Journal of Modern African Studies最新文献

{"title":"Researching Africa and the offshore world","authors":"Ricardo Soares de Oliveira","doi":"10.1017/S0022278X22000210","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022278X22000210","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT One of the key features of today's global economy is an ‘offshore world’ of financial structures, institutions and techniques designed to provide secrecy, asset protection and tax exemption. While its worldwide impact is very significant, Africa is affected to an unusual extent by the strategies of tax avoidance/evasion, outward financial flows (both legal and illegal) and corruption enabled by the offshore world. This is corroborated by a number of quantitative studies of capital flight as well as by influential investigations such as the Pandora Papers, Panama Papers and Luanda Leaks. The offshore world's limited presence in the study of contemporary African politics, political economy and international relations is therefore striking. The purpose of this exploratory paper is to highlight this gap, provide a preliminary analysis, and suggest that the politics of African insertion in the global offshore economy merits more attention from scholars of African politics.","PeriodicalId":47608,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern African Studies","volume":"60 1","pages":"265 - 296"},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2022-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44443468","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Understanding Modern Nigeria: ethnicity, democracy, and development by Toyin Falola Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021. Pp. 672. £74.99 (hbk).","authors":"D. Babalola","doi":"10.1017/S0022278X22000131","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022278X22000131","url":null,"abstract":"invest in pro-trade policies – particularly when members are not in direct competition with each other – so that the leaders can mobilise members if the state tries to interfere. In the absence of state threats, strong leaders use their power to extort traders and embezzle market funds. Competition between traders, as well as weak leaders, can also lead to poor private governance and poorly functioning markets. Grossman concludes that private governance works best in the shadow of the state – under enough threat of interference to motivate strong leaders to build governance institutions but not so much interference that the government crushes or takes over market institutions. The book supports the argument with a rich array of original surveys, maps, administrative data, observations, and interviews with traders in Lagos. Informal work and institutions are notoriously difficult to quantify because they exist by definition outside of regulatory agencies that collect regular data and labour statistics. Grossman addressed this challenge by building a sampling frame of markets from the Lagos Waste Management Authority, mapping out every market in the city and taking a census of , shops. Grossman then randomly selected shops from this frame and surveyed  traders in face-to-face interviews with a team of enumerators. She conducted three waves of surveys in ,  and , with  traders participating in all three waves. This trove of data gives Grossman unprecedented quantitative data on the economic and political decisions of an important group of microenterprises over time. Grossman uses these data to prove her points as well as anticipate objections and alternative explanations. She illustrates the numbers with interviews, stories and observations across the market landscape in Lagos. Grossman asserts that her account of private governance institutions in Lagos marketplaces uncovers a channel for trade and development that does not require a benevolent or efficient government or even the rule of law. Instead, she argues, all a government needs to do to spur efficient private institutions is to threaten to intervene in business people’s affairs. She convincingly demonstrates that when predatory politicians work against traders’ interests, they unintentionally trigger private policies and mobilisation that benefits traders. This book should be on the reading list of scholars working on property rights, development, governance, informality, African politics and urban politics.","PeriodicalId":47608,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern African Studies","volume":"60 1","pages":"423 - 425"},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2022-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48922693","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"MOA volume 60 issue 3 Cover and Front matter","authors":"","doi":"10.1017/s0022278x22000428","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/s0022278x22000428","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":47608,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern African Studies","volume":"60 1","pages":"f1 - f4"},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2022-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42247748","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Shari‘a, Inshallah: finding God in Somali legal politics by Mark Fathi Massoud Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021. Pp. 391. £26.99 (pbk).","authors":"S. Chalmers","doi":"10.1017/s0022278x22000155","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/s0022278x22000155","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":47608,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern African Studies","volume":"60 1","pages":"421 - 422"},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2022-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44738344","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"A Tapestry of African Histories: with longer times and wider geopolitics edited by Nicholas K. Githuku Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2021. Pp. 408. $125 (hbk).","authors":"Waliu A. Ismaila","doi":"10.1017/S0022278X2200012X","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022278X2200012X","url":null,"abstract":"A Tapestry of African Histories enriches our understanding of the transnational history of Africa, covering biographical studies, social and economic history, pre-colonial history, colonial and postcolonial development, and nationalist and intel-lectual history with a longue durée . The collection has been thoroughly researched by experienced contributors whose careers were in fl uenced by Robert Maxon ’ s scholarship – the historian-Africanist to whom this book is dedicated for his signi fi cant role in the development of history as an academic fi eld of study in Kenya and East Africa more broadly. Beyond Maxon, it is an addition to the revisionist scholarship on Africa reclaiming local voices in modern state formation and development.Thebookrecognizes Maxon ’ s commitment to the career of his Kenyan colleagues and their scholarship. Three of the chapters in the book are written by Maxon himself. The fi rst chapter is written by another doyen of Kenyan history, John M. Lonsdale, who argued for historical plurality in the writing of Kenyan history to help readers think for themselves. Chapter  chronicles Maxon ’ s career history and how he began to interface with Kenya and its people. Chapter  showcases Maxon ’ s biographical approach to Kenya ’ s national