Colonialism and imperialism Books

Book SynopsisWhat did it take for the United States to become a global superpower? The answer lies in a missing chapter of American foreign policy with stark lessons for todayThe cutthroat world of international politics has always been dominated by great powers. Yet no great power in the modern era has ever managed to achieve the kind of invulnerability that comes from being supreme in its own neighbourhood. No great power, that is, except one-the United States.In We May Dominate the World, Sean A. Mirski tells the riveting story of how the United States became a regional hegemon in the century following the Civil War. By turns reluctant and ruthless, Americans squeezed their European rivals out of the hemisphere while landing forces on their neighbours' soil with dizzying frequency. Mirski reveals the surprising reasons behind this muscular foreign policy in a narrative full of twists, colourful characters, and original accounts of the palace coups and bloody interventions that turned the fledgling republic into a global superpower.Today, as China makes its own run at regional hegemony and nations like Russia and Iran grow more menacing, Mirski's fresh look at the rise of the American colossus offers indispensable lessons for how to meet the challenges of our own century.

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Book SynopsisOsterhammel's book represents a new approach to the subject. The concise but sweeping study encompasses the process of colonization and decolonization from the early modern period to the twentieth century. Virtually all other studies to date have looked at strategies of colonial conquest, exploitation, and rule from the imperial point of view. Osterhammel shows that the colonial situation developed in ways that duplicated neither the metropolis nor the pre-colonial society, but instead blended these and added a new direction characteristic only of colonial realms. He emphasizes that the Europeans were normally not considered dangerous invaders by local populations until they threatened the traditional cultures with missionaries, European schools, and bureaucracy.Trade ReviewA conviction of imperial cultural superiority gave modern colonialism an aggressive turn. The result was ethnic and social stratification in the colonial society, even when colonists took over the pre-colonial administration and society as the British did in India. - Midwest Book Review

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Book SynopsisThis book presents the history of the Ukrainian settlement in Australia and associated subjects, such as the role of the Diaspora in maintaining Ukrainian identity, and an analysis of various aspects of Ukrainian literature and culture, both synchronic and diachronic. The conference at which the papers in this volume were presented was one of the many manifestations of a wish by Ukrainian scholars and community members alike, to mark the fiftieth anniversary of Ukrainian settlement in Australia.

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Book SynopsisThrough letters and journal entries rich in detail, this text follows the trials of the 19th-century Palmer family who dominated the southern banks of South Carolina's Santee River. The volume offers insights into plantation life; education; religion; and slave/master relations.

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Book Synopsis"We have been reminded time and again by anthropologists of the ideas and ideals of the Enlightenment in which the intellectual inspiration of anthropology is supposed to lie. But anthropology is also rooted in an unequal power encounter between the West and the Third World, which goes back to the emergence of bourgeois Europe, an encounter in which colonialism is merely one historical moment. It is this encounter that gives the West access to cultural and historical information about the societies it has progressively dominated, and thus not only generates a certain kind of universal understanding, but also reenforces the inequalities in capacity between the European and the non-European worlds (and derivatively, between the Europeanized elites and the 'tradtional' masses in the Third World) . . ." – from the Introduction The papers in this book analyze and document ways in which anthropological thinking and practice have been affected by British colonialism. They approach this topic from different points of view and at different levels. Each stands as an original contribution to an argument which is only just beginning.

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Book SynopsisThe United States and Imperialism uses concepts of civilization, identity, the civilizing mission, and cooperation to explain the role of imperialism throughout American history. Ninkovich's original analysis of America as an empire shows how imperialism, anti-imperialism, and geopolitics have all played a role in how the United States made decisions when seeking new territories.Trade Review"Frank Ninkovich's The United States and Imperialism is a major work of historical research and writing. Ninkovich takes on several of the most important topics in the history of US foreign relations with grace, wit, and deep understanding. The book includes a vast amount of scholarship in primary and secondary sources. Best of all, it brings centuries' old issues up to date." Robert D. Schulzinger, University of Colorado "In this provocative overview, Frank Ninkovich reconceptualizes American imperialism 'as an element of the geopolitics of modernity.' By emphasizing the liberal sensibility and modernizing goals behind imperialism, he reorients stale debates and poses fresh questions about America's identity and 'civilizing' mission." Emily Rosenberg, Macalester College "Ninkovich provides an innovative and exciting synthesis." Choice "Ninkovich presents a fresh interpretation of the contours of the American empire and places the experience of imperialism within the larger context of modern US foreign policy. This study is to be commended for its clarity, conceptual sophistication, and eloquence. It is highly recommended for classroom adoption and equally suited for undergraduate and graduate discussions" American Nineteenth Century History JournalTable of ContentsIntroduction. 1. Imperialism and National Identity in the 1890s. 2. Failed Expectations: The Civilizing Mission in the Philippines. 3. America's Caribbean Empire. 4. The Modernization of China and the Diplomacy of Imperialism. 5. Imperialism and Anti-Imperialism in America's World Policies. Conclusion: Beyond Imperialism: The Empire of Modernity. Index.

