Côte D'Ivoire retains a central place in discussions on the development of African capitalism. Dramatic increases in agricultural and industrial production in the post-colonial period, coupled with the régime's unequivocally liberal and pro-capitalist discourse, contributed to the image of the Ivoirian state as aggressively promoting the expansion of local and foreign capital. By the late 1970s, it was clear that a select stratum of Ivoirians had amassed private fortunes in the industrial sector, agro-industry, and real estate. Less clear is the significance of this fact for understanding the internal dynamics and development trajectory of Ivoirian capitalism. The idea that the Ivoirian bourgeoisie diversified from its base in agriculture to become one of the most dynamic and influential business classes in sub-Saharan Africa remains plausible, but it evokes no consensus among analysts. Indeed, students of Ivoirian capitalism have been more inclined to argue that the state itself remains the main source of private fortunes, that local capital is thoroughly subordinated to foreign capital, and that indigenous business interests are ensnared in the clientelistic networks of the régime.

The end of the cold war and of the bi-polar world order that shaped international relations over the past 50 years is forcing the Government of the United States to make dramatic policy changes that affect all parts of the globe. In Africa, it is also confronted by significant new developments on local, regional, and continent-wide levels. Of particular concern to American leaders are increasing internal demands for political democracy, and the intensification of ethnic and other conflicts which call national integrity into question. And, as the decision to send up to 30,000 marines, infantrymen, and other troops to Somalia proves, the U.S. Administration will not hesitate to use military force if authorised by the United Nations.

On the face of it, the triumph of Robert Mugabe and ZANU(PF) in the 2013 elections came as a shock, not least to opposition MDC activists. However, after a period of introspection, many have begun to construct a coherent and wide-ranging account of the result which explores opposition shortcomings, and the revived relationship between the electorate and Mugabe's ZANU(PF). This article, based on interviews with political activists conducted three months after the election, outlines and attempts to explain this account. It explores the way in which a politics of polarisation that dominated Zimbabwe in recent years appears to have given way to a politics of ambivalence: where Zimbabweans once viewed their political landscape as one populated by antinomies, they now see their state and its relation to themselves in more complex and ambiguous ways. As a result, Zimbabweans' conception of the state is increasingly coming to resemble Mbembe's formulation of states as contemporaneously ‘organizers of public happiness’ and wielders of arbitrary violence.

The Nigerian Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB), which is currently being discussed in Parliament, aims at reforming the oil industry. But it also reveals the guiding forces of local politics. The PIB exposes the limitations of the state's ambitions, desire and capacity for reform, and it is strong evidence for the regional divisions and social tensions catalysing resistance against the government of President Goodluck Jonathan, which is accused of ethnic bias in favour of the oil-producing areas of the Niger Delta.

Post-apartheid South Africa has recast its regional relations. Nonetheless, much of the literature depicts its policy as a projection of captured interests, for instance big business as embedded in Pretoria's apparent neo-liberal turn. Instead, post-apartheid South Africa's regional relations represent a political compromise, albeit not necessarily an explicit one, that reflects the different visions of South Africa's regional role and their respective political bases. Because their policies reflect the push and pull of competing constituencies, democratic states are rarely one dimensional. Post-apartheid South Africa is no exception, as it attempts to square the political circle of competing political constituencies, such as big business and labour. South Africa's regional relations and, in particular, its policy of regional economic cooperation/integration, are best understood as a reflection of the competing interests within its domestic political economy.

About 70 years ago, the Mahdist or Ansār state, in many ways a traditional Muslim government, crumbled under the fire of the Anglotional Egyptian cannons. On the condominium government that followed fell the task of pacifying the country and introducing western concepts of administration. All Sudanese attempts to defy foreign domination had failed completely by 1924. The British, the stronger of the two partners, had the lion's share in shaping the destiny of the country. Towards the end of World War II, the influential and educated Sudanese, like other Africans and Asians, demanded the right of self-determination. In 1946, in preparation for this, a sample of western democracy was introduced in the form of an Advisory Council. This Council, which was restricted to the northern Sudan, was followed two years later by the Legislative Assembly, which had slightly more powers. Although these democratic innovations were quite alien to the country and were introduced at a relatively late date, they were in keeping with traditional institutions. Until recently, the Sudan consisted of a number of tribal units where no classes or social distinctions existed and the tribal chief was no more than the first among equals; the people were therefore not accustomed to autocratic rule.

