Abstract
William Reno. Warfare in Independent Africa: Approaches to African History. York: Cambridge University Press, 2011. xxii + 271 pp. Maps. Figures. Suggested Readings. Index. $85.00. Cloth. $27.99. Paper.Elizabeth Schmidt Foreign Intervention in Africa: From Cold War to War on Terror. Approaches to African History. York: Cambridge University Press. 2013. xviii + 267 pp. Illustrations. Acknowledgments. Foreword. Abbreviations. Index. $27.99. Paper.Jeremy Levitt. Illegal Peace in Africa: An Inquiry into Legality of Power Sharing with Warlords, Rebels, and Junta. York: Cambridge University Press, 2012. xi + 301 pp. Bibliography. Index. $103.00. Cloth. $34.99. Paper.The books reviewed here are written with clarity and passion and they deserve a comprehensive readership. They all embrace a sweeping geographical and conceptual terrain, but authors presuppose no prior African studies knowledge or expertise. While soaring and panoptic, these books are also richly detailed and nuanced. No single review can do them justice. Each is a major contribution that merits attention from anyone concerned with armed in Africa and efforts to resolve those conflicts.William Reno's book is part of Cambridge University Press series, New Approaches to African History, which is designed to introduce students and general readers to current findings and new ideas in African history. Reno, who is a political scientist, highlights two significant features influencing warfare in Africa during past fifty years. First, African warfare and its practitioners have always operated within an existing state system based on European colonial divisions of territory and European imposed conceptions of sovereignty. The inviolability of borders and sanctity of sovereignty explain why intrastate rather than interstate warfare has been norm in Africa. Second, over past fifty years grievances motivating rebellion have remained fairly constant. What has changed are politics that shape rebels' fields of leverage and global reception of and their aims. The book's major message is that the nature of politics in states in which they fight plays a key role in shaping organization and behavior of (161).The political imperatives that shape rebels' actions have severe consequences for noncombatants. Reno observes that conflict in much of Africa has shifted from a focus on battles over which side should control and administer non-combatant population to a situation in which governing non-combatants is often less relevant as a central strategy of war fighting (2). Both government forces and opposition groups who challenge authority of African regimes (and both of which are termed rebels by Reno) exhibit high degrees of fragmentation and little capacity to instill a common sense of purpose among combatants and noncombatants alike. This fragmentation and kaleidoscopic array of motivation and purpose is not owing solely to human frailty and avarice. Reno also stresses complexity and contingency of what it means, using James Scott's memorable phrase, to see like a state {SeeingLike a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve Human Condition Have Failed, Yale University Press, 1999).Reno identifies five rebel typologies. Anti-colonial fought to end colonial domination. They garnered support through unifying ideologies that galvanized African populations and enlisted international support: nationalism, sovereignty, human rights, and political independence. Focusing on southern Africa, Reno discusses his next grouping, rule and their campaigns and activities to eliminate white minority rule regimes in region. As with anticolonial rebels, external support was important. Like their anticolonial counterparts, majority rule sought to fashion narratives and ideologies that would mute factional and personal differences and inspire loyalty and commitment. …
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