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Book SynopsisIn this powerful and passionate critique of the 'war on terror' in Afghanistan and its extensions into Palestine and Iraq, Derek Gregory traces the long history of British and American involvements in the Middle East and shows how colonial power continues to cast long shadows over our own present. Argues the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September 11 activated a series of political and cultural responses that were profoundly colonial in nature. The first analysis of the “war on terror” to connect events in Afghanistan, Palestine, and Iraq. Traces the connections between geopolitics and the lives of ordinary people. Richly illustrated and packed with empirical detail. Trade Review“This is a great book. 'Gregory has written a book entwining global geography with social danger. The Colonial Present takes us through the contemporary wars in Afghanistan, the Palestinian territories and Iraq as connected projects of imperial ambition... The Colonial Present is a refreshingly angry book, with all the geographical and historical scholarship to buttress its indictment of American, Israeli and British behavior around the world. It is exquisitely written... This book's screaming truths are must-read heresy." Neil Smith, Los Angeles Times "An impassioned plea by one of the world’s most eminent geographers to displace the distorted imaginative geographies that have so corrupted our representations of the Islamic world with a geographical imagination that enlarges and enhances our understandings. The long historical geography of the colonial encounter in the Middle East is here laid bare in all its twisted detail in order to comprehend the fractures underpinning contemporary political impasses in Palestine, Afghanistan, and Iraq. The Colonial Present is a ‘must read’ for all those concerned for peace and justice in our time.” David Harvey, author of The New Imperialism "The originality and profundity of Derek Gregory's The Colonial Present puts it at the top of my list." Richard Falk, Albert G. Milbank Professor Emeritus of International Law and Practice at Princeton; author most recently of The Great Terror War (2003) “Brilliantly condenses the multiple geographies of colonialism ... so that their contemporary entanglements with the flexings of modern imperial power crackle with intensity. Using September 11 2001 as a political fulcrum, Gregory traces the searing effects of fluid but durable cartographies of violence in the intersecting wars in Afghanistan, Palestine, and Iraq.” Cindi Katz, Graduate Centre, CityUniversity of New York “Powerfully and persuasively argued. Passionately written. A daring, brilliant analysis … Quite simply the most significant book written by a geographer in some time.” Allan Pred, University of California, Berkeley “The Colonial Present marshals concepts of imaginative geography and insight from the spatialisation of cultural and social theory developed in the past thirty years … An impassioned but theoretically rich critique of the ‘war on terror’ and the wider Zeitgeist that it shapes and embodies … Crucially, the book is a compelling critique of and American Empire … This is a significant book … Vintage Gregory again; enticing and provoking his audience … There is no doubting that The Colonial Present sets both standards and agendas.” Environment and Planning D "The Colonial Present is an important and politiclly engaged book." AreaTable of ContentsList of Figures. Preface. Acknowledgments. Part 1: The Colonial Present:. 1.1 Foucault’s Laughter. 1.2 The Present Tense. Part 2: Architectures of Enmity:. 2.1 Imaginative Geographies. 2.2 “Why do they hate us?”. 2.3 September 11. Part 3: The Land Where Red Tulips Grew:. 3.1 Great Games. 3.2 Uncivil Wars and Transnational Terrorism. 3.3 The Sorcerer’s Apprentices. Part 4 Civilization and Barbarism:. 4.1 The Visible and the Invisible. 4.2 Territorialization, Targets, and Technoculture. 4.3 Deadly Messengers. 4.4 Spaces of the Exception. 4.5 Deconstructions. Part 5 Barbed Boundaries:. 5.1 America’s Israel. 5.2 Diaspora, Dispossession, and Disaster. 5.3 Occupation, Coercion, and Colonization. 5.4 Camp David and Goliath. Part 6: Defiled Cities:. 6.1 Ground Zeros. 6.2 Besieging Cartographies. 6.3 Identities and Oppositions. Part 7: The Tyranny of Strangers:. 7.1 “Not as conquerors or enemies…”. 7.2 Coups and Conflicts. 7.3 Desert Storms and Urban Nightmares. Part 8: Boundless War:. 8.1 Black September. 8.2 Killing Grounds. 8.3 The Cutting-room War. Part 9: Gravity’s Rainbows:. 9.1 Connective Dissonance. 9.2 The Colonial Present and Cultures of Travel. 9.3 Pandora’s Spaces. Guide to Further Reading. Index

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Book SynopsisIn this powerful and passionate critique of the 'war on terror' in Afghanistan and its extensions into Palestine and Iraq, Derek Gregory traces the long history of British and American involvements in the Middle East and shows how colonial power continues to cast long shadows over our own present. Argues the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September 11 activated a series of political and cultural responses that were profoundly colonial in nature. The first analysis of the “war on terror” to connect events in Afghanistan, Palestine, and Iraq. Traces the connections between geopolitics and the lives of ordinary people. Richly illustrated and packed with empirical detail. Trade Review“This is a great book. 'Gregory has written a book entwining global geography with social danger. The Colonial Present takes us through the contemporary wars in Afghanistan, the Palestinian territories and Iraq as connected projects of imperial ambition... The Colonial Present is a refreshingly angry book, with all the geographical and historical scholarship to buttress its indictment of American, Israeli and British behavior around the world. It is exquisitely written... This book's screaming truths are must-read heresy." Neil Smith, Los Angeles Times "An impassioned plea by one of the world’s most eminent geographers to displace the distorted imaginative geographies that have so corrupted our representations of the Islamic world with a geographical imagination that enlarges and enhances our understandings. The long historical geography of the colonial encounter in the Middle East is here laid bare in all its twisted detail in order to comprehend the fractures underpinning contemporary political impasses in Palestine, Afghanistan, and Iraq. The Colonial Present is a ‘must read’ for all those concerned for peace and justice in our time.” David Harvey, author of The New Imperialism "The originality and profundity of Derek Gregory's The Colonial Present puts it at the top of my list." Richard Falk, Albert G. Milbank Professor Emeritus of International Law and Practice at Princeton; author most recently of The Great Terror War (2003) “Brilliantly condenses the multiple geographies of colonialism ... so that their contemporary entanglements with the flexings of modern imperial power crackle with intensity. Using September 11 2001 as a political fulcrum, Gregory traces the searing effects of fluid but durable cartographies of violence in the intersecting wars in Afghanistan, Palestine, and Iraq.” Cindi Katz, Graduate Centre, CityUniversity of New York “Powerfully and persuasively argued. Passionately written. A daring, brilliant analysis … Quite simply the most significant book written by a geographer in some time.” Allan Pred, University of California, Berkeley “The Colonial Present marshals concepts of imaginative geography and insight from the spatialisation of cultural and social theory developed in the past thirty years … An impassioned but theoretically rich critique of the ‘war on terror’ and the wider Zeitgeist that it shapes and embodies … Crucially, the book is a compelling critique of and American Empire … This is a significant book … Vintage Gregory again; enticing and provoking his audience … There is no doubting that The Colonial Present sets both standards and agendas.” Environment and Planning D "The Colonial Present is an important and politiclly engaged book." AreaTable of ContentsList of Figures xi Preface xiii Acknowledgments xvi 1 The Colonial Present 1 Foucault’s Laughter 1 The Present Tense 5 2 Architectures of Enmity 17 Imaginative Geographies 17 “Why do they hate us?” 20 September 11 24 3 “The Land where Red Tulips Grew” 30 Great Games 30 Uncivil Wars and Transnational Terrorism 36 The Sorcerer’s Apprentices 44 4 “Civilization” and “Barbarism” 47 The Visible and the Invisible 47 Territorialization, Targets, and Technoculture 49 Deadly Messengers 56 Spaces of the Exception 62 Deconstruction 72 5 Barbed Boundaries 76 America’s Israel 76 Diaspora, Dispossession, and Disaster 78 Occupation, Coercion, and Colonization 89 Compliant Cartographies 95 Camp David and Goliath 102 6 Defiled Cities 107 Ground Zeros 107 Besieging Cartographies 117 Identities and Oppositions 138 7 The Tyranny of Strangers 144 “Not as conquerors or enemies . . .” 145 Coups and Conflicts 151 Desert Storms and Urban Nightmares 156 8 Boundless War 180 Black September 180 Killing Grounds 197 The Cutting-Room War 214 9 Gravity’s Rainbows 248 Connective Dissonance 248 The Colonial Present and Cultures of Travel 256 Pandora’s Spaces 258 Notes 263 Guide to Further Reading 352 Index 359

