Liberation Movements In Africa Research Articles

DEHUMANISATION OF COLONISED HUMANS REVISITED: RACIAL SPECIESISM AND CALIBAN’S “EXPLOD[ING] PROSPERO’S OLD MYTH” IN AIME CESAIRE’S A TEMPEST

The political turmoil between the 1950s and the 1970s that stemmed from the liberation movements in Africa, and in the Caribbean Islands, in which African/ black diaspora is so common, triggered many writers of the time to visit colonial literature in order to be able to find a meaning for the liberation struggles of the blacks. Similarly, Aimé Césaire, a Francophone literary and political figure, revisited Shakespeare’s The Tempest (around 1611), and adapted it into A Tempest (Une Tempête,1969). A Tempest is a play in which Shakespearean Prospero’s strong and univocal status is replaced by strong and rebellious Caliban, who subverts all the colonial discourses that marginalise and dehumanise the blacks. In the light of these discussions, this paper aims to discuss that in A Tempest, Caliban becomes an instrument for Césaire in order to demarginalise the blacks contrary to Prospero’s dehumanising methods applied through racial speciesism. By means of Caliban’s “explod[ing] Prospero’s old myth”, Césaire wants to prove that blacks are humans, too, with a glorious history and identity to be proud of.

Colonial prejudices and decolonization complexes according to Sartre

For Jean-Paul Sartre, the oppressor breaks intersubjective solidarity and transforms the oppressed into an Other, fearing him and making him strange. It’s paradoxical since the colonizer is the one who “creates” the Other based on prejudice. This proposal follows a textual analysis focused on the essence of the colonial prejudice of the oppressor and on the complexes of liberation and independence of the oppressed peoples in the decolonization process. The objectives are: a) to highlight Sartre’s contribution to understanding colonial prejudices and decolonization complexes, as well as the position taken by the author against the war in Algeria and in favour of the colonial liberation movements in Africa; b) substantiate the position of respect for the Other as a fundamental question of an ethics of alterity.

Leo Tolstoy’s Anti-Colonial Views and Their Influence on Liberation Movements in Africa

Leo Tolstoy is one of the few Russian thinkers of the pre-Soviet era whose views influenced leaders of liberation movements in Africa. Soviet researchers explored his anti-colonial views and their perception in the African continent. Although based on extensive source material, these publications are overly ideologized. The topic is reconsidered, using previously untapped archival data, as well as publications which appeared in Russia and internationally over the past thirty years. Tolstoy’s first attempts to speak out in the press about the colonial partition of Africa date to the Italo-Ethiopian War of 1895–1896. He denounced colonial expansion as an attempt by governments to distract their people from problems at home and force them to sacrifice themselves for business and political interests of others. Tolstoy advised people in metropoles not to take part in colonial schemes, and prompted colonised peoples to defend their rights through peaceful means so that the vicious circle of violence could be broken. His anticolonial rhetoric resonated in Africa, and from the beginning of the 20th century, his ideas were accepted as a guideline. M.K. Gandhi, a future leader of the struggle for Indian independence, who spearheaded a civil-rights movement of South African Indians in the 1900s, used Tolstoy’s ideas in developing his tactics of nonviolent resistance (satyagraha). Indirectly, these ideas continued to impact the South African liberation movement thanks to Gandhi’s influence. It was not until 1961 that the African National Congress (ANC) had to form a military organisation to fight against the apartheid regime. Yet the ANC managed to achieve a non-violent transition from apartheid to non-racial democracy. The success is associated with President N.R. Mandela, who shared Tolstoy’s views on the need to abandon armed confrontation.

The Rise and Fall of the Liberation Movements in Africa

Background: Liberation movements in Africa in the past 70 years began to campaign for the liberation of African countries. The liberation of Libya in 1951 gave hope to all liberation movements in the African countries. The liberation movements in all African countries were able to liberate African people from the colonial masters. Nevertheless, the history has shown that liberation movements has failed to sustain power.

