Seeing Like a Citizen

Seeing Like a Citizen PDF Author: Kara Moskowitz
Publisher: Ohio University Press
ISBN: 0821446894
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 341

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Book Description
In Seeing Like a Citizen, Kara Moskowitz approaches Kenya’s late colonial and early postcolonial eras as a single period of political, economic, and social transition. In focusing on rural Kenyans—the vast majority of the populace and the main targets of development interventions—as they actively sought access to aid, she offers new insights into the texture of political life in decolonizing Kenya and the early postcolonial world. Using multisited archival sources and oral histories focused on the western Rift Valley, Seeing Like a Citizen makes three fundamental contributions to our understanding of African and Kenyan history. First, it challenges the widely accepted idea of the gatekeeper state, revealing that state control remained limited and that the postcolonial state was an internally varied and often dissonant institution. Second, it transforms our understanding of postcolonial citizenship, showing that its balance of rights and duties was neither claimed nor imposed, but negotiated and differentiated. Third, it reorients Kenyan historiography away from central Kenya and elite postcolonial politics. The result is a powerful investigation of experiences of independence, of the meaning and form of development, and of how global political practices were composed and recomposed on the ground in local settings.

Christianity and Genocide in Rwanda

Christianity and Genocide in Rwanda PDF Author: Timothy Longman
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 0521191394
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 377

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Book Description
This book studies the role of Christian churches in the 1994 Rwandan genocide. Timothy Longman's research shows that Rwandan churches have consistently allied themselves with the state and engaged in ethnic politics, making them a center of struggle over power and resources. He argues that the genocide in Rwanda was a conservative response to progressive forces that were attempting to democratize Christian churches.

From Empires to NGOs in the West African Sahel

From Empires to NGOs in the West African Sahel PDF Author: Gregory Mann
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107016541
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 305

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Book Description
This book explains the shift from the government of empires to that of NGOs in the region just south of the Sahara. It describes the ambitions of newly independent African states, their political experiments, and the challenges they faced. No other book places black American activism, Amnesty International, and CARE together in the history of African politics.

The Borders of Race in Colonial South Africa

The Borders of Race in Colonial South Africa PDF Author: Robert Ross
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107042496
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 365

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Book Description
This is the detailed narrative of the Kat River Settlement, which was located on the border between the Cape Colony and the amaXhosa in the Eastern Cape of South Africa during the nineteenth century. The settlement created a fertile landscape in the valley and developed a political theology of great political and racial importance to the evolution of the Cape and of South Africa as a whole.

Slaves, Freedmen and Indentured Laborers in Colonial Mauritius

Slaves, Freedmen and Indentured Laborers in Colonial Mauritius PDF Author: Richard B. Allen
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521641258
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 252

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Book Description
In this wide-ranging social and economic history of the island of Mauritius, from French colonization in 1721 to the beginnings of modern political life in the colony in the mid-1930s, Richard Allen brings out the importance of domestic capital formation, particularly in the sugar industry. He describes the changing relationship between different elements in the society - slave, free and maroon, and East Indian indentured populations - and shows how these were conditioned by demographic changes, world markets and local institutions. Based on thorough archival research, and thoroughly attuned to contemporary debates, this 1999 book will bring the Mauritian case to the attention of scholars engaged in the comparative study of slavery and plantation systems.

Islam, Ethnicity, and Conflict in Ethiopia

Islam, Ethnicity, and Conflict in Ethiopia PDF Author: Terje Østebø
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108839681
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 385

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Book Description
Discussing an armed insurgency in Ethiopia (1963-1970), this study offers a new perspective for understanding relations between religion and ethnicity.

Navigating Local Transitional Justice

Navigating Local Transitional Justice PDF Author: Laura S. Martin
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1009281038
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 215

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Book Description
In post-war Sierra Leone, a range of transitional justice mechanisms were implemented to address experiences of conflict, violence, and human rights violations. Much of the research on local transitional justice processes has focused on the work of organisations, failing to acknowledge how individual and communal dynamics shape and are shaped by these programs. Drawing on original fieldwork in Sierra Leone, Laura S. Martin moves beyond discussions measuring effectiveness and considers how people navigate their circumstances in conflict and post-conflict societies. Developing the idea of recognised and unrecognised transitional justice processes, Martin uses Fambul Tok as an example of a recognised local transitional justice program and shows how ordinary Sierra Leoneans appropriated Fambul Tok's agenda for their own purposes. Ultimately, this book highlights the crucial role of agency and the diverse range of actors involved in transitional justice processes. Justice, as Martin powerfully argues, is not something that happens to or for people, but is enacted by individuals and communities.

Smugglers and Saints of the Sahara

Smugglers and Saints of the Sahara PDF Author: Judith Scheele
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 110737989X
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 287

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Book Description
Smugglers and Saints of the Sahara describes life on and around the contemporary border between Algeria and Mali, exploring current developments in a broad historical and socioeconomic context. Basing her findings on long-term fieldwork with trading families, truckers, smugglers and scholars, Judith Scheele investigates the history of contemporary patterns of mobility from the late nineteenth century to the present. Through a careful analysis of family ties and local economic records, this book shows how long-standing mobility and interdependence have shaped not only local economies, but also notions of social hierarchy, morality and political legitimacy, creating patterns that endure today and that need to be taken into account in any empirically-grounded study of the region.

Party Politics and Economic Reform in Africa's Democracies

Party Politics and Economic Reform in Africa's Democracies PDF Author: M. Anne Pitcher
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 0521449626
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 329

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Book Description
Argues that the interaction of formal institutions and the quality of democracy explain patterns of private sector development across Africa.

Youth and Experiences of Ageing among Maa

Youth and Experiences of Ageing among Maa PDF Author: Paul Spencer
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN: 3110372339
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 196

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Book Description
The Maa of East Africa are a cluster of related pastoral peoples who share a social organization based on age. This groups men into life-long cohorts from their initiation in youth, regardless of family wealth. Historically, this type of pre-market society has been described in every continent, but East Africa provides the principal surviving region of age-based societies, among whom the Maasai are the best known. In this volume, comparison between three branches of Maa highlights different aspects of their society: the dynamics of power with age and gender among the Maasai, of ritual performance and belief among the Samburu, and of historical change among the Chamus. Here it is argued that understanding another culture can only be approached through models derived in the first instance from the representations conveyed by members of that culture. The social anthropologist may then elaborate these images through the choice of analytical parallels, even extending to other disciplines and personal experience. Each chapter in this volume views Maa institutions through a different lens, exploring models relevant to a comprehensive analysis of their social life.