Africa Today articles from September 2008

Africa Today archives from September 2008

From miracle to nightmare: an institutional analysis of development failures in Cote d'Ivoire.(Report)
September 22, 2008... Once touted as the "Ivorian miracle," Cote d'Ivoire has become a development nightmare. For two decades after obtaining independence, its economic growth and unwavering political stability baffled economists and inspired other fledgling African...

Amoah, Michael. 2007. Reconstructing the Nation in Africa: the Politics of Nationalism in Ghana.(Book review)
September 22, 2008... Amoah, Michael. 2007. RECONSTRUCTING THE NATION IN AFRICA: THE POLITICS OF NATIONALISM IN GHANA. London: Tauris Academic Studies. 248 pp. $74.95. The tension between nation-building and ethnic identities is an important issue in most...

Matthias Basedau, Gero Erdmann, and Andreas Mehler, eds. 2007. Votes, Money and Violence: Political Parties and Elections in Sub-Saharan Africa.(Book review)
September 22, 2008... Matthias Basedau, Gero Erdmann, and Andreas Mehler, eds. 2007. VOTES, MONEY AND VIOLENCE: POLITICAL PARTIES AND ELECTIONS IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA. Uppsala, Sweden: Nordic African Institute. 301 pp. $37.50. Votes, Money and Violence is a...

Freund, Bill. 2007. The African City. A History.(Book review)
September 22, 2008... Freund, Bill. 2007. THE AFRICAN CITY. A HISTORY. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press. 214 pp. $19.99. This book succeeds in its primary mission: to provide a student-friendly overview of Africa's urban histories. Bill Freund...

Lindberg, Staffan I. 2006. Democracy and Elections in Africa.(Book review)
September 22, 2008... Lindberg, Staffan I. 2006. DEMOCRACY AND ELECTIONS IN AFRICA. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. 227 pp. $24.95. In Democracy and Elections in Africa, Staffan Lindberg sets out to examine the centrality of elections in the process...

Luedke, Tracy, and Harry West, eds. 2006. Borders and Healers: Brokering Therapeutic Resources in Southeast Africa.(Book review)
September 22, 2008... Luedke, Tracy, and Harry West, eds. 2006. Borders and Healers: Brokering Therapeutic Resources in Southeast Africa. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. 223 pp. $24.95. This book is a comparative ethnography about how healers navigate...

Maxwell, David. 2006. African Gifts of the Spirit: Pentecostalism and the Rise of a Zimbabwean Transnational Religious Movement.(Book review)
September 22, 2008... Maxwell, David. 2006. AFRICAN GIFT OF THE SPIRIT: PENTECOSTALISM AND THE RISE OF A ZIMBABWEAN TRANSNATIONAL RELIGIOUS MOVEMENT. Oxford: James Currey. 320 pp. $55.00 (cloth). A number of works have been published on Pentecostalism as a new...

McPeak, John, and Peter Little, eds. 2006. Pastoral Livestock Marketing in Eastern and Southern Africa: Research and Policy Challenges.(Book review)
September 22, 2008... McPeak, John, and Peter Little, eds. 2006. PASTORAL LIVESTOCK MARKETING IN EASTERN AND SOUTHERN AFRICA: RESEARCH AND POLICY CHALLENGES. Warwickshire, U.K.: Intermediate Technology Publications. 288 pp. $29.95. Longstanding problems...

Wangila, Mary Nyangweso. 2007. Female Circumcision: The Interplay of Religion, Culture and Gender in Kenya.(Book review)
September 22, 2008... Wangila, Mary Nyangweso. 2007. FEMALE CIRCUMCISION: THE INTERPLAY OF RELIGION, CULTURE AND GENDER IN KENYA. NEW YORK: ORBIS BOOKS. 216 pp. $19.00. Focusing on female circumcision, Mary Nyangweso Wangila addresses a topic of great...

A millennium democratic goal for Ethiopia: some conceptual issues.
September 22, 2008... This paper proposes an Ethiopian Democratic Millennium Goal that articulates freedom, development, and social justice. It examines how the conceptual stretching of democracy, nation, and civil society has created epistemic obstacles that...

Cultural resistance and resilience amid imported TV programming in Nigeria.(Report)
September 22, 2008... This experimental study investigated the effects of American-produced entertainment programs on Nigerian audiences' knowledge, beliefs, behaviors, attitudes, and values, using the cultural-imperialism theory as a framework. The subject pool for...

Special seats for women in the national legislature: the case of Tanzania.(Report)
September 22, 2008... This study examines attempts to increase the number of women serving in the Tanzanian parliament by implementation of a special-seat system for women, the evolution of the system, and the impact of the system on women's competitiveness in the...

Coping with social deprivation through self-governing institutions in oil communities of Nigeria.(Report)
September 22, 2008... In spite of the fact that Nigeria relies on oil for the main source of its revenue, the communities where crude oil is extracted lack important social services. The politics of exclusion adopted by the Nigerian state is largely responsible for...