Review

Reviewed Work(s): The Fate of Africa: From the Hopes of Freedom to the Heart of Despair
by Martin Meredith
Review by: Kwame Akonor
Source: Journal of Black Studies, Vol. 37, No. 5 (May., 2007), pp. 794-796
Published by: Sage Publications, Inc.
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/40034367
Accessed: 28-06-2020 16:28 UTC

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide
range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and
facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at
https://about.jstor.org/terms

Sage Publications, Inc. is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to
Journal of Black Studies

This content downloaded from 134.193.117.53 on Sun, 28 Jun 2020 16:28:17 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
794 JOURNAL OF BLACK STUDIES / MAY 2007

popular culture, the book is written from the perspective of a social

historian. The position held by this reviewer is that the author's
utilization of the postmodernist critique of the modernist
supposition in order to advance the thesis of the book could have
been aptly achieved by the Afrocentric paradigm. Otherwise, the
study is a major intellectual contribution to the investigation, anal-
ysis, and understanding of African popular culture. Indubitably,
students and scholars in the discipline of Africana and African
studies, as well as those with zealous interest in the study of African
human sciences - orature, cultural history, performing arts, aes-
thetics, sociology, anthropology, and religion - will find this book
very precious.

- Kwame Botwe-Asamoah

University of Pittsburgh

The Fate of Africa: From the Hopes of Freedom to the Heart of Despair, by
Martin Meredith. New York: Public Affairs. 2005.
DOI: 10.1177/0021934705284451

Martin Meredith, a veteran journalist, biographer, and historian,

has written a very ambitious book on why Africa remains underde-
veloped despite half a century of independence from European
empires. Focusing on a number of postcolonial African political
leaders, events, and themes, Meredith concludes that internal prob-
lems, particularly the lack of honest and effective governance,
account for the continent's seemingly intractable troubles. It is
clear that any attempt to narrate a 50-year political history involv-
ing 50-plus countries is a daunting task, yet Meredith, with more
than 700 very readable pages, manages to extensively document
Africa's self-inflicting wounds. And therein lies the rub: By focus-
ing solely on internal factors, to the neglect of external and histori-
cal variables, Meredith provides an incomplete and partial reading
of Africa's political history.

This content downloaded from 134.193.117.53 on Sun, 28 Jun 2020 16:28:17 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 BOOK REVIEWS 795

The complete story about Africa's "history of fifty years of in

pendence" (Meredith's sub-subtitle) and how the contine
morphed "from the hopes of freedom to the heart of despai
(Meredith's subtitle) ought to include a comprehensive analysi
external constraints such as Africa's subservient and depend
status in the global political economy, the expansion of global
nomic protectionism by the major industrial countries, as we
the effect of the cold war, among others. One other important om
sion in his book is The Organization of African Unity (OAU), n
African Union. Although the OAU was largely ineffectual dur
its existence, it nonetheless was a major African political inst
tion, deserving mention in any discussion on Africa's politic
history.
Meredith's designated half-century time frame is also a liability
in that it does not allow him to take the history of Africa seriously -
that of colonialization, in particular. Rather than reporting the
behavior of Africa's "vampire-like politicians" (p. 688), a serious
reading of the colonialist project in Africa would have revealed the
long-term consequences of the colonial system's institutional
structures and helped explain why most of Africa's political elite
think and act the way they do. Africa's postindependence leaders
embraced the legacy of colonial authoritarianism that terrorized
citizens, they consolidated the colonial economic structures that
benefited the metropolitan states, and most important, Africa's
leaders became stooges of the colonialists, protecting the image
and interests of their masters every step of the way. Of course,
Franz Fanon had predicted this very behavior by Africa's
postcolonial elite in his influential essay, "The Pitfalls of National
Consciousness." In the words of Fanon (1963), "the national bour-
geoisie steps into the shoes of the former European settlement . . .
its mission has nothing to do with transforming the nation; it con-
sists prosaically of being the transmission line between the nation
and a capitalism, rampant though camouflaged, which today puts
on the masque of neo-colonialism" (p. 152). This lack of confi-
dence in self, a direct outcome of colonialism, has led Africa's lead-
ers to flirt with one Western-inspired development idea after
another, rejecting any development paradigm that has roots in

This content downloaded from 134.193.117.53 on Sun, 28 Jun 2020 16:28:17 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
796 JOURNAL OF BLACK STUDIES / MAY 2007

Africa. It is interesting that the institutional foundations of Bo

swana's governance, which the author cites as a "unique example
(p. 686) of hope among contemporary African states, are rooted
that country's cultural traditions, a fact the author fails to mention
Moreover, had Meredith adopted a historical institutional
approach, he would have exposed the artificiality of African stat
and helped explain why Africa has a disproportionate number o
failed, and failing, states.
None of these criticisms, however, diminish the importance o
this work. Indeed, I agree with the author's conclusion that the onu
for Africa's development failures lies primarily with its politic
leaders. But I agree with that conclusion for different reasons
Whereas Meredith argues that corruption and bad governance is the
dominant problem, I would argue that the main problem is th
dependent mindset of Africa's political elite. This mindset cause
its leaders to enthusiastically seek (flawed) policy advice from
non- African sources and to adopt institutions that are not compati-
ble with the beliefs and practices of African society. Africa's devel-
opment crisis is therefore a cultural problem, embedded an
entrenched in Africa's psyche and identity.

- Kwame Akonor

Seton Hall University

REFERENCE

Fanon, F. (1963). The wretched of the Earth (C. Farrington, Trans.). Ne

York: Grove.

This content downloaded from 134.193.117.53 on Sun, 28 Jun 2020 16:28:17 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms