Download or read book Intellectuals and African Development written by Bjorn Beckman and published by Zed Books Ltd.. This book was released on 2008-02-29 with total page 185 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book looks at the very different responses to the African predicament from prominent writers like Soyinka, Ngugi and Achebe, to the military men in power and the students who defy repression. It suggests that intervention by international agencies who claim to promote 'democracy' and 'empower the youth' may reinforce authoritarian attitudes and structures. The essays in the book give voice to the outrage, ridicule and revolutionary ardour, as well as to the reformist caution, of those directly affected. The shallow pretences of those in power and the hypocrisy and arrogance of the foreign helpers are also exposed. The book concludes that being an 'insider' or an 'outsider' is less important than being committed to listening to ordinary people.
Download or read book From Foreign Natives to Native Foreigners Explaining Xenophobia in Post apartheid South Africa written by M. Neocosmos and published by African Books Collective. This book was released on 2010 with total page 190 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The events of May 2008 in which 62 people were killed simply for being "foreign" and thousands were turned overnight into refugees shook the South African nation. This book is the first to attempt a comprehensive and rigorous explanation for those horrific events. It argues that xenophobia should be understood as a political discourse and practice. As such its historical development as well as the conditions of its existence must be elucidated in terms of the practices and prescriptions which structure the field of politics. In South Africa, the history of xenophobia is intimately connected to the manner in which citizenship has been conceived and fought over during the past fifty years at least. Migrant labour was de-nationalised by the apartheid state, while African nationalism saw the same migrant labour as the foundation of that oppressive system. Only those who could show a family connection with the colonial and apartheid formation of South Africa could claim citizenship at liberation. Others were excluded and seen as unjustified claimants to national resources. Xenophobiaís conditions of existence, the book argues, are to be found in the politics of post-apartheid nationalism where state prescriptions founded on indigeneity have been allowed to dominate uncontested in conditions of an overwhelmingly passive conception of citizenship. The de-politicisation of an urban population, which had been able to assert its agency during the 1980s through a discourse of human rights in particular, contributed to this passivity. Such state liberal politics have remained largely unchallenged. As in other cases of post-colonial transition in Africa, the hegemony of xenophobic discourse, the book contends, is to be sought in the specific character of the state consensus.
Download or read book From Foreign Natives to Native Foreigners Explaining Xenophobia in Post apartheid South Africa written by Michael Neocosmos and published by African Books Collective. This book was released on 2008-09-15 with total page 161 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Xenophobia is a political discourse. As such, its historical development as well as the conditions of its existence must be elucidated in terms of the practices and prescriptions that structure the field of politics. In South Africa, its history is connected to the manner citizenship has been conceived and fought over during the past fifty years at least. Migrant labour was de-nationalised by the apartheid state, while African nationalism saw it as the very foundation of that oppressive system. However, only those who could show a family connection with the colonial/apartheid formation of South Africa could claim citizenship at liberation. Others were excluded and seen as unjustified claimants to national resources. Xenophobia's current conditions of existence are to be found in the politics of a post-apartheid nationalism were state prescriptions founded on indigeneity have been allowed to dominate uncontested in condition of passive citizenship. The de-politicisation of a population, which had been able to assert its agency during the 1980s, through a discourse of 'human rights' in particular, has contributed to this passivity. State liberal politics have remained largely unchallenged. As in other cases of post-colonial transition in Africa, the hegemony of xenophobic discourse, the book shows, is to be sought in the character of the state consensus. Only a rethinking of citizenship as an active political identity can re-institute political agency and hence begin to provide alternative prescriptions to the political consensus of state-induced exclusion.