This article seeks to relate a biographical case-study to some ‘liberal’ and ‘radical’ ways of thinking about ethnicity. The Kenyan political leader Tom Mboya, who was active in labour and political affairs from 1951 until his death in 1969, was widely regarded as genuinely non-tribalist in his politics. Yet he exercised successful leadership within a political system characterised very strongly, according to a great many observers and participants, by the play of ethnic forces. His would appear to be a strikingly deviant case, and hence may be seen as a useful point of departure for a reconsideration of ideas about ethnic factors in political leadership.

The choice of indigenous versus European languages in education should be a hotly contested issue. Surprisingly, in much of Africa it is not. African states have dramatically increased their use of local languages in education over the last decade. This increase, however, has not proceeded from vocal demands on government by various language groups. Instead, it is the result of two more subtle factors: the changed attitude of a former coloniser and the work of language NGOs on the ground. These two forces have altered governments' perceptions about the utility of African languages in their education strategies. Because this political process works through persuasion, rather than bargaining, it allows choices about language in education to be less contentious than popularly assumed, separating this process from the violent ethnolinguistic conflict that is so often associated with Africa.

The establishment of marketing boards in British West Africa in the 1940s was heralded at the time as a drastic, perhaps revolutionary change in the produce trade. The political implications were undoubtedly great: public enterprise (the marketing boards) had replaced private enterprise (a number of trading companies), and the ongoing debate on their relative merits made a colourful excursion to West Africa in the 1950s because this region offered a clear-cut case for comparison.1 The differences between the organisations were thus inevitably highlighted.

Flight-Lieutenant Jerry Rawlings has presided over two distinct types of régime as far as economic policy is concerned since the overthrow of the Third Republic at the end of 1981. The first was characterised by the extensive intrusion of the state, or by those claiming to act on its behalf, in directing economic activity, notably the sale of goods and services. The other, since 1983, has witnessed greater reliance on the market freedom of individuals in both production and exchange, largely consistent with the economic liberalism prescribed by the International Monetary Fund (I.M.F.). Most analysts familiar with the evidence have concluded that the experiment during 1982–3 was an unmitigated disaster for the wellbeing of Ghanaians, and that since then the Economic Recovery Programme (E.R.P.) has successfully reversed the downward spiral and created the conditions for real income growth.

Decolonisation was a policy of the West, as well as a process reflecting the radical transformation of the configuration of power in the international system. The Soviet Union, perceived as poised to dominate Eurasia, had to be ‘contained’ lest it expanded into the Rimland and challenged the West at sea. This geo-political obsession was reinforced by the ‘loss of China’ and the outbreak of the bitter struggle between North and South Korea. But the cold war was about ideology as well as military power, and containment was therefore not just a question of building pacts but of fostering the ‘right’ kind of political régimes.

The brutal civil war that engulfed Liberia, following Charles Taylor's invasion in December 1989, has left an indelible mark in the history of this West African state. The six-year old struggle led to the collapse of what was already an embattled economy; to the almost complete destruction of physical infrastructure built over a century and half of enterprise and oligarchic rule; to the killing, maiming, and displacement of more than 50 per cent of the country's estimated pre-war population of 2·5 million; and to an unprecedented regional initiative to help resolve the crisis. Five years after the Economic Community of West African States (Ecowas) intervened with a Cease-fire Monitoring Group (Ecomog), an agreement that was quickly hailed as the best chance for peace in Liberia was signed in August 1995 in the Nigeriancapital, Abuja.

Several years ago A. O. Hirschman wrote an article entitled ‘The Search for Paradigms as a Hindrance to Understanding’ in which he attempted to ‘delineate various areas in which an impatience for theoretical formulation leads to serious pitfalls’ He reviewed two books which used opposite ‘cognitive styles’ in seeking to elucidate Latin American political development. One author was eager to set forth a paradigm of Columbian politics, and to show that all events–past, present, and future–are explained by the model (which is reducible to 34 stated hypotheses); the other wrote a study of Emiliano Zapata and the Mexican Revolution in which he was extremely reluctant to explain, moralise, or draw conclusions, but whose book is such that ‘whoever reads through [it] will have gained immeasurably in his understanding not only of the Mexican Revolution, but of peasant revolutions everywhere’.

Women could be said to be ‘the second sex in town’ in colonial Africa in that men predominated in the urban centres spawned by the political economy of colonialism. An explanation has to consider both employment and family separation. Although colonial governments, missions, commercial firms, and mines recruited men, it is not clear to what extent this was a matter of preference on the part of the major employers rather than the response of peasant households. Not at issue are the reasons for the latter's integration into the cash economy and the rôle of coercion, whether in the form of forced labour or indirectly through the imposition of tax. But what considerations were borne in mind when households deliberated about which of their members to dispatch? Whatever the part played by both employers and suppliers in determining the composition of the labour supply – and this so far totally neglected topic demands research – the result was that in many, if not all, African colonies, almost as a rule, domestic servants, secretaries, and nurses were male.

