Africa and the Disruptions of the Twenty-first Century

Paul Zeleza

Description

This collection of essays interrogates the repositioning of Africa and its diasporas in the unfolding disruptive transformations of the early twenty-first century. It is divided into five parts focusing on America's racial dysfunctions, navigating global turbulence, Africa's political dramas, the continent's persistent mythologisation and disruptions in higher education. It closes with tributes to two towering African public intellectuals, Ali Mazrui and Thandika Mkandawire, who have since joined the ancestors.

Informations

• Publié par: CODESRIA
• Date de parution: 19 février 2021
• Nombre de lectures: 2
• EAN13: 9782382340233
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 6 Mo

Extrait

Africa and the Disruptions of the Twentyfirst Century

This book is part of the CODESRIA Book Series.

Africa and the Disruptions of the Twentyfirst Century

Paul Tiyambe Zeleza

Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa DAKAR

©CODESRIA 2021 Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa Avenue Cheikh Anta Diop, Angle Canal IV BP 3304 Dakar, 18524, Senegal Website: www.codesria.org

ISBN: 9782869789975 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording or any information storage or retrieval system without prior permission from CODESRIA. Typesetting: Alpha Ousmane DIA Cover Design: Genevieve Simpson Distributed in Africa by CODESRIA Distributed elsewhere by African Books Collective, Oxford, UK Website: www.africanbookscollective.com

The Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA) is an independent organisation whose principal objectives are to facilitate research, promote researchbased publishing and create multiple forums for critical thinking and exchange of views among African researchers. All these are aimed at reducing the fragmentation of research in the continent through the creation of thematic research networks that cut across linguistic and regional boundaries.

CODESRIA publishesAfrica Development, the longest standing Africa based social science journal; Afrika Zamani, a journal of history; theAfrican Sociological Review;Africa Review of Booksthe and Journal of Higher Education in Africa. The Council also copublishes Identity, Culture and Politics: An AfroAsian Dialogue; and the AfroArab Selections for Social Sciences. The results of its research and other activities are also disseminated through its Working Paper Series, Book Series, Policy Briefs and the CODESRIA Bulletin. All CODESRIA publications are accessible online at www.codesria.org.

CODESRIA would like to express its gratitude to the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA), the Carnegie Corporation of New York (CCNY), Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Open Society Foundations (OSFs), UNESCO, Oumou Dilly Foundation, Ford Foundation and the Government of Senegal for supporting its research, training and publication programmes.

Contents

Prefacevii ......................................................................................................................................................................................................... List of Abbreviationsix ...................................................................................................................................................................... About the Authorxiii ........................................................................................................................................................................... Introductionxv .......................................................................................................................................................................................... I America’s Racial Dysfunctions  1. America’s Enduring Racial Sin 3 ..............................................................................................................................  2. Republicans, Racists and the Obama Derangement Syndrome 7 ..........................................  3. The Tragedy and Farce that is Trump’s America 11 ...............................................................................  4. Reckoning with 400 Years 15 .......................................................................................................................................  5. The American Uprising of 2020: Black Lives Matter Gains Traction 31 …...…………

 6.  7.  8.  9. 10.

11. 12. 13. 14. 15.

II Navigating Global Turbulence Brexit: From Empire via Europe to Little England 65 ........................................................................ The Western Alliance in Disarray and the Political Economy of Hegemonic Shifts 71 ....................................................................................................................................................... The Turbulent 2010s: A Historical Draft 79 ............................................................................................. The Coronavirus: The Political Economy of a Pathogen 101 .................................................... Mobilising the Diaspora for Sustainable Development 139 ......................................................

III Africa’s Political Dramas Mandela’s Long Walk with African History 155 .................................................................................... The Zuma Saga and the Postcolonial Reckoning of South Africa 165 ........................... Zimbabwe’s Political Crisis: A Tale of Failed Transitions 171 .................................................... Kenya’s Election Watershed and the Promise of African Democracy 183 .................... Malawi’s Political Earthquake 187 ...........................................................................................................................

vi

16. 17. 18. 19. 20.

Africa and the Disruptions of the Twentyfirst Century

IV Africa’s Persistent Mythologisation Why I am Afraid of the African Disease of Ebola 207 ............................................................ Trump’s Shithole Africa: The Homogenisation and Dehumanisation of a Continent 209 ............................................................................................................................................................ Black Panther217and the Persistence of the Colonial Gaze ........................................... The Decolonisation of African Knowledges 221 ............................................................................. Reckoning with the Pasts and Reimagining the Futures of African Studies for the Twentyfirst Century 237 .........................................................................

