Complicity And Responsibility In Contemporary African Writing

This book investigates the many ways in which contemporary African fiction has reflected on themes of responsibility and complicity during the postcolonial period. Covering the authors Ayi Kwei Armah, Tsitsi Dangarembga, Nuruddin Farah, Michiel Heyns, and J. M. Coetzee, the book places each writer’s novels in their cultural and literary context in order to investigate similarities and differences between fictional approaches to individual complicity in politically unstable situations. In doing so, the study focuses on these texts’ representations of discomforting experiences of being implicated in harm done to others in order to show that it is precisely during times of political crisis that questions of moral responsibility and implicatedness in compromised conduct become more pronounced. The study also challenges longstanding western amnesia concerning responsibility for historical and present-day violence in African countries and juxtaposes this denial of responsibility with the western literary readership’s consumption of narratives of African “suffering.” The study instead proposes new reading habits based on an awareness of readerly complicity and responsibility. Drawing insights from across political philosophy and literary theory, this book will be of interest to researchers of African literature, postcolonial studies, and peace and conflict studies.

Mediating Historical Responsibility brings together leading scholars and new voices in the interdisciplinary fields of memory studies, history, and cultural studies to explore the ways culture, and cultural representations, have been at the forefront of bringing the memory of past injustices to the attention of audiences for many years. Engaging with the darkest pages of twentieth-century European history, dealing with the legacy of colonialism, war crimes, genocides, dictatorships, and racism, the authors of this collection of critical essays address Europe’s ‘difficult pasts’ through the study of cultural products, examining historical narratives, literary texts, films, documentaries, theatre, poetry, graphic novels, visual artworks, material heritage, and the cultural and political reception of official government reports. Adopting an intermedial approach to the study of European history, the book probes the relationship between memory and responsibility, investigating what it means to take responsibility for the past and showing how cultural products are fundamentally entangled in this process.

This book investigates the role of ethnic federalism in Ethiopian politics, reflecting on a long history of division amongst the country’s political elites. The book argues that these patterns have enabled the resilience and survival of authoritarianism in the country, and have led to the failure of democratization. Ethnic conflict in Ethiopia stretches back to the country’s imperial history. Competing nationalisms begin to emerge towards the end of the imperial era, but were formalized by the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) from the 1990s onwards. Under the EPRDF, ethnicity and language classifications formed the main organizing principles for political parties and organizations, and the country’s new federal arrangement was also designed along ethnic fault lines. This book argues that this ethnic federal arrangement, and the continuation of an elite political culture are major factors in explaining the continuation of authoritarianism in Ethiopia. Focusing largely on the last 27 years under the EPRDF and on the political changes of the last few years, but also stretching back to historical narratives of ethnic grievances and division, this book is an important guide to the ethnic politics of Ethiopia and will be of interest to researchers of African politics, authoritarianism and ethnic conflict.

This book provides a comprehensive analysis of the development and governance nexus in Africa’s Great Lakes region. The Great Lakes region continues to experience many challenges, yet much of the literature continues to focus on political governance, leaving behind the socio-economic aspects of the everyday lives of people in the region. This book seeks to bridge this gap in information, considering the social, economic, and cultural dynamics of the population as they inter-play with political discourse as key factors of sustainable development. Drawing on empirical cases and examples from Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, South Sudan, and Uganda, the book analyses each of the major governance and development issues in Great Lakes region of Africa, including region building and integration, social protection, inter-state relations, democracy and participation, and sustainability. Written by an African scholar with over 20 years of experience of working with indigenous groups in over 34 African countries, this book will be an important read for students and scholars across the fields of international relations, political studies, sustainable development (social and economic), sociology, public policy and management and public administration.

Literature’s Critique, Subversion, and Transformation of Justice explores two of the fundamental institutions in human existence and social democracy that attend to philosophical consideration and critical discussion of how literature interacts with the phenomena of justice.

This book reflects on Nigeria’s fourth republic, the country’s longest democratic period since it gained independence from Great Britain. It argues that although constitutional or political democracy has lasted for over two decades in Nigeria and seen three successful democratic changes of power, Nigeria’s democracy remains largely militarised. During Nigeria’s fourth republic, political and socio-economic affairs have been increasingly dominated by a pervasive military presence and ideology, which has seen a redistribution of resources and government funds away from social programmes into an increase in security budgets, weapons proliferation, and internal military interventions and occupations. This institutionalisation of violence has turned the country into a national security state where the rule of force and violence rather than dialogue and compassion reflect everyday reality. Whilst acknowledging the history of militarisation during colonial and military rule, this book makes a compelling argument for considering the distinct character of the Nigerian nation state’s path to militarisation over the last 20 years of experimentation with democracy. This book’s fresh insights into the fourth republic’s path to militarisation will be of interest to researchers of African politics, security and development.

This book focuses on the continued impact of British colonial legacy on the rule of law in Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, and Zimbabwe. The legal system is intended to protect regular citizens, but within the majority of Africa the rule of law remains infused with Eurocentric cultural and linguistic tropes, which can leave its supposed beneficiaries feeling alienated from the structures intended to protect them. This book traces the impact, effect, opportunities, and challenges that the colonial legacy poses for the rule of law across Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, and Zimbabwe. The book examines the similarities and differences of the colonial legacy on the current legal landscape of each nation and the intersection with the rule of law. This important comparative study will be of interest to scholars of Political Science, International Studies, Law, African Politics, and British Colonial History.

This book examines the complex relationship between the state and civil society and the impact that this has had on democratization processes in Nigeria from colonial times to the present. Expanding notions of democracy, the author builds a theoretical understanding of civil society to show how it can be both antithetical to and an ally of the state in the struggle for democratization. Combining the neo-Gramscian framework with discursive perspectives from Habermas and Foucault, the book takes a dialectical approach that traces the incarnations of the state and civil society and relates the mutual connections of the two spaces. This book will be of interest to scholars of African politics, democratization and civil society.