Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-t5tsf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-04T19:19:16.247Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The creation and matintenance of national boundaries in Africa

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 May 2009

Jeffrey Herbst
Jeffrey Herbst
Affiliation:
Assistant Professor of Politics and International Affairs, Woodrow Wilson School, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey.
Get access

Abstract

A paradox is central to the nature of political boundaries in Africa: there is widespread agreement that the boundaries are arbitrary, yet the vast majority of them have remained virtually untouched since the late 1800s, when they were first demarcated. This article argues that, contrary to current theories, the present boundary system represents a rational response by both the colonialists and the present-day African leaders to the constraints imposed by the demographic and ethnographic structure of the continent. Using this framework of analysis, the article examines the institutions that formulated the decision-making rules for the creation and maintenance of boundaries in Africa, discusses the conditions under which cooperation among states has occurred, and explores the prospects for future changes in the borders of African states.

Type
Articles
Information
International Organization , Volume 43 , Issue 4 , Autumn 1989 , pp. 673 - 692
Copyright
Copyright © The IO Foundation 1989

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1. Prescott, J. R. V., Political Frontiers and Boundaries (London: Allen & Unwin, 1987), p. 242Google Scholar.

2. Keohane, Robert O., “International Institutions: Two Approaches,” International Studies Quarterly 32 (12 1988), p. 388CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

3. Barbour, K. M., “A Geographical Analysis of Boundaries in Inter-Tropical Africa,” in Prothero, R. M., ed., Essays on African Population (New York: Praeger, 1961), pp. 303–4Google Scholar.

4. Church, R. J. Harrison, “African Boundaries,” in East, W. Gordon and Moodie, A. E., eds., The Changing World: Studies in Political Geography (London: George G. Harrap, 1956), p. 740Google Scholar.

5. The only major change in the system was the division of the former German colonies after World War I. See Prescott, J. R. V., The Geography of Frontiers and Boundaries (Chicago: Aldine, 1965), p. 134Google Scholar.

6. Quoted in Ajala, Adkunle, “The Nature of African Boundaries,” Afrika Spectrum 83 (07 1983), p. 180Google Scholar.

7. Sautter, Gilles, “Quelques reflexions sur les frontières africaines,” in Frontieres: Problemes de frontières dans le tiers-monde (Paris: University Paris, 1982), p. 42Google Scholar.

8. Touval, Saadia, “Treaties, Borders, and the Partition of Africa,” Journal of African History 6 (Spring 1966), p. 291Google Scholar.

9. Boahen, A. Adu, African Perspectives on Colonialism (Baltimore, Md.: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1987), p. 96Google Scholar.

10. Ravenhill, John, “Redrawing the Map of Africa,” in Rothchild, Donald and Chazan, Naomi, eds., The Precarious Balance: State and Society in Africa (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1988), pp. 282–83Google Scholar.

11. Organization of African Unity (OAU), “OAU Resolution on Border Disputes, 1964,” in Brownlie, Ian, ed., Basic Documents on African Affairs (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971), p. 360Google Scholar.

12. Zartman, I. William, “The Politics of Boundaries in North and West Africa,” The Journal of Modern African Studies 3 (08 1965), p. 156CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

13. Curzon, Lord of Kedleston, , Frontiers (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1907), p. 7Google Scholar.

14. Quoted in Brownlie, , Basic Documents on African Affairs, p. 361Google Scholar.

15. See OAU, “OAU Resolution on the Situation in Nigeria, 1967,” in ibid., p. 364.

16. Foltz, William J., “Political Boundaries and Political Competition in Tropical Africa,” in Eisenstadt, S. N. and Rokkan, Stein, eds., Building States and Nations: Analyses by Region, vol. 2 (Beverly Hills, Calif.: Sage Publications, 1973), p. 365Google Scholar.

17. Cited in Jackson, Robert H. and Rosberg, Carl G., “Pax Africana and Its Problems,” in Bissell, Richard E. and Radu, Michael S., eds., Africa in the Post-Decolonization Era (New Brunswick, N. J.: Transaction Books, 1984), p. 173Google Scholar.

18. Foltz, , “Political Boundaries,” p. 374Google Scholar.

19. Jackson, Robert H. and Rosberg, Carl G., “Why Africa's Weak States Persist: The Empirical and the Juridical in Statehood,” World Politics 35 (10 1982), p. 21CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Jackson, and Rosberg, are quoting, in part, Lynch, Peter, “New States and International Order,” in James, Alan, ed., The Bases of International Order: Essays in Honour of C. A. W. Manning (London: Oxford University Press, 1973), p. 47Google Scholar.