history. Here, he argues for the study of silent voices in Kenyan history. In particular, he places focuses on Kenyan nationalist, Oginga Odinga, who he claims has not been accorded his proper place in Kenyan historiography for his heroism and contribution to decolonisation, unlike his nationalist counterpart, Jomo Kenyatta. ,","PeriodicalId":47608,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern African Studies","volume":"60 1","pages":"427 - 428"},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2022-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45834805","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Politics of Order in Informal Markets: how the state shapes private governance by Shelby Grossman Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021. Pp. 200. $77 (hbk).","authors":"C. Hummel","doi":"10.1017/S0022278X22000167","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022278X22000167","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":47608,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern African Studies","volume":"60 1","pages":"422 - 423"},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2022-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49232727","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Embodied Engineering: gendered labor, food security, and taste in twentieth century Mali by Laura Ann Twagira Athens, OH: Ohio University Press, 2021. Pp. 344. $64.00 (hbk).","authors":"Brandi Simpson Miller","doi":"10.1017/S0022278X22000143","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022278X22000143","url":null,"abstract":"a culture of meritocracy but the constitution ‘must expunge its “federal character” clauses’ (). In addition to political restructuring, Nigeria also needs economic restructuring where the excessive reliance on oil is reduced. The economy needs diversifying in such a way that the agricultural sector is accorded some importance, as it was before the discovery of oil. The book is well researched, superbly structured and written in a very simple language. However, some of the chapter introductions are rather long and this affects the flow of the discussion. In Chapter , for example,  pages (–) are devoted to the introduction. Similarly, Chapter  has  pages (–) of introduction. Some editorial issues were also observed in the book such as ‘not only is the executive list overloaded’ (), while ‘executive’ there should be ‘exclusive’. Except for those minor concerns, Understanding Modern Nigeria surely presents a critical analysis of the inherent contradictions in post-colonial Nigeria and will make an interesting read for experts on Nigeria and non-experts alike.","PeriodicalId":47608,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern African Studies","volume":"60 1","pages":"425 - 426"},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2022-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46913474","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Actors, bricolage, and translation in education policy: a case study from Ghana","authors":"P. Boakye, D. Béland","doi":"10.1017/S0022278X22000192","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022278X22000192","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Due to the centrality of education to economic growth and social development, successive governments in post-colonial Ghana have implemented policies to improve the quality of education in the country. In line with this, Ghana embarked on its first major education reform in 1987 under the Provisional National Defence Council (PNDC) government. While several studies have been conducted to explain this reform, these studies have largely been descriptive and theoretically, have over relied on the conditionality thesis. Our study draws on ideational literature and research interviews to offer an alternative explanation of the 1987 reform. Drawing extensively on the ideational concepts of bricolage and translation and focusing on the actors using these two mechanisms, the study argues that, while exogenous forces did impact the 1987 reform, it was mainly driven by endogenous factors featuring both path dependent and departing changes.","PeriodicalId":47608,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern African Studies","volume":"60 1","pages":"323 - 344"},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2022-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41928955","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Framing illegal artisanal and small-scale gold mining in the Ghanaian media during the #StopGalamsey campaign","authors":"I. Sojková","doi":"10.1017/S0022278X22000222","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022278X22000222","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) plays a significant socio-economic role in the alleviation of poverty. In Ghana, the increase in and persistence of illegal ASM (galamsey) can be explained by unemployment, cumbersome and costly registration, lack of land, corruption and Chinese engagement. Traditionally, Ghanaian governments have neglected to address ASM activities by means of policy, while publicly emphasizing its negative impacts. In 2017, the media campaign #StopGalamsey became a culmination of this process. This study represents a qualitative content analysis of #StopGalamsey media discourses. It aims to understand how galamsey was framed in the media during the first two years of the campaign. Based on an analysis of 176 articles from the Daily Graphic newspaper, four dominant frames were identified – environmental menace, criminal activity, complex menace and corruption and collusion. Galamsey was portrayed in an overwhelmingly negative way, miners were dehumanised and criminalised, conflicting perspectives marginalised, and non-traditional perception emphasised via Chinese engagement.","PeriodicalId":47608,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern African Studies","volume":"60 1","pages":"371 - 396"},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2022-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46841210","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Africa's liberation generation","authors":"R. Rotberg","doi":"10.1017/s0022278x22000209","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/s0022278x22000209","url":null,"abstract":"Today's African political class is much more diverse in character and aspiration than the one that overcame colonial rule and inaugurated independent governments. Sons of early liberation leaders now jostle for power in a few countries (Chad, Kenya), descendants of successful autocrats perpetuate family rule in others (Gabon), several long-serving hegemons remain in control after decades in office (as in Cameroon, Djibouti, Rwanda and Uganda), a clutch of kleptocrats continue to defraud citizens (as in Equatorial Guinea and Zimbabwe), upstart soldiers oust elected placeholders (Burkina Faso, Guinea, Mali), and here and there democratic stalwarts (Botswana, Ghana, Malawi, Senegal, South Africa, Zambia) are delivering authentic, uplifting, leadership to their followers.","PeriodicalId":47608,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern African Studies","volume":"60 1","pages":"397 - 419"},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2022-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48369309","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}