V Disruptions in Higher Education 21. The Six Capacity Challenges of African Universities 257 ................................................... 22. Rethinking the Value Proposition of University Education:  The Challenge of Employability 265 ............................................................................................................ 23. Africa, Internationalisation and the Global Context 273 ...................................................... 24. The Challenges and Opportunities of the Fourth Industrial  Revolution for African Universities 283 .................................................................................................. 25. Money Matters: The Financial Crises Facing Universities,  from the USA to Kenya 295 ................................................................................................................................... Epilogue In Memory of Two Intellectual Icons Ali Mazrui: A Tribute to an Intellectual Griot 317 ...................................................................................... Thandika Mkandawire: In Memory of an Intellectual Giant 321 ...............................................

References327 ............................................................................................................................................................................................. Index347 ........................................................................................................................................................................................................

Preface

I write this preface in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic and lockdowns in many countries around the world, including Kenya where I currently live. A major crisis is not only hugely disruptive, it always holds a giant mirror to society and in this case to the world at large, exposing its underlying structural deformities and dysfunctions. The coronavirus pandemic offers a stark reflection of national and global political economies in disarray and the colossal underinvestments in the economic and social wellbeing of the masses of working people. Engendering the multiple crises brutally pried open by the pandemic were the austerities, inequalities and ideological inanities of neoliberal globalisation, retrogressive populisms and wanton assaults on nature and the environment. The essays in this volume seek to make sense of the various disruptions and dysfunctions of the early twentyfirst century for Africa, of which the coronavirus pandemic is sadly symptomatic. They were written from two locations, namely, the United States where I lived for more than two decades and Kenya where I moved to take up a new position in January 2016. Thus, they reflect discourses from mutually reinforcing spatiotemporal positions, in North America and Africa, the global North and the global South, the African continent and the diaspora. As such, the essays combine observations and analyses of developments in these spaces that particularly intrigued me or struck me as significant. In short, they represent my personal meditations as an engaged PanAfrican scholar and global citizen on key developments during the second decade and beginning of the third decade of the twentyfirst century. The essays first appeared in various outlets. Some were presented as keynote addresses. Others were published in the traditional media. Many more were posted as blogs on social media. Several were transposed from one medium to another. But they all retain, with minor adjustments, their original content and flavour. For each essay, I have indicated the date on which it was written or delivered. This opens a window into both the framing of public debates and my own perspectives at the time the different essays were written.

viii

Africa and the Disruptions of the Twentyfirst Century

As always, my writings benefit from numerous engagements with my extensive network of intellectual friends, collaborators and critics in various parts of the world, especially the transatlantic PanAfrican world. I would like to thank all of them for the intellectual sustenance I derive from them. I trust they will understand that I have refrained from naming them individually to avoid making this preface too long and for fear of missing out anyone. But I trust it is in order to mention Cassandra Rachel Veney, my life partner, best friend and intellectual interlocutor who is always the first person to read anything I write before it leaves our intimate and exclusive conversations and enters the public realm. She is incredibly incisive in her comments and critiques, thorough in picking up poor writing and awkward expressions and generous in her prodding for greater clarity in my arguments and backup evidence. As I get older, I become more preoccupied, counterintuitively, with the future of my beloved continent, our global diaspora and the world at large. I am keener than ever about the quality of education we give our young people and the mentoring that the members of my generation provide to younger scholars. I am worried about the world we have created for future generations. But I am also more hopeful as I watch and witness the amazing energy, imagination, creativity, agency and fearlessness of young people. I dedicate this book to the young people in my personal and professional life, including my students at USIUAfrica and other universities at which I taught in recent years, and to the young members of my transnational extended family. I hope they will continue striving to create a better world than the one recorded in this book.

Nairobi, 25 July 2020

AAU ACB ADB AFLCIO ANC ASA AU BRICS CADFP CARES CARICOM CBC CCNY CIA CNN CODESRIA COSATU DMC DPP ECOWAS EEQ EFF EMDEs EU FAO

List of Abbreviations

African Association of Universities AntiCorruption Bureau Asian Development Bank American Federation of Labor African National Congress African Studies Association African Union Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa Carnegie African Diaspora Fellowship Program Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Caribbean Community Congressional Black Caucus Carnegie Corporation of New York Central Intelligence Agency Cable News Network Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa Congress of South African Trade Unions Developing Member Countries Democratic People’s Party Economic Community of West African States Essential employability qualities Economic Freedom Fighters Emerging Market and Developing Economies European Union Food and Agriculture Organization