20. Jackson, Robert H., “Quasi-States, Dual Regimes, and Neoclassical Theory: International Jurisprudence and the Third World,” International Organization 41 (Autumn 1987), p. 519CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

21. Jackson, Robert H. and Rosberg, Carl G., “Sovereignty and Underdevelopment: Juridical Statehood in the African Crisis,” The Journal of Modern African Studies 24 (03 1986), pp. 12–13CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

22. Jackson, Robert H., “Negative Sovereignty in Sub-Saharan Africa,” Review of International Studies 12 (10 1986), p. 256CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Jackson is quoting the General Assembly's Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples.

23. Foltz, , “Political Boundaries,” p. 379Google Scholar. Ravenhill also points to the disappearance of the “inheritance elite,” the first generation of nationalist leaders, as a reason why respect for African borders may diminish in the future. See Ravenhill, , “Redrawing the Map of Africa,” p. 290Google Scholar.

24. Young, Crawford, “Comparative Claims to Political Sovereignty: Biafra, Katanga, Eritrea,” in Rothchild, Donald and Olorunsola, Victor A., eds., State Versus Ethnic Claims: African Policy Dilemmas (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1983), p. 229Google Scholar. Young is quoting, in part, Article III, Paragraph 3, of the OAU Charter.

25. Goody, Jack, Technology, Tradition and the State in Africa (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1971), p. 30Google Scholar.

26. Colson, Elizabeth, “African Society at the Time of the Scramble,” in Gann, L. H. and Duignan, Peter, eds., Colonialism in Africa, 1870–1960 vol. 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969), p. 28Google Scholar.

27. Ranger, Terrence, The Invention of Tribalism in Zimbabwe (Gweru [Zimbabwe]: Mambo Press, 1985), p. 4Google Scholar. Emphasis in the original.

28. See Hargreaves, John D., West Africa Partitioned, vol. 1 (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1974), p. 5Google Scholar; and Hargreaves, John D., “West African States and the European Conquest,” in Gann, and Duignan, , Colonialism in Africa, 1870–1960, vol. 1, p. 199Google Scholar.

29. Allott, Antony, “The Changing Legal Status of Boundaries in Africa,” in Ingham, K., ed., Foreign Relations of African States (London: Buttersworth, 1974), p. 117Google Scholar.

30. Young, Crawford, The Politics of Cultural Pluralism (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1976), p. 6Google Scholar.

31. This may have been the case with the Masai divided by the border between Kenya and Tanzania and the Ewe divided by the border between Togo and Ghana. See Bownlie, Ian, African Boundaries: A Legal and Diplomatic Encyclopaedia(London: C. Hurst, 1979), p. 6Google Scholar.

32. The political implications of Africa's topography are explored by Derwent Whittlesey in The Earth and the State (New York: Henry Holt, 1939), pp. 319–20Google Scholar; and by Boggs, S. Whittemore in International Boundaries (New York: Columbia University Press, 1940), p. 155Google Scholar.

33. Broek, Jan O. M., “The Problem of ‘Natural Frontiers,’” in Frontiers of the Future (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1941), p. 11Google Scholar.

34. Morris, H. F., “Protection or Annexation? Some Constitutional Anomalies of Colonial Rule,” in Morris, H. F. and Read, James S., eds., Indirect Rule and the Search for Justice (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1972), p. 42Google Scholar.

35. Ibid.

36. The Economist, 15 November 1884, reprinted in Bendikat, Elfi, ed., Imperialistische Interessenpolitik und Konfliktregelung, 1884–1885 (Berlin: Wissenschaftlicher Autoren-Verlag, 1985), p. 156Google Scholar.

37. The Observer, 19 October 1984, reprinted in ibid., p. 137.

38. Quoted in Jackson, , “Negative Sovereignty in Sub-Saharan Africa,” p. 253Google Scholar.

39. The major study of the Conference remains Crowe's, S. E.The Berlin West African Conference, 1884–1885 (London: Longmans, Green, 1942)Google Scholar. While Crowe provides the correct formal title of the Conference (because it also dealt with the Niger), I will continue to use the more popular name.

40. Article 35 of the Berlin Congo Conference. The General Act of the Conference is reprinted in Arthur Berriedale Keith, The Belgian Congo and the Berlin Act (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1919), p. 315.