Download or read book Transnational Governance and the Pacification of Youth written by Harri Englund and published by . This book was released on 2004 with total page 30 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Thinking Freedom in Africa written by Michael Neocosmos and published by NYU Press. This book was released on 2016-12-01 with total page 733 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Thinking Freedom in Africa conceives an emancipatory politics beginning from the axiom that ‘people think’. Previous ways of conceiving the universal emancipation of humanity have in practice ended in failure. Marxism, anti-colonial nationalism and neo-liberalism all understand the achievement of universal emancipation through a form of state politics. Marxism, which had encapsulated the idea of freedom for most of the twentieth century, was found wanting when it came to thinking emancipation because social interests and identities were understood as simply reflected in political subjectivity which could only lead to statist authoritarianism. Neo-liberalism and anti-colonial nationalism have also both assumed that freedom is realizable through the state, and have been equally authoritarian in their relations to those they have excluded on the African continent and elsewhere.Thinking Freedom in Africa then conceives emancipatory politics beginning from the axiom that ‘people think’. In other words, the idea that anyone is capable of engaging in a collective thought-practice which exceeds social place, interests and identities and which thus begins to think a politics of universal humanity. Using the work of thinkers such as Alain Badiou, Jacques Rancière, Sylvain Lazarus, Frantz Fanon and many others, along with the inventive thought of people themselves in their experiences of struggle, the author proceeds to analyse how Africans themselves – with agency of their own – have thought emancipation during various historical political sequences and to show how emancipation may be thought today in a manner appropriate to twenty-first century conditions and concerns.
Download or read book Citizenship Education and Social Development in Zambia written by Ali A. Abdi and published by IAP. This book was released on 2010-06-01 with total page 171 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Zambia, the butterfly-shaped, central African country has a population of about 11 million people, and as other Sub-Saharan African countries, has been trying to democratize since the early 1990s. Clearly, though, the promise of political reform did not fulfill the expectations of the public, and with about 60 percent of the population living below the poverty line, many Zambians are no longer confident that more open political systems can improve their lives. But the problem may not be inherent in the political process itself, and could be found more in the apparent disconnection between people’s needs and the way the country’s affairs are run. It is with respect to these and related issues that this book emphasizes the crucial relationship between education and political participation, and specifically highlights citizenship education as essential for Zambia’s social development. Social development, which should comprise, inter alia, the economic, political, and cultural wellbeing of societies can be enhanced by citizenship education, which focuses on elevating people’s understanding of their rights and responsibilities vis-à -vis government institutions, structures and functions. Indeed, it is the centrality of the political component in people’s lives, especially its relationship with public policy and public programs that should underline the important role of citizenship education. In describing these issues, the book analyzes the role of the media, women’s groups and youth in enhancing the political, educational, and by extension, the economic lives of the Zambian people. The book should interest students and scholars of Zambian (as well as African) education, politics, and social development. It should also be useful for policy makers, institutional managers and both public and para-public leaders in Zambia and elsewhere in the continent.
Download or read book Women Sexuality and the Political Power of Pleasure written by Susie Jolly and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2013-06-13 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This pioneering collection explores the ways in which positive, pleasure-focused approaches to sexuality can empower women. Gender and development has tended to engage with sexuality only in relation to violence and ill-health. Although this has been hugely important in challenging violence against women, over-emphasizing these negative aspects has dovetailed with conservative ideologies that associate women's sexualities with danger and fear. On the other hand, the media, the pharmaceutical industry, and pornography more broadly celebrate the pleasures of sex in ways that can be just as oppressive, often implying that only certain types of people - young, heterosexual, able-bodied, HIV-negative - are eligible for sexual pleasure. Women, Sexuality and the Political Power of Pleasure brings together challenges to these strictures and exclusions from both the South and North of the globe, with examples of activism, advocacy and programming which use pleasure as an entry point. It shows how positive approaches to pleasure and sexuality can enhance equality and empowerment for all.
Download or read book Challenging Hegemony written by Nigel C. Gibson and published by Africa Research and Publications. This book was released on 2006 with total page 312 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Africa Development written by and published by . This book was released on 2007 with total page 786 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A quarterly journal of the Council for the Development of Economic and Social Research in Africa = Revue trimestrielle du conseil pour le développement de la recherche economique et sociale en Afrique.
Download or read book World Development Report 2011 written by World Bank and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2011-05-01 with total page 417 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The 2011 WDR on Conflict, Security and Development underlines the devastating impact of persistent conflict on a country or region's development prospects - noting that the 1.5 billion people living in conflict-affected areas are twice as likely to be in poverty. Its goal is to contribute concrete, practical suggestions on conflict and fragility.