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Book SynopsisAn examination of French citizenship and cultural identity in Algeria during the last quarter-century of colonial rule. In recent years, a multicultural society and changing conceptions of French identity have been the source of considerable debate in scholarship, literature and the media in France. This book examines equally contested definitionsof French identity from the past, but not those forged within the borders of the French 'Hexagon,' as French geographic space is sometimes called. It is the study of French sentiment in colonial Algeria of the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s, during the last quarter century of colonial rule in North Africa. It seeks to uncover elements of French identity that were generated past the Pyrenees and the Alps, beyond the bordering Atlantic Ocean, English Channel and Mediterranean Sea, outside the physical space so central to "Frenchness." It asks whether far-reaching state institutions could transform indigenous and settler populations in colonial Algeria -- Europeans, Jews and Muslims -- intoFrench men and women. It examines what these individuals wrote of French sentiment in colonial Algeria. Did they articulate alternative definitions of French identity? The colonial "periphery" is clearly quite central to France'sevolving postcolonial sense of self. Colonial Algerian heterogeneity and the country's unique relationship to France make it an especially rich site in which to study French national and cultural identities. French military conquest and the occupation of the North African coast established one of the oldest and largest settler colonies within the French Empire. Unlike other colonies, Algeria lay relatively close to metropolitan France, a daylong journey by ship from Marseilles. No colony other than Algeria was granted French departmental status. No other land administered under the auspices of the French Empire had as numerous a European settler population, many of whom becamenaturalized French citizens. This study suggests that although Algeria had become officially French, "Algerie française", even at the pinnacle of its acceptance, was more diverse and more contested than its title suggests.Trade Review[An] important contibution to the scholarship on the Algerian war. * AFRICAN STUDIES REVIEW *Organized as six interrelated chapters, Gosnell's book disentangles the harsh reality of trying to make Algeria French from the myth of l'Algerie française as represented through the socializing experiences of a centralized system of education and obligatory military service, among other things. . . Gosnell's book succeeds admirably in elaborating and exposing that colonial legacy from which Algeria continues to suffer today. * AMERICAN HISTORICAL REVIEW, February 2004 *Valuable new study. . . this is an ambitious book that addresses complex questions w ith admirable clarity -- a rare but essential quality in discourse analysis. * JOURNAL OF MODERN HISTORY *This book provides an essential resource for students of Algerian and French colonial history. At a time when French cultural identity is again at the center of public debate in France, it provides a necessary examination of the ambiguities and contradictions, as well as the idealism and bad faith, that have long lain at the heart of definitions of Frenchness. * JOURNAL OF COLONIALISM AND COLONIAL HISTORY 2006 *Gosnell does a fascinating job of untangling the ethnic threats of Algerian society, revealing that each group and even sub-group of the population maintained its own culture and attitudes toward France. . . . The work is essential for any student of the French-Algerian crisis and a valuable addition to any library of twentieth-century French culture. -- Alice J. Strange * FRENCH REVIEW, 2005 *Table of ContentsL'Algerie francaise: An Imagined Community? Colonial Schools and the Transmission of French Culture The Colonial Press and the Construction of Greater France An Indigenous Perspective on France and Frenchness A Colonial Scale of Frenchness Algerianite: The Emergence of a Colonial Identity

