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Week Three Notes: Citizenship, Nationalism, & Political Independence in
Africa
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Reading Notes
Reading One: Nationalism and Political Independence in Africa
SOURCE: Adeyeri, James Olusegun, “Nationalism and Political Independence in Africa” In Ojo, Samuel
and Falola, Oloruntoba (eds) Palgrave Handbook of African Politics, Governance and Development
(London: Macmillan, 2018) Chapter 12, 203-213.
SUMMARY: 11 pages to ~ 6 pages. Honestly not that helpful in terms of exam material imo. Easy read
though, its more of a historical overview of nationalism and gaining independence, no theories/models.
Introduction
The ideological underpinnings of African nationalism and the quest for political independence had
political, economic and social ramifications. Colonial actions and inactions provided African nationalists
with the impetus and ingredients to formulate an ideology for the struggle for freedom.
Patterns of Independence Struggle in Africa
West Africa
Nationalism in pre-colonial West Africa was championed by politicians, journalists, critics and other
elements, who were essentially cultural nationalists who advocated Black emancipation and defense of
the African personality.
● Edward Wilmot Blyden: He debunked the Eurocentric views of such scholars as R.F. Burton,
James Hunt, and T.J. Hutchinson, who sought to explain the status of racial inferiority in
biological terms
○ He urged educated elites to reject mental slavery. African integrity and identity over
negative manifestations of European cultural infiltration
● James Johnson: Despite his devotion to Christianity, he criticized foreign Christians and
advocated the complete integration of Christianity through African rites.
○ In his visions for nationalism he paid attention to the issue of education for Black people.
○ Other members of the West African elite, such as Samuel Ajayi Crowther, J.A. Horton
and Leopold Sedar Senghor, embraced his policy and zeal, in order to defend African
indigenous institutions against Western infiltration.
● Cultural nationalism - pre-colonial era shifted towards political protest
● British West Africa:
○ National Congress of British West Africa (NCBWA) 1920 marked a huge change in the
political history of the territory.
○ The organization brought together delegates from the four British West African colonies,
Nigeria, Sierra Leone, the Gambia, and Gold Coast, and consolidated independently
expressed grievances into one single petition.
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○ also advocated the notion of a single West African nationality (an English-speaking one)
to be facilitated via the establishment of a West African university.
○ The NCBWA resolutions synergized the grievances and pleas of numerous groups,
organizations and individuals.
○ Other components of the collaboration included independent church movements,
grievances of chiefs and subjects over land, economic grievances
● French West Africa:
○ Owing to the draconian nature of the French colonial policy of indigenat, press and
liberty of association laws, early modern nationalism in French West Africa did not take
the form of formal political organizations, but manifested itself through protest
movements, voluntary associations and the elite.
○ In Ivory Coast and Upper Volta, now Cote D’Ivoire and Burkina Faso respectively,
people in their thousands deserted their homes and villages in order to avert curvee
(forced labor).
○ A resistance movement, the Nana Vo, emerged against the arbitrary requisition of food
and animals by the chiefs, who had the approval of the colonial government.
○ In 1923, the people of Porto Novo, Dahomey, rioted in protest against the hike in head tax
payable by men, women, and children.
○ Workers also adopted illegal industrial actions in Senegal, Guinea, Dahomey, and Sudan
to express their grievances against an unfair economic system that prohibited them from
negotiating their conditions of service
● In both British West Africa and French West Africa, the post-Second World War period ushered
in full-fledged anticolonial nationalism.
○ Reformist proto-nationalism was thus replaced by anticolonial nationalism, which was
more political and territorial.
○ Fiercely anticolonial movements emerged to demand not just liberation, independence,
self-determination, and autonomy, but also liberal democracy, majority rule, immediate
freedom and human rights.
○ Finally, these movements also pursued socio-economic objectives such as modernization,
industrialization and education.
East Africa
● Early modern nationalism in East Africa was shaped by an emphasis upon education, economic
development and modernization that was championed by village schoolteachers, shopkeepers,
clerks and cotton-growers
● Kenya:
○ Mid-1920s came with the formation of the Kikuyu Central Asssociation (KCA)
■ Resistance against the missionary assault on Kikuyu tradition and culture
■ many Kikuyu abandoned the mission churches or gave up their teaching jobs in
mission schools, and proceeded to establish their own churches and schools.
○ Kenya’s journey to independence was characterized by violent upheavals, unlike
Tanganyika’s process which was relatively smooth.
