taste their beers and learn exactly what goes into that beverage you wouldn't dream of braaiing (South Africa's barbecuing tradition) without. There is also a section that covers up-and-coming breweries.

Delve deeper into food and beer pairing with delectable recipes from top South African chefs, each dish paired with a local lager or ale. And for those who don't know the difference between the two, African Brew hopes to turn the beer novice into a connoisseur with tasting notes and troubleshooting tips showing you what to look for in your preferred pint.

- Features 38 of South Africa's microbreweries plus the cradle of beer brewing in South Africa, SAB

- Includes recipes and beer pairings

- Insights on home-brewing, beer recipes and step-by-step brewing guides

- Contains sections on South Africa's craft cider movement as well as mead-making

- Covers the history of brewing in South Africa

- Includes a look at sorghum beer brewing both in a traditional setting and large-scale production

Ryno Reyneke provided photographs for Portrait of Singapore (2004, written by Sean Sheehan) and for Franschoek Food (2013, written by Myrna Robins). Cape Town-based travel writer Lucy Corne has contributed articles to Reader's Digest Asia, Getaway Magazine, and Beer & Brewer Magazine.

New Africa Book of the Day - 4 July 2014

Africa Beyond the Mirror, by Boubacar Boris Diop, translated from the French by Vera Wülfing-Leckie and Caroline Beschea-Fache

Release Date: July 10, 2014
Publisher: Lynne Rienner Publishers

Boubacar Boris Diop's latest collection of essays pushes the reader to look beyond the many clichés that are all too common currency in descriptions of Africa today. From the perspective of such diverse topics as the Rwandan genocide, African literature, and globalization, Diop interrogates the portrayal of Africa in the international media and points to truths that must be told—and heard.

Contents:

Introduction.
Rwanda: Against the Habit of Misery.
Remembering Genocide Through Art.
Yolande Mukagasana: Talking to the Killers.
Kigali-Paris: The Two-Headed Massacre.
Beloved Country, My Beautiful People!
Senegal Between Cheikh Anta Diop and Léopold Sédar Senghor.
The New Wretched Earth.
A Letter to a Friend About the Sinking of the Joola.
African Literature: Words Versus Things.
Write and ... Keep Quiet!
Mongo Beti and Us.
Exchange to Change Our World.
Carona, The Global Village.
Negro-African Identity and Globalization.
Invisible Cities and the Armchair Traveler.

Senegalese author Boubacar Boris Diop has also written Murambi, The Book of Bones (2006), La gloire des imposteurs (2014, with Aminata Dramane Traore), Le Temps de Tamango (2002, with Mongo Beti), and Louise Im Blauweiss Gestreiften Leibchen (2011).

New Africa Book of the Day - 20 June 2014

In the Name of the People: Angola's Forgotten Massacre, by Lara Pawson

Release Date: June 25, 2014
Publisher: I.B. Tauris

On 27th May 1977, a small demonstration against the MPLA, the ruling party of Angola – led to the slaughter of thousands, if not tens of thousands, of people. The protestors were supporters of the MPLA, however the ruling elite feared this new 'factionalism' might lead to a coup d'état. The events of May 1977 are little talked of in Angola today – and virtually unknown outside the country.

In this book, journalist Lara Pawson tracks down the story of what really happened on that fateful day. In a series of vivid encounters, she talks to eyewitnesses, victims and even perpetrators of the violent and confusing events of the 27th May and the following weeks and months. From London to Lisbon to Luanda, she meets those who continue to live in the shadow of the appalling events of 40 years ago and who – in most cases – have been too afraid to speak about them before. Pawson investigates not only the unwritten story of the 27th May - one of the biggest taboos in Angolan contemporary history – but she also challenges long-held assumptions about political opposition in Angola, as well as the MPLA, Cuba and the former President Agostinho Neto.

Despite Angola's enormous oil wealth, poverty and racial division remain live problems for most of its people. This book contributes to a deeper understanding of modern Angola – its people and its politics; past, present and future.

Journalist Lara Pawson writes for The Guardian and has been a Writing Fellow at the Wits Institute of Social & Economic Research, at the University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. She is also on Twitter.

Africa Book of the Day - 20 April 2014

Easter in Abuja (This Is Africa - Lessons I learned from Dr. Stephen Covey) by John Irving and Christine Irving

Release Date: February 25, 2013
Publisher: Aurochs Press [Kindle Edition]

When I was struggling with the challenges of middle age I discovered the man I consider one of the greatest American teachers, mentors and philosophers of our generation, Dr. Stephen Covey. While Martin Luther King was my guide as a teenager and young adult, Dr. Covey was the man who guided me through my forties and fifties. His 7 Habits have helped and healed so many. This story is about Habit 1: Be Proactive.

This Is Africa is a series of stories garnered from more than ten years flying and travelling throughout Africa as a jumbo-jet captain and avid adventurer. During my wanderings I was often joined by my indomitable companion-for-life Christine Irving, my soul-mate of five decades. She is a writer, poet, priestess and my own personal Goddess. While I haven’t travelled in every country in Africa, I have been in Algeria, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Cote d'Ivoire, Democratic Republic of The Congo, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Ghana, Guinea, Ivory Coast (Cote d'Ivoire), Kenya, Liberia, Libya, Mali, Mauritania, Mauritius, Morocco, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Republic of Congo, Senegal, Seychelles, Somalia, South Africa, Sudan, Tanzania, The Gambia, Tunisia, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe. During my travels I have had some interesting times which I will share with you in my series This Is Africa.

In Easter In Ajuba I describe a Nigerian airport that was not expecting my Boeing 747-400 freighter, just after midnight on Easter morning.

Authors Christine and John Irving have also written Magdalene A.D: Part II - Gospel of a Mary (2012), Motorcycle Dreaming - Riding the 'Beauty Way' Back in Time Across America (2009), Mystery of the Black Madonna (2012), and Be a Teller of Tales (2009).

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New Africa Book of the Day - 17 April 2014

Markets and States in Tropical Africa: The Political Basis of Agricultural Policies by Robert H. Bates

Release Date: April 18, 2014
Publisher: University of California Press

Following independence, most countries in Africa sought to develop, but their governments pursued policies that actually undermined their rural economies. Examining the origins of Africa’s “growth tragedy,” Markets and States in Tropical Africa has for decades shaped the thinking of practitioners and scholars alike. Robert H. Bates’s analysis now faces a challenge, however: the revival of economic growth on the continent. In this edition, Bates provides a new preface and chapter that address the seeds of Africa’s recovery and discuss the significance of the continent’s success for the arguments of this classic work.

“Ever since its original publication in 1981, this elegant study has been a clarion call for agrarian reform predicated on market incentives. Bates's perspective transcends the lingering ideological nostrums that still impede progress toward the construction of modern economies in Africa. Based largely on his personal empirical research, this lasting work continues to guide the quest for realistic approaches to the problem of poverty in Africa and other agrarian regions of the world.”—Richard L. Sklar, author of African Politics in Postimperial Times

Robert H. Bates is Eaton Professor of the Science of Government at Harvard University. His other books include Analytic Narratives with Avner Greif, Margaret Levi, Jean-Laurent Rosenthal, and Barry Weingast (1999); Prosperity and Violence (2001); and When Things Fell Apart (2007).

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