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Are International Organizations tools of hegemonic predation, or do they have autonomous functions and capacities?
Since the end of World War II, international organizations (IOs) have proliferated and redefined the global political and economic landscape as states band together to advance particular interests. To perceive IOs as mere tools of hegemonic predation ignores the complex dynamics that have characterised their evolution.
What is the relation between nationalism and the ‘colonial difference’?
This essay draws on the work of Partha Chatterjee to argue that a distinction might be drawn between political and cultural nationalism. Whilst political nationalism sought to challenge the notion of ‘colonial difference’ in the outer realm, cultural nationalism sought to maintain it (albeit reformed and reshaped) in the inner realm. This contradictory process continues to have important consequences for Africa today.
Why and in what ways have the concept of global civil society and organizations seeking to represent it been criticized?
This essay presents some of the major criticisms of global civil society, namely its conceptual vagueness and incoherence; its rhetorical function as a legitimation device that arguably undermines the transnational demos; and finally its maintenance and reproduction of the neoliberal order.
Explaining African state ‘failure’: Does the state make the nation or the nation make the state?
In seeking to explain ‘tribalism’ and ‘state failure’ in Africa, academics often point towards the misalignment of the nation and the state: either the post-colonial state has failed to make the nation, or nations have descended into ‘tribalism’ in the process of carving out a state. What is common in these two presumptions, is that all African nations or states have the power to make their counterpart; by extension, the ‘failure ‘of such processes is rarely problematised beyond domestic politics and historical references to the impact of colonialism.
Achievements and Limitations of Nation-building in Africa: The case of Zimbabwe
Recent months have seen inter-ethnic conflict in Kenya, exclusivist attacks aimed at immigrant populations in South Africa and continuing controversy surrounding the future of Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe. Cases such as these expose serious societal tensions within some contemporary African states, including those traditionally considered the continent’s ‘success stories’. In light of this, it’s pertinent to ask about the achievements and limitations of nation-building in Africa.
Describe the major proposals to revise the International Financial Architecture to limit the frequency and severity of financial crises in developing countries in the future.
The devastating financial crises that have hit developing nations in Latin America and Asia over the past several decades have given rise to numerous rallying calls to reform the “international financial architecture.” Liberalizing the financial system to foreign capital flows have contributed to immense domestic political and economic turmoil, and in some nations even to violence.
NATO in Afghanistan: fighting to define its future
Almost sixty years after it was first formed, NATO has changed a great deal from the organisation which once prepared to fight the Red Army in Germany’s Fulda Gap. This essay will argue that the alliance is now fighting fto define its future, in Afghanistan.
The ‘Developmental State’ and Economic Development
The term ‘developmental state’ has been incorrectly used to describe any state presiding over a period of economic development and improvement in living standards. This essay describes the attributes of the ‘developmental state’ and explains how they led to highly successful economic development in the Newly Industrialized Countries (NICs).
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