Domains of politics 
and modes of rule
: Political structures of the 
neocolonial state in Africa


“A concise, dense and illuminating dissection of the workings of the post-independence African state that also charts a path towards imagining and working for a true politics of liberation.”Ndongo Samba Sylla, Senior Researcher, Rosa Luxemburg Foundation.


This is a brief attempt to orient the study of the neocolonial state in Africa through an assessment of the manner in which it rules its people.  It is argued that the state produces different modes of rule by deploying different politics over different parts of the population.  In this manner, it can combine a genuinely democratic rule in the image of the West over some while subjecting the majority to colonial forms of domination.  Imported political subjectivities from the West and its obsession with human rights discourse are reserved largely for a sphere of civil society in which the right to have rights is conferred upon citizens.  In the domains of uncivil society and ‘traditional’ society, the right to rights is not observed by the state so different subjectivities, regularly including violence, govern the manner political problems and solutions are addressed both by the state and by people.  In consequence, distinct political subjectivities prevail in the conceptualization of popular resistance in all three domains, and it becomes difficult to rally such different concerns and conceptions within an overall anti-neocolonial struggle.

ISBN Print: 9781990263774
Publication Date: May 2023
Page Count: 44
Binding Type: Soft cover
Trim Size: 6in x 9in
Language: English and Français
Colour: B&W

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Emeritus Professor in Humanities, Rhodes University, South Africa; Distinguished Visiting Scholar University of Connecticut Humanities Institute, United States; Visiting Professor, WISER, University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa.

    Contents

    Internationalism and neocolonialism, The problem of neocolonialism in Africa, How are we to think these problems?, The origins of contemporary neocolonialism, How are we to think neocolonialism today?, The three domains of state politics, Civil Society, Uncivil Society, ‘Traditional Society’, “Conclusions:
Some consequences for popular policies”, About the author

     

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