Certain historians are inclined to view the political awakening of Asia and Africa as part of an ongoing, world-wide, social revolution, previously inaugurated in Europe and America. In that perspective, colonial nationalism and its aftermath appear to involve primarily another ‘revolt of the masses’, another rising of the ‘great uwashed’, another ‘search for status’ by the lower classes of the world.

Direct military intervention, aimed at unseating civilian governments and replacing them with ruling councils drawn largely from the army, is a relatively recent phenomenon in Africa. With the exception of the Sudan, where officers led by General Ibrahim Abboud seized control in November 1958, no supplanting of civilian authority by a military junta occurred until 19 June 1965 (Algeria). Then, in rapid succession, the Governments of Congo-Kinshasa (25 November 1965), Dahomey (22 December 1965), Central African Republic (1 January 1966), Upper Volta (4 January 1966), Nigeria (15 July 1966), Ghana (24 February 1966), Nigeria once again (29 July, 1966), Burundi (28 November 1966), Togo (13 January 1967), and Sierra Leone (23 March 1967) fell victims to coups d'état.

On 30 May 1967, Lt.-Col. C. Odumegwu Ojukwu, Military Governor of Nigeria's Eastern Region, announced the secession of Eastern Nigeria from the Federation and the creation of the sovereign and independent state called the Republic of Biafra. The birth of Biafra was the product of a long and bitter blood feud between the conservative, Muslim, Hausa-Fulani people of the North and the progressive, Christian Ibos of the East. The roots of the hostility are deep, but the immediate impetus for the break-up began with the military coup d' état of I 5 January 1966, in which the civilian régime of Prime Minister Tafawa Balewa was overthrown and several leaders assassinated.

The concept ‘integration’, which came into general usage in the social sciences by way of nineteenth-century evolutionary thought, was eagerly seized upon as an heuristic device for the study of new states because it evoked the fundamental notion of making whole or entire by addition or combination. But the concept wears better as a signal of topical concern than as a building block in a rigorous theoretical edifice. The most obvious problem is that the very richness of suggestion embodied in the word ‘integration’ generates promiscuity.

Political systems of every description continuously confront a problem crucial to their survival: how to prepare the younger members of the system for the political responsibilities they must one day assume. This problem is quite general; it exists in all societies in every historical epoch, and it embodies a learning process that stretches back to a child's first perceptions of the larger social world. How children learn the values that will guide their future behaviour in politics, and what it is they learn, are questions with answers that vary from society to society.

The new nations of the world hold many expectations for their education systems. They expect that schools will produce the labour force for their manpower requirements, the leadership for their bureaucracies, and the citizenry for an enlightened social order. In pluralistic countries, governments expect also that schools will assist in integrating sub-populations fragmented by religious, linguistic, or ethnic differences. This article will examine the theme, ‘education and national integration’, in Nigeria, whose federal form of government was erected in recognition of profound cultural disparities.

An example of a long-standing arrangement for economic integration in Africa which operates in a very special environment is the case provided by Botswana, Lesotho, and Swaziland (BLS), the former High Commission Territories. Geographically and ethnically these three independent countries—Swaziland shortly to be so—are closely related to the Republic of South Africa. For many years they have had the closest of economic ties with that country. Indeed, for most of their history as separate territories, it was assumed both by Britain and by South Africa that they would ultimately be absorbed within the latter.

Political instability upsets particularly those observers whose own countries have had no experience of it for many generations. They often exaggerate its effect on social and economic life and expect the activities of society practically to cease, where governments topple. But, beyond this miscalculation of effects, observers sometimes conclude that governmental instability in the developing countries reflects some human inferiority of their peoples. Unfortunately this kind of belief also tends to take root among literate opinion-makers in the developing countries, who often are no better than outsiders in interpreting the complexities of their own situation. In this development there are dangers of damage to political and social morale which could be much more serious than temporary phases of internal economic disruption and foreign disinvestment. What in fact are the reasons for the fall of governments in post-colonial Africa?

The press in Tanzania mirrors the political consciousness of a newly independent state and reflects some of the ambiguities that accompany political articulation in a one-party democracy. In this analysis of the four daily newspapers, special attention has been given to the ‘news geography’ which is presented in an attempt to anticipate the world image or ‘psychological geography’ which results from reading the daily newspaper. For even the selection of what news to print reflects the tensions and conflicts between an ideal news policy and the limitations imposed by the lack of funds, personnel, and the influence of the western news services.

Economic integration has been in the forefront of discussion in Africa since the massive movement towards independence in the late 1950's and early 60's. There was immediate recognition that, while independence had been the primary goal, African frontiers were largely an artificial by-product of the colonial scramble 60 to 70 years ago, that many African countries were too small to be economically viable, and that to transform political into economic independence necessarily required concerted action. Further impetus was given to thinking and discussion by the setting up of the Economic Commission for Africa in 1958 and of the Organisation of African Unity in 1963. Concepts, of course, varied, as the pre-history of the O.A.U. shows clearly. The radical Casablanca group stood for an all-African common market, to lead rapidly to an all-African government. The member states of the Union africaine et malgache had much more limited but also more precise objectives: especially continued close co-operation among the francophone countries, and association with the European Common Market, particularly France. There were other ideas and associations, often cutting across these two main groupings. Yet it is perhaps only recently that views are beginning to clarify and that the real difficulties involved are being realised, a condition precedent for progress in practice. Economic integration has to be seen as an ultimate goal, with a number of concrete intermediate steps involving ever-increasing economic cooperation among groups of countries.