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Book SynopsisThe only complete study of modern Gambian politics from the establishment of British rule to the overthrow of the Jawara government. A Political History of the Gambia: 1816-1994 is the first complete account of the political history of the former British West African dependency to be written. It makes use of much hitherto unconsulted or unavailable British and Gambian official and private documentary sources, as well as interviews with many Gambian politicians and former British colonial officials. The first part of the book charts the origins and characteristics of modern politics in colonial Bathurst (Banjul) and its expansion into the Gambian interior (Protectorate) in the two decades after World War II. By independence in 1965, older urban-based parties in the capital had been defeated bya new, rural-based political organisation, the People's Progressive Party (PPP). The second part of the book analyzes the means by which the PPP, under President Sir Dawda Jawara, succeeded in defeating both existing and new rival political parties and an attempted coup in 1981. The book closes with an explanation of the demise of the PPP at the hands of an army coup in 1994. The book not only establishes those distinctive aspects ofGambian political history, but also relates these to the wider regional and African context, during the colonial and independence periods.Trade ReviewA meticulous, richly documented and eloquently written book; a precious gift to a country and its peoples. It fills a most important gap and is sure to make a lasting contribution to Gambian and African studies. A true labor of love. --Abdoulaye Saine, associate professor of political science, Miami University * . *Table of ContentsSocial and Economic Setting Constitutional Change in The Gambia, 1816-1994 Merchants and Recaptives: The Origins of Modern Politics, 1816-86 Patrician Politics in the Era of the Forsters, 1886-1941 The Establishment of Party Politics, 1941-59 The "Green Uprising": The Emergence of the People's Progressive Party, 1959-65 Electoral Politics, 1965-81 Radical and Insurrectionary Political Challenges, 1965-81 Electoral Politics, 1981-94 The Gambia's External Relations, 1965-94 The 1994 Coup and the Jawara Legacy

