Africa Today articles from January 1993

Africa Today archives from January 1993

Mass Media, politics and society in Botswana: the 1990s and beyond. (Botswana: Achievements and Challenges)
January 1, 1993... In contemporary African politics, to study the press and broadcasting is to unavoidably and deeply enter the realm of political and social policy analysis. This article examines recent patterns and trends in media-government relations in...

Diamonds are a state's best friend: Botswana's foreign policy in Southern Africa. (Botswana: Achievements and Challenges)
January 1, 1993... Since independence in 1966, Botswana has been a puzzle in the context of southern African politics. Its territorial boundaries were a result of the British imperial strategy to foil a potential link between German Southwest Africa and the Boer...

Reforming the reform: education in Botswana. (Botswana: Achievements and Challenges)
January 1, 1993... Botswana is one of the largest and most populated of 71 "small states" with populations below 1.5 million (of which there are 13 in Africa).(1) The development and operation of education systems in small states has become a focus of concern for...

Environmental policy in Botswana: a critique. (Botswana: Achievements and Challenges)
January 1, 1993... This paper deals with some of the causes of environmental degradation in Botswana. These causes are rooted in structural problems, such as cultural continuity in rural-urban settings, population growth and concentration of population in a few...

A Little God: The Twilight of Patriarchy in a Southern African Chiefdom.
January 1, 1993... The author of this book, Diana Wylie, describes earlier and later 19th and 20th century Tswana society, with particular reference to the Ngwato chiefdom. She uses two pattern variables to describe Tswana society: traditional and modern social...

My Fight Against Apartheid.
January 1, 1993... Michael Dingake is a Motswana from Bobonong in northeastern Botswana. He is in his early sixties. He has spent one quarter of his life in prisons in South Africa, including 15 years between 1966-82 on Robben Island where he was a fellow prisoner...

Land Filled With Flies: A Political Economy of the Kalahari.
January 1, 1993... Land Filled with Flies is an impressive book. Its quality was recognized when it received the Herskovits award in 1990, but the reader need only read the first few pages to judge both the quality and ambitiousness of the work. Wilmsen presents an...

Mating.
January 1, 1993... This novel is set in Botswana, about Botswana, but it is not of or for Botswana. It has been written for Americans and is more about America and American perceptions of the world than Africa. It is a novel about "whites in Africa and not black...

Regulation of the environment in traditional society as a basis for the right to a satisfactory environment. (Africa Rights Monitor )
January 1, 1993... In international legal circles, the right to a satisfactory environment was articulated in the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights, in article 24. That article, however, does little to specify any precise meaning. Further, it appears in...

The Bushman Myth: The Making of a Namibian Underclass.
January 1, 1993... In Robert Gordon's The Bushman Myth, we at last have what I believe is an accurate and balanced account of a people arguably among the world's most studied and least understood. Gordon succeeds in fleshing out the problems with Bushman myths and...

A Gesture of Belonging: Letters from Bessie Head, 1965-1979.
January 1, 1993... In 1964 Bessie Head's arrival in the British Protectorate of Bechuanaland, now the Republic of Botswana, marked the beginning of a 15-year exile from South Africa which culminated in her citizenship only seven years prior to her death. Born in a...

Starlings Laughing: A Memoir of Africa.
January 1, 1993... The author of this book, June Vendall Clark, formerly June Kay, was an activist for wildlife protection in the 1960s. While this book claims to be a memoir of Africa, it is not; nor is it an account of the struggle to protect wildlife in Botswana...

Who's Who in South African Politics, 3d ed.
January 1, 1993... It is a sign of frequent usage when a reference book is known by the name of its author, rather than by its title. Now in its third edition, Sheila Gastrow's book is invariably referred to in this fashion by South African librarians, and the...