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- Convenors:
-
Lena Dallywater
(Leibniz Institute for Regional Geography)
Helder Adegar Fonseca (University of Évora)
Chris Saunders (University of Cape Town)
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- Discussant:
-
Robin E. Möser
(University of Potsdam)
- Format:
- Panel
- Stream:
- Perspectives on current crises
- Location:
- S62 (RW I)
- Sessions:
- Monday 30 September, -, -
Time zone: Europe/Berlin
Short Abstract:
In the process of African decolonization, key moments in the political transition from colonial/white-ruled states to new independent majority-ruled states can be identified. The round table discussion focuses on the roles of communist actors in these transitions from a comparative perspective.
Long Abstract:
In the long and protracted process of decolonization in sub-Saharan Africa, a number of key moments in the political transition from colonial/white-ruled states to new independent majority-ruled states can be identified: the first (1957-1965), the second (1974-1977) and the third (1989-1994). The existing literature does not consider the roles of communist actors in these transitions from a comparative perspective. With the second thematic stream “Perspectives on current crises” in mind, the round table participants look back into the past of African decolonial transitions, and scrutinize actors and agents of change at the moments of evolutionary or revolutionary political transition for sovereignty and its consolidation. Political transitions are complex processes, a shift from one set of political procedures to another, from an old pattern of rule to a new one. It is an interval of intense political uncertainty during which the shape of the new institutional dispensation is established in a democratic, consensual or, more frequently, in a conflicting or “violent” manner. Participants unravel cases from Lusophone, Francophone, and Anglophone settings, to revisit and compare, and to discuss which ‘experts’, which ‘strategies’ lead to actual outcomes of negotiations in moments of crises, and who’s ideas are sidelined, and which transfers fail(ed). Although the round table is historically oriented, it thus provides food for thought for current global upheavals with consequences for societies on the African continent, and it connects with other projects on the history of entanglements of African actors and societies in the 'East' (see, e.g., Schade, Lazic, Záhořík).
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Monday 30 September, 2024, -Paper short abstract:
This paper will consider the role of various communist actors in the political transitions that took Namibia to independence in 1990 and South Africa from apartheid to democracy in the early 1990s: Cuba, the Soviet Union and the South African Communist Party.
Paper long abstract:
This paper will consider the role of various communist actors in the political transitions that took Namibia to independence in 1990 and South Africa from apartheid to democracy in the early 1990s. Cuba played a key role in the military conflict that led to the angola/Namibia accord of December 1988 that paved the way for Namibian independence, and the way in which Namibia moved to independence in turn made possible the transition in south Africa. But whereas there was no communist party in Namibia, and only a few leading Namibians retained a strong commitment to communist ideology, in South Africa the South African Communist Party (SACP) had by the late 1980s been closely tied to the Soviet Union for decades. While the Soviets, and to a lesser extent the German Democratic Republic, provided weapons and military training to the armed wings of the two liberation movements, in the late 1980s, under Mikhail Gorbachev, the Soviets sought to promote peaceful settlements to the southern African conflicts. While international communism played no role in the south African transition, leading figures in the SACP were influential, in often surprising ways, in helping to shape South Africa’s political transition. This paper will try to bring out the nuances in the story of the two transitions and will offer reflections on how they were similar and different, and why.
Paper short abstract:
This paper examines an overlooked aspect of North Korea's role in African decolonial transitions: the development of a new global order. Using the 1987 Pyongyang Conference for South-South Cooperation as a case study, this paper discusses the North Korean-African attempts at worldmaking.
Paper long abstract:
This chapter examines North Korea’s involvement in African decolonial transitions. The reign of Kim Il Sung (1948-1994) coincided with the gradual liberation of the African continent, and North Korea provided assistance to a variety of African liberation movements and postcolonial governments. North Korea helped African political elites to achieve and consolidate national independence, while in return North Korea received support in the United Nations and hard foreign currency.
This chapter argues that North Korean-African cooperation went a step further: North Koreans and Africans discussed the development of a new global order. The Pyongyang Conference for South-South Cooperation, held in 1987, is a window into this overlooked dimension of North Korea’s role in African decolonial transitions. ‘Let us develop South-South cooperation’ said Kim in 1987 at the Pyongyang conference, a message that resonated with African political elites highly invested in world-making.
This chapter thus moves beyond a pragmatic, transactional understanding of North Korean-African relations and examines the idealism behind Kim Il Sung’s connections to the African continent. The Pyongyang conference has so far been ignored in the historiography, but a recent discovery of South Korean diplomatic cables makes it possible to produce the first description and analysis of this event. It offers an opportunity to interrogate larger analytical questions, such as North Korea’s role in the Cold War, the importance of Africa for North Korean diplomacy, and the question whether North Korean behavior was motivated by ideology or pragmatism.
Paper short abstract:
This paper deals with the involvement of the Polish People’s Republic (PRL) in the Angolan decolonization process. Using a comparative approach, it aims to explore how Warsaw’s engagement in Angola differed from that of other communist actors.