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Book SynopsisA compelling account of the establishment of Tanzania's stable and ambitious government in the face of external threats and internal turmoil. In the early 1960s, nationalist politicians established in Tanzania a stable government in the face of external threats and internal turmoil. Paul Bjerk's volume chronicles this history and examines the politics and policies of the nation's first president, Julius Nyerere. One of the great leaders of modern Africa, Nyerere unified the diverse people who became citizens of the new nation and negotiated the tumultuous politics of the Cold War. In an era whenmany postcolonial countries succumbed to corrupt dictatorship or civil war, Nyerere sought principled government. Making difficult choices between democratic and autocratic rule, Nyerere creatively managed the destabilizing forces of decolonization. With extensive archival research and interviews with scores of participants in this history, Bjerk reorients our understanding of the formative years of Tanzanian independence. This study provides a new paradigm for understanding the history of the postcolonial nations that became independent in a global postwar order defined by sovereignty. Paul Bjerk is associate professor of history at Texas Tech University.Trade ReviewBjerk's chapters on ujamaa ideology and villagization will be essential reading for historians of Tanzania. . . . Bjerk has clarified the stakes in debate about Nyerere and the ujamaa period. His study will leave historians well poised for the challenge of fully incorporating into their stories critics as well as proponents of ujamaa. * JOURNAL OF AFRICAN HISTORY *Bjerk offers detailed insight into the critical first years of Tanganyika as a sovereign nation and the personalities and events that gave rise to the United Republic of Tanzania. . . . a welcome addition to the burgeoning historiography of Nyerere and Tanzania in recent years. * CANADIAN JOURNAL OF AFRICAN STUDIES *A fascinating read for anyone interested in understanding either the formation of Tanzania or the man who I would argue is modern Africa's most exceptional, idealistic, intelligent and, as this book shows, at times quite coolly ruthless, leader: Julius Nyerere. -- Jane Plastow * LUCAS BULLETIN *Bjerk's work will provide an invaluable resource for those engaged in the academic study of the immediate post-independence period in both Tanzania (Tanganyika) and Africa more broadly. * TANZANIAN AFFAIRS *This very detailed book importantly links political events in Tanzania with what was happening regionally, continentally, and globally. Bjerk provides insight into one of Africa's most important political figures and the domestic and international political events of the time. Recommended. * CHOICE *At a time when Afro-pessimism is so much in vogue it is good to have a book like this. Here the stress is on the competence of African leadership, on government's creativity in the face of international actors, and on the close link between the people and their leaders. There is much here to celebrate and admire. * INT'L JOURNAL OF AFRICAN HISTORICAL STUDIES *Table of ContentsIntroduction The Education of Julius Nyerere Contemplating the Postcolony Independence and the Fear of Division The Invention of Ujamaa The Origins of Villagization The 1964 Army Mutiny The National Youth Service A Realist Foreign Policy The Cold War and the Union Treaty Contending with International Intrigue Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisA methodical analysis of relations of domination and subordination through media narratives of nationhood in an African context. Nation as Grand Narrative offers a methodical analysis of how relations of domination and subordination are conveyed through media narratives of nationhood. Using the typical postcolonial state of Nigeria as a template andengaging with disciplines ranging from media studies, political science, and social theory to historical sociology and hermeneutics, Wale Adebanwi examines how the nation as grand narrative provides a critical interpretive lens through which competition among ethnic, ethnoregional, and ethnoreligious groups can be analyzed. Adebanwi illustrates how meaning is connected to power through ideology in the struggles enacted on the pages of the print media overdiverse issues including federalism, democracy and democratization, religion, majority-minority ethnic relations, space and territoriality, self-determination, and threat of secession. Nation as Grand Narrative will triggerfurther critical reflections on the articulation of relations of domination in the context of postcolonial grand narratives. Wale Adebanwi is associate professor of African American and African studies, University of California-Davis, and a visiting professor at the Institute of Social and Economic Research (ISER), Rhodes University, Grahamstown, South Africa.Trade ReviewWith its recuperation of the nation as an entity, and its insistence on the reality of identity politics both as a contested terrain and as the most meaningful narrative for Nigerian press history, this book represents a significant landmark in the new African print cultures scholarship. * AFRICA *[A] brilliant combination of the analysis of political history and the mass media in pre- and post-colonial Nigeria. The book will be suitable as resource material for students, scholars and practitioners of political science, history, mass media and discourse analysis. * JOURNAL OF MODERN AFRICAN STUDIES *This book is an asset to anyone who desires to, as closely as possible, experience major historical events in Nigerian history. [It] is a brilliant piece of evidence that there are non-anthropological methods to unearthing deep understanding of what exists today in Nigeria. As such, the book is recommended reading not just for Nigerians and Africans, but also for the common student of politics. * PUBLIUS: THE JOURNAL OF FEDERALISM *This is a thought-provoking book which takes a novel approach to some of the most fundamental questions facing contemporary Africa. It deserves a wide readership. * AFRICAN JOURNALISM STUDIES *The book represents a major contribution toward understanding the immensely complex role that newspapers have played in the political history of postcolonial Africa; it provides a unique and indispensable reflection on the very specific ways in which postcolonial societies have approached democracy. * AFRICAN STUDIES REVIEW *Table of ContentsList of Illustrations Acknowledgments Nation as Grand Narrataive Interpretive Theory, Narrative, and the Politics of Meaning In Search of a Grand Narrative: The Press and the Ethno-Regional Struggle for Political Independence Hegemony and Ethno-Spatial Politics: "Nationalizing" the Capital City in the Late-Colonial Era Paper Soldiers: Narratives of Nationhood and Federalism in Pre-Civil War Nigeria Representing the Nation: Electoral Crisis and the Collapse of the Third Republic The "Fought" Republic: The Press, Ethno-Religious Conflicts, and Democratic Ethos Narratives, Territoriality, and Majority-Minority Ethnic Violence Narratives, Oil, and the Spatial Politics of Marginal Identities Conclusion: Beyond Grand Narratives Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisThe story of how African farmers, African-American scientists, and British businessmen struggled to turn colonial Africa into a major cotton exporter. During the first two decades of the twentieth century, demand for raw cotton in Europe, Asia, and America outstripped production as African Americans migrated away from Southern cotton fields. Consequently, industrialists in Europe turned to Africa for new sources of cotton. This volume documents the efforts by British financiers and colonial officials, along with some African-American allies, to bring the American model of cotton production to colonial Africa. In a narrative featuring a host of characters -- including British entrepreneurs, African kings, and African-American scientists -- author Jonathan Robins weaves together events in Africa, Britain, and the AmericanSouth. Robins chronicles the origins, failings, and eventual evolution of Britain's colonial cotton project, revealing the global forces and actors that moved and transformed the international cotton industry. JonathanE. Robins is assistant professor of global history at Michigan Technological University.Trade ReviewThis book makes a significant contribution to the global history of cotton and our understandings about the long durée of capitalism. Offering a detailed account, grounded both in well-researched detail and reflective attention to how historical knowledge is produced, Robins has succeeded in producing an important and timely publication. * AFRICA AT LSE *Well-researched and thought provoking book that [.] manages to bring in a great amount of detail to show how cotton's empire worked, or failed to work, in the early decades of the twentieth century. * CONNECTIONS *It is a very well-written and entertaining book, and an important addition to our understanding of early twentieth-century debates over the significance of cotton. * HISTORY *Table of ContentsIntroduction The Cotton Crisis: Lancashire, the American South, and the Turn to "Empire Cotton" "The Black Man's Crop": The British Cotton Growing Association and Africa "The Scientific Redemption of Africa": Coercion and Regulation in Colonial Agriculture "King Cotton's Impoverished Retinue": Making Cotton a "White Man's Crop" in the American South Cotton, Development, and the "Imperial Burden" Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisAn innovative study of labor relations, particularly the interactions of recruitment agents and migrant workers, in the mining concessions of Wassa, Gold Coast Colony, 1879 to 1909. Recent years have seen renewed interest in the historical study of labor in Africa. Unlike those of the past, these new studies are rooted in the recognition of Africa's dynamic, expansive, and productive informal sector. While this book focuses on one of West Africa's earliest large-scale industries, namely the Wassa gold mines in the southwest Gold Coast, it is not solely concerned with the traditional working class. Rather, it explores the plurality oflabor relations that characterized the mining concessions during the period 1879 to 1909, including the presence of migrants from various parts of West Africa as well as casual and tributary laborers, both male and female. In capturing the phenomenon of labor mobility as it played out in Wassa, Mediators, Contract Men, and Colonial Capital presents one of the fullest accounts of the labor agents who regularly brought groups of migrant laborers to the mines. The narrative discusses these agents' means of employment and roles in the informalization and indentureship of labor; in addition, it explores the regional dynamics of the recruitment machinery and confronts issues of coercion and choice. Scholars interested in African history, global labor history, economic history, and women's work in Africa will find much of value in this innovative study. Cassandra Mark-Thiesen is aResearch Fellow of the Swiss National Science Foundation (Marie-Heim Vögtlin Grant) in the history department of the University of Basel.Trade ReviewThis is an important book, which helps to recast a seemingly well-discussed theme (the two gold booms in the southern interior of the Gold Coast) into a fresh, well-structured discussion of labour recruitment and labour organization. * SWISS HISTORY REVIEW *Provides a number of important insights into the global labour history of imperial gold mining in Wassa, as well as in a wider West African context... [An] comprehensive, informative and well-researched study is recommended for public and private libraries, and especially for historians and experts of migratory studies, mining industry and labour relations. * GHANA JOURNAL OF DEVELOPMENT STUDIES *Cassandra Mark-Thiesen delivers a readable and insightful study of African-run labor recruitment schemes in colonial Ghana's emerging mining industry. * CONNECTIONS *Mark-Thiesen digs up a rich historical archive that enriches our understanding of the dynamic history of labour in the Gold Coast. * LSE REVIEW OF BOOKS *Cassandra Mark-Thiesen's Mediators, Contract Men, and Colonial Capital gives readers a window into the lives of the wide variety of African workers and entrepreneurs that journeyed to the Wassa gold mines and the port city of Sekondi in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Her 'labor centered' approach will be invaluable to historians of colonial mining economies. * IJAHS *By deepening our understanding of the actors and institutions involved in mobilizing labor after the outlawing of slavery in the Gold Coast in 1874, Cassandra Mark-Thiesen sheds light on the economic, political, and sociocultural factors that motivated people from within and beyond the Gold Coast to work in the Wassa mines. * AFRICAN STUDIES REVIEW *Table of ContentsIntroduction Prospectors, Politicians and the Question of "Progress": The First and Second Gold Boom in Wassa Labor Recruitment in the Nineteenth Century: The Place of Practicality Disrupted Recruitment at the Turn of the Twentieth Century: Women, Whites, and other Labor Agents Government Strategies for Assisting the Mines Labor Agents, Chiefs and Officials, 1905 to 1909: The Incorporation of the Northern Territories' Labor Reserve Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisThose who control the world’s commanding economic heights, buttressed by the theories of mainstream economists, presume that capitalism is a self-contained and self-generating system. Nothing could be further from the truth. In this pathbreaking book—winner of the Paul A. Baran-Paul M. Sweezy Memorial Award—radical political economists Utsa Patnaik and Prabhat Patnaik argue that the accumulation of capital has always required the taking of land, raw materials, and bodies from noncapitalist modes of production. They begin with a thorough debunking of mainstream economics. Then, looking at the history of capitalism, from the beginnings of colonialism half a millennium ago to today’s neoliberal regimes, they discover that, over the long haul, capitalism, in order to exist, must metastasize itself in the practice of imperialism and the immiseration of countless people. A few hundred years ago, write the Patnaiks, colonialism began to ensure vast, virtually free, markets for new products in burgeoning cities in the West. But even after slavery was generally abolished, millions of people in the Global South still fell prey to the continuing lethal exigencies of the marketplace. Even after the Second World War, when decolonization led to the end of the so-called “Golden Age of Capitalism,” neoliberal economies stepped in to reclaim the Global South, imposing drastic “austerity” measures on working people. But, say the Patnaiks, this neoliberal economy, which lives from bubble to bubble, is doomed to a protracted crisis. In its demise, we are beginning to see – finally – the transcendence of the capitalist system.Trade Review“The ideas outlined in A Theory of Imperialism are central to understanding the construction of the unequal global system in the past and in the present.” —Samir Amin, author, The Liberal Virus: Permanent War and the Americanization of the World