The historical literature on statebuilding in Europe has often portrayed a positive relationship between war, state making and long-term democratisation. Similarly, a number of large-n quantitative studies have concluded that war promotes democracy – even in cases of civil war. Against this, a growing area studies literature has argued that violent conflict in developing countries is unlikely to drive either statebuilding or democratisation. However, this literature has rarely sought to systematically set out the mechanisms through which war undermines democracy. Contrasting three ‘high conflict’ cases (Burundi, Rwanda and Uganda) with two ‘low conflict’ cases (Kenya and Tanzania) in East Africa, we trace the way in which domestic conflict has undermined three key elements of the democratisation process: the quality of political institutions, the degree of elite cohesion, and the nature of civil-military relations. Taken together, we suggest that the combined effect of these three mechanisms helps to explain why Kenya and Tanzania have made significantly greater progress towards democratic consolidation than their counterparts and call for more in-depth research on the long-term legacy of conflict on democratisation in the African context.

At the turn of the century, Sayid Maxamad Cabdille Xasan led a 21-year battle against foreign colonialists in the Somali lands. Then British aircraft mercilessly bombarded his main fort at Talex in 1920, and he died a few months later, his military forces in utter disarray. The Sayid, as he is known, is none the less considered the father of modern Somali nationalism. Military defeat did not spoil the lustre of this hero's feats.

In January 1991 President Ali Hassan Mwinyi appointed a Commission of Inquiry into Land Matters, under the chairmanship of Professor Issa Shivji, with extremely broad terms of reference. It was mandated not only to review laws and policies concerning the allocation, tenure, use, and development of land, and to make recommendations for reform, but also to examine the nature of the disputes that had arisen, and to propose measures for their solution. More generally, it was to hear complaints from the general public and to look into any other matters connected with land that it deemed appropriate. The appointment of the Commission might be interpreted as tacit official acknowledgement that the land policies of the preceding 25 years had, in many ways, been a failure, and that now was the time to formulate a new approach in keeping with the economic changes embraced in the mid-1980s

Civil society is the space of uncoerced human association and relational networks formed for the sake of family, faith, interests and ideology. Supporters of civil society have argued that this conglomeration of networks and organisations has helped to fuel democratic aspirations and channel democratic demands in Africa. Proponents maintain that civil society serves as a counter to the actions of the predatory African state, which seeks to limit individual freedoms and to encroach on societal resources. By questioning the actions of state officials and by challenging state policies, civil society organisations can cause the state to be more accountable and transparent, and can facilitate a positive deconcentration of political power. A plural, vibrant civil society encourages political liberalisation and the development of a democratic and legitimate state. It is because the organisations of civil society promote democratic values among their members that they are able to challenge repressive state actions and facilitate democratic development. Since their members trust each other and feel that they have a say in group activities, democratic organisations are more unified and effective at achieving their political objectives.

This article challenges these assumptions about civil society through an examination of rural Senegalese organisations. I argue that groups in civil society rarely teach their members democratic values because most associations do not practice legitimate, inclusive and accountable decision making. More often than not, social hierarchies and power relations that define how individuals of different genders and classes are to interact in the public realm limit democracy. As a result, civil society groups often become ineffective and disorganised, and cannot achieve their political, economic or social goals. The inefficiency and undemocratic nature of civil society have larger implications for democratic transitions in Africa.

Of all the serious problems facing the present rulers of Ethiopia none has proved to be more elusive or challenging than the question of nationalities. Since the 1974 revolution there has been a proliferation of liberation movements calling for either regional autonomy or outright secession from Ethiopia. Although the Somalis and the Eritreans have long sought to break away from Ethiopia and have waged an armed struggle for many years, the Afar, Oromo, and Tigrean movements are recent developments which manifested themselves openly after the overthrow of Haile Sellassie. Their discontent with the weakened central Government, which they saw as insensitive to their needs, had long been brewing, and now threatens the viability of Africa's oldest state.

The political ideas put forward by the leaders of the new states provide one of the most popular entrées to African politics, and they have now received a good deal of attention. This is understandable enough. Many African leaders are highly articulate, and their views, embodied in frequent speeches and writings by those who control the information media, are—unlike so much other information—easily accessible. The value and significance of these ideas may well have been exaggerated, but even so they cannot simply be ignored.