The Failure of Former African Liberation Movements to Transition to Democracy after Ascension to Power: A Descriptive Analysis of Eritrean People’s Liberation Front

This paper investigates the perplexing issue of the democratic deficit in Africa's post-liberation states. It seeks to answer why former African liberation movements failed to make a genuine transition to democracy during the second stage of the national liberation struggle, instead of leaving behind authoritarian military regimes and one-party states that disappointed people. The paper's primary goal is to study the transitional path of former liberation movements in Africa and examine the factors that contribute to the failure of the transformation process from armed resistance to conventional politics. The research is descriptive and analytical in nature, conducted using the qualitative research method. The findings show that former liberation movements in Africa failed as governments due to a variety of factors, the most important of which is elite resistance to democratisation, which led to the transition to dictatorship, the absence or weakness of political institutions due to the persistence of the liberation era's political culture, and the tinkering with the constitution and failure to put some of its key principles into effect. Furthermore, the study showed that anti-colonial revolutions in Africa only liberated the state, not the people. Finally, the paper ends with some recommendations i.e. several steps to be taken in order for African countries to overcome the dilemma of the liberation movement's democratic transition failure

Remarks on 40+ Years of Mechanical Engineering Teaching

Having obtained my licenciatura in Mechanical Engineering in 1973, I started an MSc in Applied Mechanics at Imperial College London the year after the carnation revolution in Portugal. Later, I prepared my PhD at Cranfield Institute of Technology (now Cranfield University). After 5 years in the UK, I returned to Porto with my MSc and PhD degrees to start an appointment as assistant professor at FEUP in 1980. Portugal was then struggling with a radical change of circumstances: from a country with overseas colonies, impoverished by a dictatorship and wars against liberation movements in Africa, to a European country and democracy with a dramatic lack of infrastructure. Research was certainly not a priority! In 1986 Portugal joined the European Communities, and in 1999 was one of the initial member countries adopting the Euro. Among other setbacks, bad choices of priorities (an excessive emphasis on services with neglect of manufacturing, or heavy investment in motorways with complete neglect of railways) marked the path until todays’ situation. Nevertheless, attention dedicated to scientific and technical research grew steadily in the past decades; and 2020 started with the country displaying good prospects as regards financial stability and renewed interest for manufacturing and exports. Having moved from assistant professor to full professor, with sabbaticals and visiting professorships in several countries, and participation in juries for selection of academic staff in many institutions, I had the possibility of witnessing the transformations in the engineering education scene in Portugal and elsewhere. The communication will discuss lessons learned throughout my 40+ years academic career, put in the context of a highly diversified set of external circumstances.

The Rallying Call to Decolonize

When Okwui Enwezor gained world renown as artistic director of Documenta11 in 2002, his accomplishments as curator of contemporary African art were already well established. His In/Sight: African Photographers, 1940–Present, exhibition (1996) had the temerity to describe the intentional ways in which Africans shaped their own photographic representation in a medium whose history was as long and distinguished in Africa as in Europe. Enwezor’s 2001 exhibition The Short Century: Independence and Liberation Movements in Africa, 1945–1994, was a revelatory journey through the long process of colonial resistance and independence no less revolutionary for its astonishing range of content far beyond that of art objects, including film, music, theater, literature, and literature. In helming Documenta11, Enwezor not only included a historic number of non-white, non-European artists but also redefined the exhibition, before its opening in Kassel, by conceiving it as a final installment of several “platforms” staged worldwide. His were strategic, paradigmatic interventions engineered to globalize the art world, and they effectively amounted to acts of art-historical decolonization. Enwezor’s legacy is instructive. Achieving an inclusive and equitable art history that is sustainable requires decentralizing white, Eurocentric, male, cisgender, and heterosexual hegemony. In two of his final projects, large-scale solo shows of Frank Bowling and El Anatsui, exhibiting these artists on their own terms did just that. It is through his curatorial practice of art-world decolonization that Enwezor has issued a rallying cry. He has shown us the way forward.