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Book SynopsisThe fourteen countries in west and equatorial Africa that formed the heart of what was once France's African colonial empire all independent now for more than four decades still retain French as an official language, remain attached to French culture, and maintain political links with France. Each country, however, has developed its own distinctive brand of politics. Victor Le Vine traces the political evolution of these countries, exploring the elements that have shaped their particular political dynamics while allowing them to remain part of a unique francophone sociopolitical community. Le Vine's provocative discussion of topics ranging from the colonial context, political culture, and religion to ""redemocratization,"" informal politics, and international relations offers a comprehensive, unique perspective on the workings of this relatively little-known group of states.Trade ReviewA fresh and sweeping survey of... the fourteen countries of Francophone Africa. An excellent book. Mathurin C. Houngnikpo, African Studies Review A masterful examination of much neglected Francophone countries of West Africa.... Both erudite and accessible."" Richard Peck, Africa Today ""Magisterial in analytic reach and encyclopedic in coverage.... Highly recommended"". Choice ""An exceptionally well-informed perspective on one of the most intriguing 'regions' of the continent."" James F. Barnes, Appalachian State University ""A masterly analysis.... Le Vine not only provides important insight into the politics of some very understudied countries, but also makes a highly persuasive case for recognizing what is distinctive about the political experiences of those countries with a French colonial background."" Leonardo Villalon, University of FloridaTable of ContentsIntroduction. Contexts. The Human and Geographical Contexts of Politics. The Colonial Context. Political Life and Institutions, 1944 1960. Society and Politics. Political Cultures. Ideology and Political Style: The Uneasy Marriage of Thought and Action. Ethnicity, Religion, and National Politics. Structures, Processes, and Power. Experiments in Power, 1958 2003. Redemocratization. Rulers and Leaders. In the Shadow of the State: The Domain of Nonformal Politics. Connections. Francophone Africa in the Global Arena. Appendix. Basic Political Data on the Fourteen States.

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Book SynopsisA former Africa editor for The Economist, Robert Guest addresses the troubled continent's thorniest problems: war, AIDS, and above all, poverty. Newly updated with a preface that considers political and economic developments of the past six years, The Shackled Continent is engrossing, highly readable, and as entertaining as it is tragic.Guest pulls the veil off the corruption and intrigue that cripple so many African nations, posing a provocative theory that Africans have been impoverished largely by their own leaders' abuses of power. From the minefields of Angola to the barren wheat fields of Zimbabwe, Guest gathers startling evidence of the misery African leaders have inflicted on their people. But he finds elusive success stories and examples of the resilience and resourcefulness of individual Africans, too; from these, he draws hope that the continent will eventually prosper. Guest offers choices both commonsense and controversial for Africans and for those in the West who wish Africa well.