Representative institutions are a feature of political systems everywhere. The political systems of the new states that have emerged since World War II are no exception. Despite the far-reaching changes made by them in the institutions bequeathed by their colonial masters, they have almost everywhere retained, albeit with significant modifications, the representative assembly.

About 70 years ago, the Mahdist or Ansār state, in many ways a traditional Muslim government, crumbled under the fire of the Anglotional Egyptian cannons. On the condominium government that followed fell the task of pacifying the country and introducing western concepts of administration. All Sudanese attempts to defy foreign domination had failed completely by 1924. The British, the stronger of the two partners, had the lion's share in shaping the destiny of the country. Towards the end of World War II, the influential and educated Sudanese, like other Africans and Asians, demanded the right of self-determination. In 1946, in preparation for this, a sample of western democracy was introduced in the form of an Advisory Council. This Council, which was restricted to the northern Sudan, was followed two years later by the Legislative Assembly, which had slightly more powers. Although these democratic innovations were quite alien to the country and were introduced at a relatively late date, they were in keeping with traditional institutions. Until recently, the Sudan consisted of a number of tribal units where no classes or social distinctions existed and the tribal chief was no more than the first among equals; the people were therefore not accustomed to autocratic rule.

The present leaders in the Third World are mainly drawn from élites who, in one way or another, were the product of the colonial era. Algeria, of course, is no exception. Although she was always part of the Arab world, French rule, to which she was subjected for more than a century, left a strong impact. One of the results of the colonial era in Algeria was the rise, in the late nineteenth century, of a French-educated elite who tried, despite their limited number, to find a formula by which the native and colonial societies could live together harmoniously. The purpose of this short study is to trace the origins of these Algerians who, without doubt, were among the pioneers of these élites in Africa.

At midnight on the evening of 3 October 1966, the former British Protectorate of Basutoland attained its political independence and assumed the new title of Lesotho. From that time, after a period of nearly 100 years of colonial administration, the British Government officially relinquished all its formal, direct, legal and financial control of the country. Although this has not meant, as some have suggested, the complete rejection by Britain of any financial assistance and responsibility to its former dependency, it has nevertheless forced Lesotho to become to an even greater extent than ever before the economic hostage of South Africa. In the context of the present good relations between South Africa and Lesotho, the term ‘hostage’ is perhaps the wrong one to use, conveying as it does fairly strong emotional overtones. But it is clear from even the most cursory examination of the economic situation that Lesotho will become more and more economically dependent upon South Africa—irrespective of the political party in power. As an enclave of South Africa, Lesotho has always been closely integrated economically with the Republic by virtue of its peculiar geographical position.1 This, together with the country's extreme climate and inhospitable terrain, enforces an external dependence which makes nonsense of political desires for complete self-sufficiency.

The urban explosion is one of Africa's outstanding characteristics. Its many facets provoke a multitude of problems in such diverse yet interrelated fields as administrative efficiency, health control, land values and engineering, juvenile and other crime, prostitution, the provision of housing and educational facilities, efficient traffic flow, and much more.

In this article, I have put down some very tentative thoughts on loans, firstly as they are used in financing small-scale African enterprises, and secondly as a service that African businessmen give to their customers. These remarks arise out of research in progress, and may well need to be revised when the findings are more complete, and have been analysed. Meanwhile, I hope that what follows will suggest a few ideas in a field of development where there are many problems, but little previous experience and knowledge to go by.

Given present social, economic, and political conditions in developing countries, the political élites of these countries clearly merit study. To a great extent, ‘l'indépendance vaut ce que valent ou ce que veulent les dirigeants’ (‘independence reflects the worth or the wishes of the leaders’).1 More specifically, Mali's Modibo Keita has played an important role not only in his own country but in African politics generally. Yet little research and writing has touched on his thought on politics and related topics. This essay seeks to examine these ideas, in introductory fashion, and to provide a basis for further and more detailed research.

FOR understandable reasons, the foreign policy behaviour of African states is only now emerging as a subject of investigation. Most of the new states have been politically independent for less than a decade and their international character is not yet clearly established. On occasion, observers are frustrated by actions which they do not approve or understand, and are tempted to depict African foreign policy as less than responsible. Keeping in mind that any interpretation must remain tentative at this time, there have been none the less a number of international events which yield significant material for evaluation as case studies. One such event, the subject of this study, was the fracas which followed the arrest, in October 1966, of a party of Guineans by Ghana authorities.

In September 1966, possibly for the first time in history, large numbers of Jews paid homage to a man with a notorious anti-Semitic past—Dr Hendrik F. Verwoerd, the late Prime Minister of South Africa, assassinated while he sat in his parliamentary seat. London's Jewish Chronicle reported that in Johannesburg overflow crowds attended memorial services in the city's Great Synagogue and Temple Israel. Verwoerd was eulogised by a rabbi as ‘one of the greatest Prime Ministers, if not the greatest’ that South Africa had ever had; and in Cape Town, the chief rabbi stated that Verwoerd had been the first man to give apartheid a ‘moral basis’1

The intellectual and social origins of those modern movements of political and cultural assertion which are allegedly centred on peculiar African circumstances or peculiar African principles of traditional culture—movements which may be conveniently summed up as ‘Africanism’1—are to be sought in a variety of directions. Factors in the historical and social traditions of the continent in distant centuries have been evoked by some inquirers; while others have listed external influences—emanating in the main from Europe or North America, affecting chiefly those few Africans who travelled overseas, and operating only since the middle decades of the last century—which have directly or indirectly encouraged expressions of Africanism within Africa.