Frantz Fanon and the CIA Man

This essay reconstructs a missing link in Frantz Fanon’s life and death. Based on an encounter with Fanon’s CIA handler, C. Oliver Iselin, it presents the firsthand experience of a mid-level figure in the U.S. security state who participated in the national liberation movements in Africa. The essay suggests that Iselin’s memories and images of decolonization reflect the wider arc of how liberal American attitudes evolved and congealed toward the Third World, as national liberation went from attracting hopeful sympathy, to disappointment, and finally to blame. The long, unedited samples of Iselin’s speech are meant to grant his perspective some autonomy from the author’s interpretations of them, and to provide the reader with raw material to make different interpretations. The essay also examines Fanon’s understanding of American liberals’ changing attitude toward national liberation movements. Both Iselin and Fanon’s projections are then counterpoised with the author’s own impressions of present-day Algeria.

ARGÉLIA E A QUESTÃO COLONIAL: interpretações sobre o colonialismo

É inegável os impactos da Guerra de Libertação da Argélia no continente africano e para própria França. Seus longos anos de conflito impactaram diversos movimentos de libertação colonial em África e causaram uma ruptura política profunda na França. O presente trabalho tem por objetivo analisar os posicionamentos de Sartre, Frantz Fanon e Bourdieu em seus escritos analisando as consequências do colonialismo francês em Argélia e os impactos da guerra para o colonizador e o colonizado.

Mau-Mau War Rituals and Women Rebels in Kirinyaga County of Kenya (1952–1960): Retrieving Women Participation in Kenya’s Struggle for Independence

The Mau-Mau war of independence in Kenya was fought after the returnees of the First and Second World Wars (1919–1945), who were mainly Christians, succeeded in politicising the black majority in the then Kenyan colony (1920–1963) to demand justice across the colour divides, as a religio-ritual duty which climaxed in oaths. The first stage of the war was seen in the change of contents in the African ritualistic dances that young men and women had gotten used to. In time, the love songs became political and/or patriotic songs that prepared people for a major war that was in the offing. The second stage was the secretive binding oaths. The third stage was the repositioning of the rebels in terms of forest fighters, the combatants, who were to engage the British government in guerrilla warfare. The third stage also saw some rebels positioned as spies, oath administrators, resource mobilisers, food suppliers to the forest fighters, among other offices. In all these duty allocations within the rank-and-file of society, it is critically important to ask: Were these ritualistic oaths a poor imitation and/or mockery of ecclesiastical Eucharist? Were men and women fighters acting from a just war theory? What role did women play in this all-important war that inspired other liberation movements in Africa and beyond? In Kirinyaga County of Kenya, were there women combatants and/or supporters of Mau-Mau rebellion (1952–1960)? The materials in this article are primarily gathered through archival sources and through interviewing some of the participants.

Mau-Mau war rituals and women rebels in Kirinyaga county of Kenya (1952-1960): retrieving women participation in Kenya's struggle for independence

The Mau-Mau war of independence in Kenya was fought after the returnees of the First and Second World Wars (1919–1945), who were mainly Christians, succeeded in politicising the black majority in the then Kenyan colony (1920–1963) to demand justice across the colour divides, as a religio-ritual duty which climaxed in oaths. The first stage of the war was seen in the change of contents in the African ritualistic dances that young men and women had gotten used to. In time, the love songs became political and/or patriotic songs that prepared people for a major war that was in the offing. The second stage was the secretive binding oaths. The third stage was the repositioning of the rebels in terms of forest fighters, the combatants, who were to engage the British government in guerrilla warfare. The third stage also saw some rebels positioned as spies, oath administrators, resource mobilisers, food suppliers to the forest fighters, among other offices. In all these duty allocations within the rank-and-file of society, it is critically important to ask: Were these ritualistic oaths a poor imitation and/or mockery of ecclesiastical Eucharist? Were men and women fighters acting from a just war theory? What role did women play in this all-important war that inspired other liberation movements in Africa and beyond? In Kirinyaga County of Kenya, were there women combatants and/or supporters of Mau-Mau rebellion (1952–1960)? The materials in this article are primarily gathered through archival sources and through interviewing some of the participants.

Seeking new allies in Africa: China’s policy towards Africa during the Cold War as reflected in the construction of the Tanzania–Zambia railway

In the 1960s, there was an upsurge in national liberation movements in Africa. Newly independent Tanzania and Zambia urgently needed a railway transportation line to link the two countries in order to achieve true independence and self-strengthening. Using archival materials, this paper shows that the Chinese government decided to support construction of this railway in response to Tanzania’s request for aid, despite China’s own economic underdevelopment. In the face of US and British policies to thwart the railway construction, China overcame Zambian suspicion and ultimately facilitated the signing of a tripartite agreement with both Tanzania and Zambia. China’s assistance in the construction of the Tanzania–Zambia railway during the Cold War had great strategic significance. This project helped China break out of its international isolation, and it became a turning point in China’s gradual formulation of its own independent Africa policy. Moreover, it promoted national emancipation and economic construction in Africa and broadened the influence of the Chinese developmental path there. However, this project also created a financial burden for China, and its underlying model of cooperation proved unsuitable for sustaining the railway’s long-term operation.

Visualising FRELIMO’s liberated zones in Mozambique, 1962–1974

Headquartered in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, the Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (FRELIMO) engaged the Portuguese army from 1962 to 1974 in a ground war over Mozambique’s independence. At the centre of this military struggle were the geographical regions of the liberated zones, areas in northern Mozambique that FRELIMO designated as under its control. In order to make an exile movement present and real for illiterate populations, FRELIMO trained a group of its soldiers as photographers, who travelled across Mozambique to photograph the war. This act of photographing and distributing images had its political advantages for drawing international aid, but these image-making processes also risked disrupting the ethnically diverse coalitions that made up FRELIMO’s military and popular support. In an effort to address scholarship on liberation movements in Africa, which has overlooked the importance of photography, this article considers the technical, technological, and structural mechanisms FRELIMO instituted from 1962 to 1974 to facilitate the production and circulation of photographs of its liberated zones. Reading FRELIMO’s photographic archive of the liberation struggle against the stories of their producers and users allows for an understanding of how the visualising of the liberated zone enabled FRELIMO to situate itself as a national movement with broad regional and ethnic support inside Mozambique, all the while articulating for international audiences a multiracial and countrywide war effort. The liberated zone was not just a physical landmark, but its picturing transformed it into a visually constituted category for foreign and local populations to identify with an independent Mozambique under FRELIMO’s control.

Special Contribution: Interview with Giovanni Arrighi “At Some Point Something Has To Give” – Declining U.S. Power, the Rise of China, and an Adam Smith for the Contemporary Left

iovanni Arrighi (1937-2009) spent his life thinking and writing about what he saw on his well-traveled path: liberation movements in Africa, worker rebellion in Italy, global inequality between North and South, the military and financial limits of US power, and the economic rise of China. In his many articles and books, including an unplanned trilogy on the origins and workings of global capitalism, Arrighi grappled with the complexities of history and the limitations of existing economic and political theories. This rethinking was fully on display in his final book, Adam Smith in Beijing: Lineages of the Twenty-First Century. Although I interviewed Arrighi on May 18, 2008, several months before the financial meltdown in global markets, his prescient statements are relevant for the crises we face today. Arrighi passed away in June 2009. His scholarly and intellectual tradition continues on at the Giovanni Arrighi Center for Global Studies at The Johns Hopkins University.

How Ideas Influence Decision-Making: Olof Palme and Swedish foreign policy, 1965–1975

The main research question in this study is how ideas matter during different phases of a decision-making process. More specifically, the study examines whether principled and causal ideas influence foreign policy as roadmaps or as focal points, and if there is a difference across policy-making stages. The empirical basis for this article is an examination of whether former Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme (1927–1986) primarily used his ideas as roadmaps for one of his foreign policy priorities during an early agenda-setting phase of the process, and ideas as focal points for one of his foreign policy priorities during a policy-making phase. The two cases studied are (1) Sweden's decision to say no to European Economic Community membership in the early 1970s and (2) Sweden's decision to say yes to support liberation movements in Africa in the late 1960s. The main conclusion is that Palme used his ideas as roadmaps during all phases of the decision-making process, and that ideas are necessary to guide and frame all types of issues during all stages of the decision-making process.