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Book SynopsisWhat did the American Founders actually intend for the country, and does it even matter today? If America began as an idea, then what kind of idea? In a time of increasing turmoil over American history, politics, and society, Crossroads for Liberty: Recovering the Anti-Federalist Values of America's First Constitution takes a surprising and thought-provoking look at the American Revolution, the Articles of Confederation, and the Constitution, and asks what we can learn from them. Author William Watkins casts a critical eye on conventional wisdom about the Articles of Confederation, as he outlines the differences between that original U.S. governing document and the Constitution, which replaced it. He finds that the Articles protected individual liberty and community-centered government in ways that the looser language of the U.S. Constitution did not. Watkins draws from contemporary examples of bureaucratic overreach and expansion to support his argument—examples that were startlingly predicted by proponents of small government at the time of the Constitution's adoption. Along the way, he points back to the Articles and the values of the American Revolution as a framework for reimagining American politics to foster liberty and truly representative governance. Crossroads for Liberty arrives at an important time in American political life, and its reexamination of the American Founding presents a significant contribution to the story about America. Readers will come away with a greater understanding of current political and constitutional issues, as well as a new perspective on American history.

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Book SynopsisAcclaimed historian Gordon S. Wood presents the first volume in a stunning collection of British and American pamphlets from the political debate that divided an empire—and created a nationIn 1764, in the wake of its triumph in the Seven Years War, Great Britain possessed the largest and most powerful empire the world had seen since the fall of Rome and its North American colonists were justly proud of their vital place within this global colossus. Just twelve short years later the empire was in tatters, and the thirteen colonies proclaimed themselves the free and independent United States of America. In between, there occurred an extraordinary contest of words between American and Britons, and among Americans themselves, which addressed all of the most fundamental issues of politics: the nature of power, liberty, representation, rights and constitutions, and sovereignty. This debate was carried on largely in pamphlets and from the more than a thousand published on both sides of the Atlantic during the period.Here, Gordon S. Wood has selected thirty-nine of the most interesting and important pamphlets to reveal as never before how this momentous revolution unfolded. This first of two volumes traces the debate from its first crisis—Parliament's passage of the Stamp Act, which in the summer of 1765 triggered riots in American ports from Charleston, South Carolina, to Portsmouth, New Hampshire—to its crucial turning point in 1772, when the Boston Town Meeting produces a pamphlet that announces their defiance to the world and changes everything. Here in its entirety is John Dickinson's justly famous Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania, considered the most significant political tract in America prior to Thomas Paine's Common Sense. Here too is the dramatic transcript of Benjamin Franklin's testimony before Parliament as it debated repeal of the Stamp Act, among other fascinating works. The volume includes an introduction, headnotes, a chronology of events, biographical notes about the writers, and detailed explanatory notes, all prepared by our leading expert on the American Revolution. As a special feature, each pamphlet is preceded by a typographic reproduction of its original title page.LIBRARY OF AMERICA is an independent nonprofit cultural organization founded in 1979 to preserve our nation’s literary heritage by publishing, and keeping permanently in print, America’s best and most significant writing. The Library of America series includes more than 300 volumes to date, authoritative editions that average 1,000 pages in length, feature cloth covers, sewn bindings, and ribbon markers, and are printed on premium acid-free paper that will last for centuries.Trade Review“This collection of pamphlets from the American Revolution is timely, important, and judiciously selected, which is no surprise given that Gordon S. Wood is the most insightful and accomplished scholar of the intellectual origins and consequences of the Revolution. These volumes are a great and fitting addition to the Library of America series.” — Alan Taylor, winner of the 2014 Pulitzer Prize for History for The Internal Enemy: Slavery and War in Virginia“Gordon S. Wood’s grasp of the dynamics of the Imperial debate that culminated in American independence is unsurpassed. By including all sides of the controversy Wood has created the most discriminating and revealing collection of sources we have on the emerging ideology of the Revolution.” — Richard D. Brown, Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor of History, Emeritus, at the University of Connecticut“These volumes make a valuable contribution to the learning and teaching of American history. The men who wrote the script for national independence were strong, daring thinkers and skilled writers, with their lives at stake and their conscience in their pens. Their great gift to us lives on in this splendid collection.” — Michael McGiffert, Editor Emeritus, The William and Mary Quarterly

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Book SynopsisFor the 250th anniversary of the start of the American Revolution, acclaimed historian Gordon S. Wood presents a landmark collection of British and American pamphlets from the political debate that divided an empire and created a nation: In 1764, in the wake of its triumph in the Seven Years War, Great Britain possessed the largest and most powerful empire the world had seen since the fall of Rome and its North American colonists were justly proud of their vital place within this global colossus. Just twelve short years later the empire was in tatters, and the thirteen colonies proclaimed themselves the free and independent United States of America. Now, for the 250th anniversary of the Stamp Act Crisis, the momentous upheaval that marked the beginning of the American Revolution, Pulitzer Prize–winning historian Gordon S. Wood presents a landmark two-volume edition of the political debate that led to the Declaration of Independence. This unprecedented collection gathers in two authoritative Library of America volumes the complete texts of thirty-nine of the most fascinating and influential British and American pamphlets of the period: inexpensive, widely circulated works that were the instant media of their day, ideal for the rapid exchange of ideas. In the first volume a controversy about the origin and function of colonies quickly becomes a deeper dispute over the nature of political liberty itself, in which Massachusetts lawyer James Otis boldly asserts the colonists’ natural rights; Benjamin Franklin gives dramatic testimony against the Stamp Act before the House of Commons; John Dickinson calls for collective action in the famous Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania; and the so-called “Boston Pamphlet,” written by Samuel Adams and others, turns the focus of debate to the question of sovereignty, setting the stage for the final crisis to come. In the second volume Thomas Jefferson advances a vision of a radically new kind of empire in the work that first made him famous; Joseph Galloway presents an ingenious but ill-fated plan for preserving union with Great Britain; Samuel Johnson gives vent to his deep animus for the Americans and their pretensions to liberty; Edmund Burke makes an eloquent case for reconciliation before it’s too late; and Thomas Paine, in the truly revolutionary Common Sense, proclaims that the “birthday of a new world is at hand.” Prepared by the nation’s leading historian of the American Revolution, each volume includes an introduction, headnotes, biographical notes about the writers, a chronology charting the rise and fall of the first British empire, a textual essay describing the production, reception, and influence of each work, and detailed explanatory notes. As a special feature, the set also features typographic reproductions of the pamphlets’ original title pages. LIBRARY OF AMERICA is an independent nonprofit cultural organization founded in 1979 to preserve our nation’s literary heritage by publishing, and keeping permanently in print, America’s best and most significant writing. The Library of America series includes more than 300 volumes to date, authoritative editions that average 1,000 pages in length, feature cloth covers, sewn bindings, and ribbon markers, and are printed on premium acid-free paper that will last for centuries.Trade Review“This collection of pamphlets from the American Revolution is timely, important, and judiciously selected, which is no surprise given that Gordon S. Wood is the most insightful and accomplished scholar of the intellectual origins and consequences of the Revolution. These volumes are a great and fitting addition to the Library of America series.”— Alan Taylor, winner of the 2014 Pulitzer Prize for History “Gordon S. Wood’s grasp of the dynamics of the Imperial debate that culminated in American independence is unsurpassed. By including all sides of the controversy Wood has created the most discriminating and revealing collection of sources we have on the emerging ideology of the Revolution.”— Richard D. Brown, University of Connecticut“These volumes make a valuable contribution to the learning and teaching of American history. The men who wrote the script for national independence were strong, daring thinkers and skilled writers, with their lives at stake and their conscience in their pens. Their great gift to us lives on in this splendid collection.”— Michael McGiffert, Editor Emeritus, The William and Mary Quarterly

