The Complexity of Being Human is a thoughtful exploration of personal reflections and beliefs. It delves into the diversity of humanity and the ways in which people interact as they strive for harmony, respect, and acceptance. The variety within Homo Sapiens shapes the outcomes of these interactions. It influences not only harmony and respect but also conflict, religion, cruelty, and joy. Ultimately, the book argues that the ability to accommodate and accept one another is the true foundat...

Afrikaners have long been portrayed as the villains of South Africa’s apartheid state. Because they were such intensely vilified pariahs, many Americans and Europeans remain intrigued by Afrikaners as a vestige of white nationalism living in Africa who nevertheless peacefully transferred political power to South Africa’s black majority. Afrikaner Identity tells the longer story of the Afrikaners, starting with the emergence of an accidental Dutch colony at Cape Town in the seventeenth cent...

How have professional communicators transformed the business of politics? How do political bodies use the media to sell domestic and foreign policies to the public? This fully revised new edition of The Media and Political Process assesses the impact of spin doctoring and media activity in liberal democracies that are just as concerned with impression management and public relations as with policy.Political processes never stand still, and this revised second editi...

Decolonization and White Africans examines how African decolonization affected white Africans in eight countries – Algeria, Kenya, Northern Rhodesia (Zambia), Southern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe), Angola, Mozambique, South West Africa (Namibia), and South Africa – and discusses their varied responses to decolonization, including resistance, acquiescence, negotiations, and migration. It also examines the range of mechanisms used by the global community to compel white Africans into submitting to de...

The European Union (EU) stands out as a fascinatingly unique political organisation. On the one hand, it has shown the potential for developing deep and wide-ranging cooperation between member states, going far beyond that found anywhere else in the world. On the other, it is currently in the throes of a phase of profound uncertainty about its viability and future. Showing how and why the EU has developed from 1950 to the present day, this Very Short Introduction covers a range of...

An innovative examination of the forces - both destructive and dynamic - which have shaped twentieth-century South Africa. This book provides a stimulating introduction to the history of South Africa in the twentieth century. It draws on the rich and lively tradition of radical history writing on that country and, to a greater extent than previous accounts, weaves economic and cultural history into the political narrative. Apartheid and industrialization, especially mining, are central the...

First published in her pioneering treatise Statecraft, the opinions and projections of the former Prime Minister on Europe remain potent and resoundingly prophetic.Margaret Thatcher foresaw the European Union as a swelling superstate, gradually eroding Britain's freedom. Irreparable and doomed, European integration did not allow for the birthright of nationhood. It was the most recent incarnation of an idea that has been tried many times before, and the outcomes were far from happy...

In Africa no European country has had an influence as Britain. The first tangible break in the development was achieved by the South African parliament in 1934. But already Britain had shaped and predetermined South Africas future. The country wanted no other than evolutionary change, and this theme informed all administrations. Deception was the name of the game as was the violation of resolutions of the United Nations. Thus by the 1990s Britain was relative to other European countries in...

If you boil a kettle twice today, you will have used five times more electricity than a person in Mali uses in a whole year. How can that be possible?Decades after the colonial powers withdrew Africa is still struggling to catch up with the rest of the world. When the same colonists withdrew from Asia there followed several decades of sustained and unprecedented growth throughout the continent. So what went wrong in Africa? And are we helping to fix it, or simply making matters wor...

The liberation movements of Southern Africa arose to combat racism, colonialism and settler capitalism and engaged in armed struggle to establish democracy. After victory over colonial and white minority regimes, they moved into government embodying the hopes and aspirations of their mass of supporters and of widespread international solidarity movements. Even with the difficult legacies they inherited, their performance in power has been deeply disappointing. Roger Southall tracks the exp...

A new biography of Ghana’s Kwame Nkrumah, one of the most influential political figures in twentieth-century African history.As the first prime minister and president of the West African state of Ghana, Kwame Nkrumah helped shape the global narrative of African decolonization. After leading Ghana to independence in 1957, Nkrumah articulated a political vision that aimed to free the country and the continent—politically, socially, economically, and culturally—from t...

In 1994, the first non-racial elections in South Africa brought Nelson Mandela and his African National Congress to office; elections since have confirmed the ANC's hold, both popular and legitimate, on power. Yet, at the same time, South Africa has one of the highest rates of protest and dissent in the world - underscored by the police shooting of 34 striking miners at Marikana in 2012 - regions of deep poverty and environmental degradation, rising inequality and high unemployment rates. ...