Property rights, land tenure and the racial discourses

A persistent theme in land and agrarian studies is the appropriation of land and natural resources by mostly Western foreigners and the inequitable division of land and natural resources between Indigenous people and white settlers. It was this overt racial inequality in land ownership and the accompanying structures of oppression that led to the rise of liberation movements in Africa, South America and Asia. Most, if not all, land and agrarian reform programmes in the former colonies take the racial inequality in land as their point of departure. The same applies to the process of changing the inequalities in the use and ownership of natural resources such as wildlife, fisheries and forests. Whereas critical scholarship and social movements vehemently opposed the racialized nature of land dispossession, less attention has been paid to the persistence of racialized tenure systems. The silence on the racial character of land and natural resource tenure is rather surprising given that colonial tenure systems were based on race and racist grounds. This paper draws on examples from nature conservancies and communal land reform in southern Africa to argue that the dual land and natural resource tenure inherent from colonialism and apartheid remains intact in contemporary southern Africa. It also suggests that the democratic governments in the region and critical scholarship have failed to challenge the racialized character of land tenure. Instead, they continued to reinvent orthodox views of society and culture. Race seems to matter most in property regimes in the region in as far as it relates to equity rather than its initial categorization of people. The consequences of the persistence of the racialized tenure systems are that the success or failure of land and resource use and management reproduces racial explanations.

The Paradox of China’s Policy in Africa

AbstractIn many cases it was China’s longstanding solidarity with several liberation movements in Africa in the colonial period which was later upgraded to bilateral and state-level diplomatic relations in the postcolonial era. However, the twenty-first century has also brought about quantitative and potentially qualitative changes in Sino-African relations which are more complex than what the advocates of stronger Sino-African relations (Sino-optimists) and proponents of disengagement (Sino-pessimists) seem to suggest. The defining patterns of China’s influence in Africa are either not yet fully crystallized or they come in paradoxical pairs. The essay spells out the manifestations of these paradoxes and what can be done under the circumstances to improve the African condition. The divergent schools of thought about the possible impacts of China’s increased activities in Africa seem not to be totally unrelated to their underlying assumptions about the causes of Africa’s unsuccessful modernization. The essay also explores these intellectual issues by focusing on the contradictory dimensions of Afro-Chinese relations.

The Short Century: Independence and Liberation Movements in Africa, 1945-1994

For much of Africa the 20th century was overshadowed by the experience of colonial rule, with politcal independence arriving for most people only in the last 50 years. Short Century is a broad survey of cultural life in Africa from the independence movements through the post-colonial era to the end of apartheid in 1994. Expansive, wide-ranging and illustrated, this book studies achievements in all areas of the performing and fine arts, photography, literature, theatre, architecture, music and film. Short Century includes the works of over 50 artists from the paintings of Mancona and Sekoto during the '50s, through the drawings and theatre projects of William Kentridge up to the installations and video works of Kay Hassan and Oladele A. Bamgboye. The great writers of the continent - Soyinka, Senghor and Cesaire amongst others - Africa's filmmakers, architects and musicians, all of whom left their mark on the process of decolonization, are studied here in depth. Renowned historians and cultural philosophers discuss the background of developments and analyze the ideological strategies employed by Western colonial powers to preserve their grip on African countries and peoples. A chapter on photojournalism supplemented by a detailed chronology of events and political movements presents the main stages of Africa's political history. A comprehensive anthology in the appendix contains some 30 historical documents, such as essays, speeches and political manifestos, shedding light on the key issues of the period.

The Short Century: Independence and Liberation Movements in Africa, 1945-1994.:The Short Century: Independence and Liberation Movements in Africa, 1945-1994.

The Short Century: Independence and Liberation Movements in Africa, 1945-1994. Organized by the Museum Villa Stuck, Munich. Curator: Okwui Enwezor. P.S. Contemporary Art Center, Museum of Modern Art affiliate, Long Island City, Queens, New York City. February 10-May 5, 2002.

The Short Century: Independence and Liberation Movements in Africa, 1945-1994

The Short Century: Independence and Liberation Movements in Africa, 1945-1994