Federation, Partnership, and the Chronologies of Space in 1950s East and Central Africa

Bibliographic Data

ID8959002
AuthorsIsmay Milford (0000-0001-5761-2348, University of Edinburgh, corresponding author)
Year2020
Volume63
Issue5
Pages1325-1348
Publication date2020-02-04
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueThe Historical Journal (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0018-246X • E-ISSN: 1469-5103
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s0018246x19000712
OpenAlexW3005081581
LanguageEN
Citations received5
References cited36

This article assesses the relationship between the imposed Central African Federation (1953–63) and the ways in which East and Central African thinkers and leaders conveyed and pursued the possibilities of decolonization. Existing literature on federalism in twentieth-century Africa fails to place regional projects in dialogue, studying in isolation East Africa and Central Africa, ‘utopian’ and oppressive regionalisms. But such clear dividing lines were not articulated in the four discursive ‘sketches’ of East and Central Africa that this article brings to light: those of anti-Federation organizations in Nairobi and Ndola in 1952; students at Makerere College (Kampala) in 1953; mobile Malawian activists in regional and pan-African forums around 1955–8; and East African party publicity representatives around 1958–60. At each of these critical moments, thinkers creatively constructed various relationships between geographical space and chronological change, through the lens of a broader, interdependent East and Central Africa, as a means to fend off perceived threats to a precarious advancement towards a democratic future. Attending to the evolution of these ideas shows not only how the Central African Federation placed material constraints on regional solidarity, but how ‘thinking regionally’ could support the case for national borders, even before decolonization

Decolonization · Democracy · East-Central Europe · General partnership · Geography · Interdependence · Political science · Politics · Publicity · Solidarity · African history and culture studies · African studies and sociopolitical issues · Law · South African History and Culture

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