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  The Postcolonial State in Africa

  * * *

  Fifty Years of Independence, 1960–2010

  CRAWFORD YOUNG

  THE UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN PRESS

  Africa, 2012

  The University of Wisconsin Press

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  Madison, Wisconsin 53711-2059

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  Copyright © 2012

  The Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,

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  Printed in the United States of America

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Young, Crawford, 1931–

  The postcolonial state in Africa : fifty years of independence, 1960–

  2010 / Crawford Young.

  p. cm.—(Africa and the diaspora: history, politics, culture)

  Includes bibliographical references and index.

  ISBN 978-0-299-29144-0 (pbk. : alk. paper)—ISBN 978-0-299-29143-3 (e-book)

  1. Africa—Politics and government—1960– 2. Africa—History—1960–

  3. Postcolonialism—Africa. I. Title. II. Series: Africa and the diaspora.

  DT30.5.Y686 2012

  960.3’2—dc23

  2012015295

  To

  REBECCA YOUNG

  In Memoriam

  Contents

  Cover Page

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  List of Tables

  Preface

  Glossary and Acronyms

  The Postcolonial State in Africa

  Part One Setting the Frame

  1 A Half Century of African Independence: Three Cycles of Hope and Disappointment

  2 In Search of the African State

  Part Two Itineraries: Three Cycles of Hope and Disappointment

  3 Decolonization, the Independence Settlement, and Colonial Legacy

  4 The Road to Autocracy: Breakdown of the Decolonization Settlements

  5 Anatomy of State Crisis

  6 Democratization and Its Limits

  Part Three Themes and Conclusions

  7 Morphology of Violent Civil Conflict

  8 Africanism, Nationalism, and Ethnicity: The Ambiguous Triple Helix of Identity

  9 The African Postcolonial State: Concluding Reflections

  Notes

  Index

  Tables

  TABLE 1.1 Six Phases of Postcolonial Evolution

  TABLE 2.1 State as Concept

  TABLE 4.1 Successful Coups in Africa, 1952–70

  TABLE 4.2 African and Other Developing Areas Average Annual Growth Rates, 1960–70

  TABLE 5.1 African and Other Developing Areas Average Annual Growth Rates, GNP per Capita, 1965–89

  TABLE 6.1 Classification by Regime Type, 2009

  TABLE 6.2 African Perspectives on Democracy, Twenty Countries, 2008

  TABLE 7.1 African Civil Wars, 1990–2010

  TABLE 9.1 Sub-Saharan African Economic Growth in Comparison, circa 1960–2010

  TABLE 9.2 African Defense Expenditures, 2007

  TABLE 9.3 Top and Bottom Ten Countries, 2010 Mo Ibrahim Index

  TABLE 9.4 Comparative African State Performance, 2009

  Preface

  In a real sense, this volume is a product of the half century of engagement with Africa, beginning with graduate study in 1955, that roughly overlaps the fifty years of African independence. Teaching and research concerning African politics was my primary mission during my academic career at the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 1963 until 2001 and has continued to be my main interest in my emeritus years. The present book became my primary (though not the only) research focus after publication of the work intended as a predecessor, The African Colonial State in Comparative Perspective, in 1994. One may only hope that the volume is worthy of its protracted period of gestation.

  Over such an extended time period, the number of debts I have accumulated far exceeds the space available to acknowledge them all. Looming over all others is the diverse support I have received from the university I have been privileged to serve: a pair of research professorships, one bearing the name of my doctoral mentor, Rupert Emerson, and the other that of the retired chancellor and president of the university, H. Edwin Young, as well as sundry grants from the Graduate School Research Committee. Beyond material support, the superb intellectual environment provided by the university, especially my colleagues in the Department of Political Science and in the African Studies Program, and the resources of the university libraries have been of immense benefit. The extraordinary erudition and scholarly contribution of my colleague Jan Vansina have been a particular inspiration.

  Over the years, I have enjoyed research awards from the Ford Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation, Guggenheim Foundation, Fulbright Program, Social Science Research Program, and most recently the Mellon Foundation. Visiting years at the Institute for Advanced Study (Princeton), and the Wood-row Wilson Center (Washington) were memorable opportunities. Of particular value were visiting professor years at Makerere University in Uganda (1965–66) and Cheikh Anta Diop University of Dakar in Senegal (1987–88), and a term as dean of the Social Science Faculty at the former Lubumbashi campus of the Université Nationale du Zaire (now University of Lubumbashi) in Congo (1973–75). The latter service fell within the frame of an African university development program of the Rockefeller Foundation, whose field representative (and dean of African politics scholarship), the late James Coleman, was a priceless support.

