African Studies

Ziel dieser Arbeit ist es die Frage zu beantworten, ob es möglich ist die Außenpolitik eines afrikanischen Staates aus einer afrozentrierten, nicht eurozentristischen Perspektive zu betrachten. Dafür wird der Fall Nigerias während des Kalten Krieges als wichtiges Beispiel genommen, weil diese zeiträumliche Kategorie besonders wichtig für ist. Man versucht hier zu beschreiben und darzustellen, wie das größte west-afrikanische Land seit seiner Unabhängigkeit mit dem globalen Kontext während des Kalten Krieges sich verbunden hat und ob es in seiner Politik die Ost-West-Konfrontation gestaltet hat.

Obiettivo di questo lavoro è rispondere alla domanda, se sia possibile osservare la politica estera di uno Stato del continente africano da una prospettiva afrocentrata, o ancora meglio da un punto di vista non euro-centrico. A questo scopo viene offerto come esempio emblematico il caso della Nigeria durante il periodo della guerra fredda, considerando questa categoria temporale particolarmente importante per determinare cosa sia una descrizione euro-centrica. In breve, si cercherà di raccontare e descrivere il modo in cui il più grande Paese dell’Africa occidentale si sia rapportato dal momento della sua indipendenza al contesto globale rappresentante la guerra fredda e se abbia o meno conformato la propria politica alle condizioni imposte dal conflitto tra Est ed Ovest.

This article analyses the implications of the Forced Labour Convention of 1930 on colonial labour policies for road labour carried out under chiefs in the Gold Coast. The British colonial administration implemented a legal application of the convention that allowed the continuation of the existing system of public works. In the Gold Coast, the issue of road labour was most prominent in the North, where chiefs maintained the majority of roads. Indirect rule became crucial in retaining forced labour in compliance with the convention. This article focuses on "hidden strategies" of British colonialism after 1930, contrasting studies of blatant cases of forced labour. The analysis is based on a close scrutiny of the internal discourse among colonial officials on the question of road labour and the Forced Labour Convention.

This article analyses the implications of the Forced Labour Convention of 1930 on colonial labour policies for road labour carried out under chiefs in the Gold Coast. The British colonial administration implemented a legal application of the convention that allowed the continuation of the existing system of public works. In the Gold Coast, the issue of road labour was most prominent in the North, where chiefs maintained the majority of roads. Indirect rule became crucial in retaining forced labour in compliance with the convention. This article focuses on “hidden strategies” of British colonialism after 1930, contrasting studies of blatant cases of forced labour. The analysis is based on a close scrutiny of the internal discourse among colonial officials on the question of road labour and the Forced Labour Convention.

This article explores the post-colonial national identity formation using place names that commemorate the nation’s past in Zimbabwe. Place name alterations that the new political elites implemented at independence in 1980 were aimed at disassembling relics of the deposed regime and craft a new national identity. The commemorative landscapes of Harare, as a national capital, constitute a strategic medium in the constitution of national identity. Ethnicity dominated the political landscape in Zimbabwe. The two main political parties, the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) and Zimbabwe African People’s Union (ZAPU), have been aligned with the two supertribes, Shona and Ndebele, respectively. The article explores how the ruling ZANU (PF) government whose leadership was largely Shona used a meta-narrative modelled around discourses of exclusionary autochthony and a partial presentation of the liberation war history that projected ZAPU as having made an insignificant contribution to ...

Like Kenya, Namibia, and South Africa, Zimbabwe was one of the countries that the imperial mission had targeted to establish as a settler economy. The objective of creating a white settler colony was evident in the entire colonial system, including place naming. Generally, place naming served political functions of declaring power and authority over the entire colony. While white minority rule ended in 1980, it, however, left some symbolic imprints on the cultural landscape of the independent nation, Zimbabwe. Given that colonialism entrenched white identity on the cultural landscape, this article interrogates efforts by the Mnangagwa government, which assumed political office in November 2017, to dislodge Rhodesian memory from the cultural landscape. This article demonstrates that decolonisation is not an event but an ongoing process that political elites execute whenever they want to serve present political purposes. It interrogates the dialectics of political power and rememberin...

This article examines the elite construction of cultural landscapes in Harare. Since assuming the reins of power in the Zimbabwe African Nation Union (ZANU) in 1977, Robert Mugabe invented a political culture that conflated him with spirit mediums whom the nationalist movement had elevated to national deities and dead kings. Mugabe continued to cultivate this political culture in the post-colonial era using different discourses of self-presentation. The place-renaming exercise that the Mugabe regime implemented immediately after independence was part of Mugabe’s self-legitimating efforts. This article establishes that the place-renaming system in Harare projected Mugabe as a divine king.