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Book SynopsisAn exploration of how an official French visual culture normalized France's colonial project and exposed citizens and subjects to racialized ideas of life in the empire. By the end of World War I, having fortified its colonial holdings in the Caribbean, Latin America, Africa, the Indian Ocean, and Asia, France had expanded its dominion to the four corners of the earth. This volume examines how an official French visual culture normalized the country's colonial project and exposed citizens and subjects alike to racialized ideas of life in the empire. Essays analyze aspects of colonialism through investigations into the art, popular literature, material culture, film, and exhibitions that represented, celebrated, or were created for France's colonies across the seas. These studies draw from the rich documents and media--photographs, albums, postcards, maps, posters, advertisements, and children's games--related to the nineteenth- and twentieth-century French empire that are held in the Getty Research Institute's Association Connaissance de l'histoire de l'Afrique contemporaine (ACHAC) collections. ACHAC is a consortium of scholars and researchers devoted to exploring and promoting discussions of race, iconography, and the colonial and postcolonial periods of Africa and Europe.Trade Review"Visualizing Empire delves deeply into colonial image making and the difficult issues of conquest, race, media, and cultural stereotyping through a peerless collection of visual artifacts of colonial imagery. The authors frame these works within a multidisciplinary context that at once deepens, broadens, and enhances our knowledge of French colonialism and how it worked both in the metropole and in the complex geographical and cultural worlds in which the French were engaged. Through a close examination of these forms—architecture, mapping, dress, caricature, zoos, fairs, games, advertising, and localized sites of encounter, Visualizing Empire provides us a seat at the table to experience up close the ever expanding thirst of empire that shaped the modern world."—Suzanne Preston Blier, Allen Whitehill Professor of Fine Arts and of African and African American Studies, Harvard University;;“Visualizing Empire introduces a stunning archive, now at the Getty Research Institute, that will be a powerful addition to the study of art and visual culture of early twentieth-century French colonialism. Utilizing a diversity of artifacts—from toys to maps—the authors demonstrate the centrality of material culture in the Republic's imperial ambitions to build consensus at home and to justify its racial, political, and economic dominance in the countries that comprised its colonies. This groundbreaking anthology enacts the importance of rigorous collaborative scholarship as itself a subversive corrective to a past that continues to haunt the present.”—Kishwar Rizvi, Professor in the History of Art, Islamic Art and Architecture, Yale University

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Book SynopsisThe Invention of the Colonial Americas is an architectural history and media-archaeological study of changing theories and practices of government archives in Enlightenment Spain. It centers on an archive created in Seville for storing Spain's pre-1760 documents about the New World. To fill this new archive, older archives elsewhere in Spain-spaces in which records about American history were stored together with records about European history-were dismembered. The Archive of the Indies thus constructed a scholarly apparatus that made it easier to imagine the history of the Americas as independent from the history of Europe, and vice versa. In this meticulously researched book, Byron Ellsworth Hamann explores how building layouts, systems of storage, and the arrangement of documents were designed to foster the creation of new knowledge. He draws on a rich collection of eighteenth-century architectural plans, descriptions, models, document catalogs, and surviving buildings to present a literal, materially precise account of archives as assemblages of spaces, humans, and data-assemblages that were understood circa 1800 as capable of actively generating scholarly innovation.Trade Review"This is a fascinating study of how the decision to establish a colonial archive required distinguishing European from colonial history and reimagining the role and place of the Americas in Spain, present and past. It demonstrates that the breakup of the Hispanic world was not unilateral, as not only creoles but also Spaniards, gradually moved to affirm that Spain and Spanish America were distinct. Hamann masterfully and convincingly shows that at the heart of the Archive of the Indies-an archive all historians of Spanish America use-is a hidden story about how our own field came to be and about what we have routinely seen but failed to notice."-Tamar Herzog, Monroe Gutman Professor of Latin American Affairs, Harvard University; “The Invention of the Colonial Americas takes the reader on an illuminating reconstruction of Seville’s Archive of the Indies as a physical place, one whose organization and content allowed eighteenth-century writers to sever the histories of Europe and the Americas. Byron Ellsworth Hamann’s innovative study—intellectual, spatial, data-driven, and always human in its focus—offers a necessary contribution to our understanding of the Spanish Enlightenment.”—Jesús Escobar, Northwestern University

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