  A number of graduate students have provided invaluable help as research assistants; in the years during which this volume was my primary goal, they include Gwen Bevis, Brandon Kenthammer, Cédric Jourde, Bruce Magnus-son, Geraldine O'Mahoney, Laura Singleton, and Ric Tange. Beyond direct research assistance, these pages reflect the intellectual contributions of the sixty outstanding graduate students whose doctoral programs I have been privileged to help supervise; perhaps less directly, but no less importantly, the stimulation provided by the intellectual curiosity of the hundreds of graduate students and thousands of undergraduates enrolled in my courses over the years plays a part as well. Several of my former students served as coauthors on various books and articles over the years, notably Thomas Turner, Neal Sherman, Tim Rose, and Mustafa Mirzeler.

  My teaching and research years in Uganda, Congo-Kinshasa, and Senegal were likewise enriched by colleagues and students. In Uganda, these include Okello Oculi, E. A. Brett, Edward Kannyo, and Nelson Kasfir. In the Lubumbashi years, my debt is great to Munzadi Babole and Ileka Nkiere, my colleagues in the dean’s office, as well as fellow faculty members Mwabila Malela, Pascal Payanzo, Georges Nzongola Ntalaja, Johannes Fabian, Jean-Claude Willame, Jean-Luc Vellut, Bogumil Jewsiewicki, and Benoït Verhaegen. In Senegal, special thanks are due to my colleagues Babacar Kante, El Hadj Mbodj, Tafsir Ndiaye, Mamadou Diouf, and Richard Siegwalt.

  Over the past five decades, I have benefited from regular contact with several fellow African politics scholars entered the field about the same time as I did: Goran Hyden, René Lemarchand, Richard Sklar, William Foltz, and Herbert Weiss. I am especially grateful to my colleagues who provided inval
uable critiques of the manuscript draft: Michael Schatzberg, Thomas Spear, Aili Mari Tripp, Scott Straus, Louise Young ,and Ralph Young. So also did the press readers, notably Catherine Boone and Pierre Englebert.

  Our four daughters, Eva, Louise, Estelle, and Emily, all assisted with the manuscript at one stage or another. Greatest of all is my debt to my beloved late wife Becky, who passed away while the manuscript was in process. Her remarkable political career as long-serving state legislator, former member of the Madison School Board and Dane County Board of Supervisors, and occupant of other high state offices was an inspiration to her family. She was always the first to see manuscript drafts, including the first two chapters of the present work. I dedicate the volume to her indelible memory.

  Glossary and Acronyms

  ABAKO Alliance des Bakongo (Congo-Kinshasa)

  AEF Afrique équatoriale française

  ADB African Development Bank

  AFDL Alliance des forces démocratiques pour la libération du Congo-Zaire

  ANC African National Congress (South Africa)

  Anya-nya guerrilla forces; southern Sudanese insurgents

  AOF Afrique occidentale française

  AQIM Al Qaeda in the Islamique Mahgreb

  AFRC Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (Sierra Leone)

  AU African Union

  BDP Botswana Democratic Party

  bula matari crusher of rocks, Congolese term for Belgian colonial state

  CFA franc communauté financière d’Afrique (currency)

  DUP Democratic Unionist Party (Sudan)

  ECOMOG West African Military Advisory Group

  ECOWAS Economic Community of West African States

  ELF Eritrean Liberation Front

  EPLF Eritrean People’s Liberation Front (Eritrea)

  Estado Novo Portuguese “New State” under the 1933–75 dictatorship

  FDLR Front démocratique pour la libération du Rwanda

  FIS Front islamique de salut (Algeria)

  FLN Front de libération nationale (Algeria)

  FNLA Frente nacional para a libertaçâo de Angola

  forces vives vital forces of society

  Françafrique former French territories in sub-Saharan Africa

  FRELIMO Frente da libertação de Moçambique

  GDP gross domestic product

  Gécamines Générale des carrières et des mines (Congo-Kinshasa mining corporation)

  GNP gross national product

  Herrenvolk master race

  ICC International Criminal Court

  ICU Islamic Courts Union

  IGAD Inter-African Governmental Agency for Development

  IMF International Monetary Fund

  Interahamwe Rwandan Hutu youth militia

  jamahariyya state of the masses, Muammar Qadhafy’s term for his Libyan autocracy

  Kamajors traditional militia in Mende region, Sierra Leone

  KANU Kenya African National Union

  loi-cadre 1956 French framework law providing territorial reorganization for decolonization

  LRA Lord’s Resistance Army (Uganda)

  LURD Liberians United for Peace and Democracy

  MASSOB Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra (Nigeria)

  MDC Movement for Democratic Change (Zimbabwe)

  MFDC Mouvement des forces démocratiques de Casamance (Senegal)

  MMD Movement for Multi-Party Democracy (Zambia)

  MPLA Movimento para a libertaçâo de Angola

  MPR Mouvement populaire de la révolution (Congo-Kinshasa)

  mukhabarat national security state, referring to Arab states

  NARC National Alliance Rainbow Coalition (Kenya)

  NCP National Congress Party (Sudan)

  NEPAD New African Partnership for Development

  NIF National Islamic Front (Sudan)

  NP National Party (South Africa)