Download or read book Domesticating Democracy written by Susan Helen Ellison and published by Duke University Press. This book was released on 2018-04-19 with total page 282 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Domesticating Democracy Susan Helen Ellison examines foreign-funded alternate dispute resolution (ADR) organizations that provide legal aid and conflict resolution to vulnerable citizens in El Alto, Bolivia. Advocates argue that these programs help residents cope with their interpersonal disputes and economic troubles while avoiding an overburdened legal system and cumbersome state bureaucracies. Ellison shows that ADR programs do more than that—they aim to change the ways Bolivians interact with the state and with global capitalism, making them into self-reliant citizens. ADR programs frequently encourage Bolivians to renounce confrontational expressions of discontent, turning away from courtrooms, physical violence, and street protest and coming to the negotiation table. Nevertheless, residents of El Alto find creative ways to take advantage of these micro-level resources while still seeking justice and a democratic system capable of redressing the structural violence and vulnerability that ADR fails to treat.
Download or read book Governance for Peace written by David Cortright and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2017-09-21 with total page 307 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An evidence-based analysis of governance focusing on the institutional capacities and qualities that reduce the risk of armed conflict.
Download or read book Yearbook of Transnational History written by Thomas Adam and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2022-05-05 with total page 215 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Yearbook of Transnational History is dedicated to disseminating pioneering research in the field of transnational history. This fifth volume advances the frontier of transnational history into early modern times. The six chapters of this volume explore topics and themes from early modern times to the fall of Communism. This volume includes chapters about the Huguenots and Sephardi Jews as transnational nations in the seventeenth and eighteenth century, the construction of cannabis knowledge cultures in the transatlantic world of the nineteenth century, the role of the German pastor Martin Niemoeller in the construction of transnational religious identities in the aftermath of World War II, and the labor migration - from Cuba to East Germany - within the Socialist world in the 1970s and 1980s.
Download or read book Cannabis Policy written by Robin Room and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2010 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It looks at the experience of a number of countries which have tried reforming their regimes and softening prohibition, exploring the kinds of changes or penalties for use for possession: including depenalization, decriminalization, medical control, and different types of legalization. It evaluates such changes and draws on them to assess the effects on levels and patterns of use, on the market, and on adverse consequences of prohibition. For policymakers willing to look outside the box of the global prohibition regime, the book examines the options and possibilities for a country or group of countries to bring about change in, or opt out of, the global control system. Throughout, the book examines cannabis within a global frame, and provides in accessible form information which anyone considering reform will need in order to make decisions on cannabis policy (much of which is new or has not been readily available).
Download or read book Making States Work written by United Nations University and published by United Nations University Press. This book was released on 2005 with total page 419 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The point of departure for this collection of articles is the idea that there is a link between international peace and strong states respectful of human rights and robust civil societies. Presented by Chesterman (New York U. School of Law, US), Ignatieff (Harvard U.'s John F. Kennedy School of Government, US), and Thakur (United Nations Universi
Download or read book The Last Utopia written by Samuel Moyn and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2012-03-05 with total page 346 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Human rights offer a vision of international justice that today’s idealistic millions hold dear. Yet the very concept on which the movement is based became familiar only a few decades ago when it profoundly reshaped our hopes for an improved humanity. In this pioneering book, Samuel Moyn elevates that extraordinary transformation to center stage and asks what it reveals about the ideal’s troubled present and uncertain future. For some, human rights stretch back to the dawn of Western civilization, the age of the American and French Revolutions, or the post–World War II moment when the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was framed. Revisiting these episodes in a dramatic tour of humanity’s moral history, The Last Utopia shows that it was in the decade after 1968 that human rights began to make sense to broad communities of people as the proper cause of justice. Across eastern and western Europe, as well as throughout the United States and Latin America, human rights crystallized in a few short years as social activism and political rhetoric moved it from the hallways of the United Nations to the global forefront. It was on the ruins of earlier political utopias, Moyn argues, that human rights achieved contemporary prominence. The morality of individual rights substituted for the soiled political dreams of revolutionary communism and nationalism as international law became an alternative to popular struggle and bloody violence. But as the ideal of human rights enters into rival political agendas, it requires more vigilance and scrutiny than when it became the watchword of our hopes.
Download or read book Cultural Perspectives Geopolitics Energy Security of Eurasia written by Mahir Ibrahimov and published by . This book was released on 2017 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