41. Lindley, M. F., The Acquisition and Government of Backward Territory in International Law (London: Longmans, Green, 1926), p. 210Google Scholar.

42. Alexandrowicz, C. H., “The Partition of Africa by Treaty,” in Ingham, , Foreign Relations of African States, p. 148Google Scholar.

43. Morris, , “Protection or Annexation?” p. 43Google Scholar.

44. “A. W. L. Hemming: Minute, West African Expansion, 10 November 1890,” reprinted in C. W. Newbury, ed., British Policy Towards West Africa: Selected Documents, 1875–1914 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971), p. 206.

45. Hall, William Edward, A Treatise on the Foreign Powers and Jurisdiction of the British Crown (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1894), p. 224Google Scholar.

46. Lindley, , The Acquisition and Government of Backward Territory, pp. 210–11Google Scholar. See also Kratochwil, Friedrich, “Of Systems, Boundaries and Territoriality: An Inquiry into the Formation of the State System,” World Politics 39 (10 1986), p. 39CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

47. Barrows, Walter L., “Changing Military Capabilities in Black Africa,” in Foltz, William and Bienen, Henry, eds., Arms and the African (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1985), p. 101Google Scholar.

48. OAU “Charter of the OAU,” reprinted in Brownlie, Basic Documents on African Affairs, pp. 2–3.

49. For example, Kenya suggested to ethnic Somalis that they could move back to Somalia but stated that the land they inhabited in northern Kenya would remain in Kenya. See Jackson, , “Negative Sovereignty in Sub-Saharan Africa,” p. 252Google Scholar.

50. Naldi, Gino J., “The Case Concerning the Frontier Dispute (Burkina Faso/Republic of Mali): Uti Possidetis in an African Perspective,” International and Comparative Law Quarterly 36 (10 1987), pp. 901–2CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

51. International Court of Justice Reports, Case Concerning the Frontier Dispute (Burkina FasolRepublic of Mali), The Hague, 22 December 1986, p. 567.

52. Naldi, , “The Case Concerning the Frontier Dispute,” p. 902Google Scholar.

53. Government of Tanzania, “Tanzania Recognizes Biafra,” reprinted in A. H. M. Kirk- Greene, ed. Crisis and Conflict in Nigeria: A Documentary Sourcebook, 1966–1970, vol. 2 (London: Oxford University Press, 1971), p. 208.

54. Julius Nyerere, “Why We Recognized Biafra,” reprinted in ibid., p. 211.

55. OAU, OAU Resolution on the Situation in Nigeria, 1967,” in Brownlie, , Basic Documents on African Affairs, p. 364Google Scholar.

56. Foltz, William J., “The Organization of African Unity in Trouble: How and Why It Works and Does Not Work,” Report 689-AR, U. S. Department of State, mimeograph, 09 1983, p. 18Google Scholar.

57. Jackson, and Rosberg, , “Why Africa's Weak States Persist,” pp. 23–24Google Scholar.

58. Crawford, James, The Creation of States in International Law (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1979), p. 262Google Scholar.

59. See Oye, Kenneth A., ed., Cooperation Under Anarchy (Princeton, N. J.: Princeton University Press, 1986)Google Scholar.

60. Keohane, Robert O., “Reciprocity in International Relations,” International Organization 40 (Winter 1986), p. 8CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

61. Ibid., p. 10.

62. The dynamics here are similar to the U. S. -Soviet strategic relationship. Both sides know that a nuclear war cannot be limited once it starts, since there is no obvious benchmark that both sides would recognize as a natural stopping point. Therefore, they are both extraordinarily reluctant to take any measure that might begin the spiral. See Schelling, Thomas C., The Strategy of Conflict (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1980), pp. 74–77Google Scholar.

63. Keohane, , “Reciprocity in International Relations,” p. 12Google Scholar.

64. Huntington, Samuel P., Political Order in Changing Societies (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1968), p. 123Google Scholar.

65. Tilly, Charles, “Reflections on the History of European State-Making,” in Tilly, Charles, ed., The Formation of Nation States in Western Europe (Princeton, N. J.: Princeton University Press, 1975), p. 42Google Scholar.

66. See Barrows, , “Changing Military Capabilities in Black Africa,” pp. 99 and 120Google Scholar; and Ravenhill, , “Redrawing the Map of Africa,” p. 287Google Scholar.