  NPFL National Patriotic Front of Liberia

  NRA National Resistance Army (Uganda)

  NRC National Republican Convention (Nigeria)

  OAU Organization of African Unity

  ODM Orange Democratic Movement (Kenya)

  PAIGC Partido africano da independência de Guiné e Cabo Verde

  POLISARIO Frente popular para la liberación de Saguia el-Hamra y Rio de Oro

  RCD Rassemblement congolais pour la démocratie

  RENAMO Rêsistencia nacional moçambicana

  RPF Rwandan Patriotic Front

  RUF Revolutionary United Front (Sierra Leone)

  SADC Southern African Development Community

  SAPs structural adjustment programs

  SDP Social Democratic Party (Nigeria)

  shari’a Islamic law

  SLPP Sierra Leone People’s Party

  SNM Somali National Movement

  SPLA/M Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army

  SSDF Somali Salvation Democratic Front

  SSDF Southern Sudan Defense Force

  TPLF Tigray People’s Liberation Front (Ethiopia)

  TFG Transitional Federal Government (Somalia)

  UDF United Democratic Front (South Africa)

  UDSG Union démocratique et sociale gabonaise

  ULIMO United Liberation Movement of Liberia

  UNAMSIL United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone

  UNDP United Nations Development Program

  UNECA United Nations Economic Commission for Africa

  UNITA Uniâo para a independência total de Angola

  UNOSOM United Nations Operation in Somalia

  UPC Union des populations du cameroun

  UPDF Uganda People’s Defense Force

  UPS Union progressiste sénégalaise

  USC United Somali Congress

  ZANU Zimbabwe African National Union

  ZANU-PF Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front

  The Postcolonial State in Africa

  PART ONE

  * * *

  Setting the Frame

  1

  * * *

  A Half Century of African Independence

  Three Cycles of Hope and Disappointment

  BASELINE FOR INDEPENDENCE

  The symbolic date of African independence is commonly acknowledged to be 6 March 1957, when the colonial Gold Coast became the sovereign state of Ghana. Some might choose 1956, when Morocco, Tunisia, and Sudan all emerged from colonial occupation. But these transitions lacked the continental resonance of Ghanaian independence. The commanding importance of Ghana lies in its having traced a path along which former British territories would soon follow, setting in turn a precedent that other European colonial powers could not escape, even if Portugal resisted militarily for nearly two decades.1 Above all, Ghanaian independence was decisive in creating a sense of the inevitability of imminent decolonization, which was not present even a year or two earlier. Still, the more customary baseline for marking the independence era is 1960, when no less than seventeen countries achieved sovereignty.

  Five turbulent decades have followed, producing an African political landscape in which there was strikingly little change in the set of state actors but a dramatic transformation in their institutional content and social environment. Outcomes well beyond the outer bounds of analytical imagination when Ghana celebrated its independence are legion. If one accepts as valid measure of state performance a stable democratic regime politically and sustained robust development economically, then none could forecast that two of the least promising territories in 1957, Botswana and Mauritius, would top the tables five decades hence. Conversely, at that base point Somalia was frequently celebrated as a rare African example of a genuine nation-state whose cultural coherence held promise for effective rule; yet since 1991—for nearly a third of the postcolonial era—the country has been a morass of civil strife pitting subclans and warlord factions against one another in an effectively stateless environment. In 1957, many Africans and observers perceived in the mass single party of anticolonial combat the pot
ential for societal mobilization for rapid development once independence was won. Armed liberation movements combined progressive ideologies with apparent iron discipline, presumed applicable to the tasks of development. These illusions have an archaic ring today.

  SCOPE AND OBJECTIVES: SEEING AFRICA WHOLE

  The object of this volume is to examine the political trajectories of the fifty-three African states over the course of the past half century. This period covers my academic career, which has been devoted to the study of African politics, as researcher, as teacher, as visiting professor in three African countries (Senegal, Uganda, and Congo-Kinshasa), as faculty dean in Congo, and as occasional policy consultant.2 I include the entire continent rather than restricting “Africa” to its sub-Saharan regions, which is a frequent analytical practice, and I have made this choice for several reasons. History argues for a continental perspective; deep cultural, economic, religious, and political links unite the Arab tier of states in the north to the lands to the south. As G. N. Sanderson has noted, the colonial partition that defined the contemporary territorial map operated in interactive competitive manner with the entirety of the continent as its frame.3 Ali Mazrui adds that “Africa is at once more than a country and less than one. . . . Africa is a concept, pregnant with the dreams of millions of people."4 The two major recent collective works synthesizing African history from its earliest days, the Cambridge and UNESCO eight-volume histories of Africa, both aspire to seeing Africa whole. Official Africa claims standing as a constituted region of intercommunicating states with a commonality of goals; the pan-African dream is surprisingly robust in the face of its institutional shortcomings and disappointments. Not least important, the most popular sport in Africa, football (soccer), operates organizationally on an all-Africa basis.