1st Edition

The African Inheritance

By Ieuan Ll. Griffiths Copyright 1995
    232 Pages
    by Routledge

    232 Pages
    by Routledge

    Africa is a continent gripped by civil wars and widespread famine. The causes of many of the continent's problems are deep rooted and can be traced to Africa's colonial past, when European powers divided the spoils of the continent into separate sovereign states.
    The African Inheritance examines the effect this "balkanization" of Africa has had, and is having, on the political and economic well-being of the continent.
    From a brief history of pre-colonial Africa and its subsequent European partition and inevitable decolonization, the book discusses the consequences of such an inheritance: small and weak states, destructive secessionist movements, irredentism and African imperialism. Attempts to tackle these problems and assert independent development are inhibited by the colonial inheritance.

    1 INTRODUCTION 2 PRE-COLONIAL AFRICA 3 EUROPEANS AND AFRICA, 1415–1885 4 THE EUROPEAN PARTITION OF AFRICA 5 COLONIAL AFRICA 6 PROTECTING APARTHEID 7 THE STATES OF MODERN AFRICA 8 POLITICAL BOUNDARIES 9 CAPITAL CITIES 10 LAND-LOCKED STATES 11 SECESSIONIST MOVEMENTS 12 IRREDENTISM 13 AFRICAN IMPERIALISM 14 POLITICAL UNION 15 ECONOMIC GROUPINGS 16 INFRASTRUCTURAL DEVELOPMENT 17 CONCLUSIONS

    Biography

    Ieuan L l. Griffiths is Reader in Geography in the School of African and Asian Studies at the University of Sussex.