Paper long abstract:
The relations between the countries of the Soviet bloc (Global East) and the decolonized states of the Global South have been a particular subject of analysis by historians focused on the agency of both peripheries in creating transcontinental interconnections of “socialist solidarity”. The wave of decolonization that swept across Lusophone Africa (1974-1977), particularly the complex Angolan transition to independence, was an active phase in the development of these links with the communist world, even with socialist states that were until then reluctant to become entangled in the competitive dynamics of the Cold War in Southern Africa. Recent historiography argues that the involvement of the Polish People’s Republic (PRL-Polska Rzeczpospolita Ludowa) in Africa was comparatively cautious and small-scale, based on a pragmatic approach guided by economic considerations and relatively independent of the Kremlin (see Gasztold 2018, 2023, Puchalski 2023, Knopek 2023). In this paper, exploring Polish archives systematically, we dialogue with this literature by focusing on the case of the Angolan process of decolonization as a privileged window of observation of the 'hot' Cold War in order to examine Warsaw’s involvement, interactions and motives. Particular emphasis is placed on a comparative approach with other communist actors to explore how Polish engagement in Angola differed from that of other socialist states.
Paper short abstract:
The paper compares Czechoslovakia's strategies towards Angola and Mozambique after 1974. The aim is to contribute to the academic discussion about the approach of the small European state of the East towards two similar countries of the Global South during their transition to independence.
Paper long abstract:
Numerous research in recent years, inspired by the New Cold War History, shows that the smaller states of the Soviet bloc did not just blindly follow Moscow's instructions in the Global South but also pursued their interests there. However, little attention has been paid to comparing their strategies in different states.
The paper compares Czechoslovakia's official strategies towards Angola and Mozambique after 1974. Both Lusophone African states were similar in many aspects (e.g., shared history of Portuguese colonialism and decolonization, language, geography) but different in others (e.g., economic potential, geopolitical importance). The first aim is to explore if Czechoslovakia, a small European socialist state, reflected these differences in its approach. The second aim is to contribute to the academic discussion about the official strategies of a smaller member of the East towards two similar countries of the Global South during their transition to independence. It will be examined by analyzing official strategic documents, main agreements, crucial Czechoslovak projects in both states and the narratives represented in the Czechoslovak media. Where possible, the findings will be confronted with the perspective of other members of the Soviet bloc and African counterparts. The research will be based mainly on declassified archival materials and interviews.
Paper short abstract:
This contribution investigates the involvement of expatriates self-identifying as socialists, operating outside the machinery of state socialism, in the development agendas and projects that marked the political transitions in Mozambique and Guinea-Bissau in the 1970s and 1980s.
Paper long abstract:
Political, economic and social transitions from empire to nation-state were hugely shaped by debates around development. African postcolonial elites were not alone in addressing these issues, but benefited from the exchanges and experience of a wide range of international actors. Some of these actors played a key role in shaping transitions on the ground, through specific rural development projects, educational and health programs, etc. Cooperation agreements between African and socialist countries were one of the channels that enabled the East-South circulation of experts (Burton 2021; Pieporka 2020) but there were other routes of mobility, usually less formal or without state backing, through which actors who identified themselves as socialist or communist moved – West-South and South-South– to contribute to the transition and ensuing nation-building plans.
This paper aims to offer a first exploration of the role that the development experts, academics and workers that moved southwards outside bilateral/state mobility frameworks played in diverse subfields connected to 1970s and 1980s/90s transitions. Drawing on concrete examples of individuals engaged in the development sector in Guinea-Bissau and Mozambique, this contribution broadens the scope of socialist mobilities and exchanges beyond the conventional East-South axis. This provides room to analyse critiques, tensions and alternative visions of politically or ideologically-driven circulations and the impact that a plurality of socialisms had in African decolonial transitions.
Paper short abstract:
As part of African-Soviet student mobilities, between the years 1960 and 1993, around forty young Tuareg and Berabish, including four women, were trained in the Soviet Union, in the former Soviet bloc and Cuba.
Paper long abstract:
As part of African-Soviet student mobilities, between the years 1960 and 1993, around forty young Saharan from Mali and Niger (Tuareg and Berabish), including four women, were trained in the Soviet Union and in the former Soviet bloc, in the technical-scientific sector (medicine, engineering, geology, and chemistry). After an historical contextualization of these international student's trajectories through the difficult process of adapting to institutionalized formal schooling, I analyze their professional and political careers, both in Mali and Niger or in support of the current independence movements. Understanding this part of African post-colonial contemporary history from the point of view of the new elites of nomadic and pastoral origin makes it possible to navigate the social interactions in landlocked regions, situated on the social peripheries of states, in contexts that Veena Das defines as often being 'unreadable' (Das 2004). Based on original, first-hand empirical data, my communication will first focus on these students' strategies, using an ethnographic and biographical approach that aims to capture the student's point of view.