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A Short History of Modern Angola
This book begins in 1820 with the Portuguese attempt to create a third, African, empire after the virtual loss of Asia and America. In the nineteenth century the most valuable resource extracted from Angola was agricultural labour, first as privately owned slaves and later as conscript workers. The colony was managed by a few marine officers, by several hundred white political convicts, and by a couple of thousand black Angolans who had adopted Portuguese language and culture. The hub was the harbour city of Luanda which grew in the twentieth century to be a dynamic metropolis of several million people. The export of labour was gradually replaced when an agrarian revolution enabled white Portuguese immigrants to drive black Angolan labourers to produce sugar-cane, cotton, maize and above all coffee. During the twentieth century this wealth was supplemented by Congo copper, by gem-quality diamonds, and by off-shore oil. Although much of the countryside retained its dollar-a-day peasant economy, new wealth generated conflict which pitted white against black, north against south, coast against highland, American allies against Russian allies.The generation of warfare finally ended in 2002 when national reconstruction could begin on Portuguese colonial foundations.
256 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 2015
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
April 5, 2026
An interesting read on an up and coming African nation about which there has been a surprising paucity of literature on its history --- Angola.
Having said this is interesting is not to say that it was enthralling. To be honest, I found it rather dry -- factual, but, if it is to be believed, a history in which there are few driving historical figures or major world changing events.
For most of Angola's recorded history, it was colonized and dominated by Portugal. For the most part, evidently, Portugal's approach was predominantly one of benign neglect, in comparison with other contemporary European colonial powers in Africa.
Until the 1920s, most of Portugal's direct governance of Angola was confined to the coastal areas around Luanda --- using it as a base from which to trade with the various self-governing African kingdoms in the interior for ivory, gold, and other commodities.
Curiously, as exploitative as most other European powers' colonialism were, most, at least, abjured the slave trade. In contrast, Portugal kept it going surreptiously well into the early 1900s. Portugal, under pressure from her ally, Great Britain, by the 1860s, had to abandon open slave trading, but then kept it going illicitly via what would now be considered today "human trafficking" --- taking human beings seized either by the African kingdoms or by Portuguese smugglers and sold to plantations in Sao Tome and Principe or even Brazil.
By the 1920s with the overthrow of the Portugal's monarchy, the Salazar dictatorship in Portugal took over, and chose to apply a more intense approach Angola. The de facto slave trade was quashed; however, the new regime sought other means by which to make the colony profitable to the mother nation. In some ways, this was no better -- and with respect to native Angolans managing their own local affairs, worse --- for this meant Portugal extending colonial methods similar to those used by Belgium in the neighboring Congo: forced labor, forcing agricultural quotas on native farmers and villages, and seizing of native lands for plantations.
This continued for decades with some initial success in making Angola profitable for Portugal. However, by the 1950s, Angolans were becoming positively desperate --- from poverty and man-made famine ---- to such an extent, Angolans in many locations resorted to burning coffee and cotton seed stores so that these could not be planted on lands needed by the people for their subsistence crops.
This exploded into revolution in 1961 with the Angolan Revolution. However, the resistance to Portugal was not unified --- subdivided into 3 rival movements -- MPLA, FNLA, and UNITAS --- whose divisions made it possible for a second rate light weight power like Portugal to hold onto Angola for another 14 years. Hitherto a backwater, now Angola became a free for all as it fell into the rivalry of the Cold War along with the desperate efforts of apartheid regimes of South Africa and Rhodesia to survive. Military weapons and soldiers (from some of these) for the various factions flowed in from the US, the Soviet Union, Cuba, the Congo, Rhodesia, and South Africa --- fueling a scorched earth, bloody regional war.
With Portugal's Carnation Revolution overthrowing its dictatorship, Portugal withdrew, and Angola gained her independence --- but the various factions in Angola continued into an Angolan Civil War that dragged on --- with some intervals of truce -- until 2002.
It would be wonderful if this history then had a tale of peace and prosperity for Angola after independence. Unfortunately, with the MPLA ultimately gaining power, its leader, Jose Eduardo dos Santos, took Angola onto a path all too well trodden by so much of the rest of post-c0lonial Africa --- the "Big Man" phenomenon -- where a dictator takes power, and then proceeds to enrich himself and his supporters at the expense of the rest of the people.
Despite becoming a major exporter of oil, some estimates are that, under dos Santos, a breathtaking sum for one of the world's poorest countries --- some $24 billion of Angola's petroleum earnings went to dos Santos, his family, and cronies --- at a time when the average Angolan was earning only a few hundred dollars annually.
I was starting to think that this history would end in this Big Man trajectory. However, it does end on a hopeful note. Dos Santos is no longer the President, and it does seem that Angolans, at long last, are gaining more control of their resources and, with it, are building a nation with a bright future --- Luanda is growing, public works and infrastructure are improving, and economic growth and tourism are on the rise.
Overall, not a real page turner. However, I am glad I read this and, from it, have a better understanding of the effects of colonialism upon Africa and of the history and culture of one of sub-Saharan Africa's up and coming nations.
Having said this is interesting is not to say that it was enthralling. To be honest, I found it rather dry -- factual, but, if it is to be believed, a history in which there are few driving historical figures or major world changing events.
For most of Angola's recorded history, it was colonized and dominated by Portugal. For the most part, evidently, Portugal's approach was predominantly one of benign neglect, in comparison with other contemporary European colonial powers in Africa.
Until the 1920s, most of Portugal's direct governance of Angola was confined to the coastal areas around Luanda --- using it as a base from which to trade with the various self-governing African kingdoms in the interior for ivory, gold, and other commodities.
Curiously, as exploitative as most other European powers' colonialism were, most, at least, abjured the slave trade. In contrast, Portugal kept it going surreptiously well into the early 1900s. Portugal, under pressure from her ally, Great Britain, by the 1860s, had to abandon open slave trading, but then kept it going illicitly via what would now be considered today "human trafficking" --- taking human beings seized either by the African kingdoms or by Portuguese smugglers and sold to plantations in Sao Tome and Principe or even Brazil.
By the 1920s with the overthrow of the Portugal's monarchy, the Salazar dictatorship in Portugal took over, and chose to apply a more intense approach Angola. The de facto slave trade was quashed; however, the new regime sought other means by which to make the colony profitable to the mother nation. In some ways, this was no better -- and with respect to native Angolans managing their own local affairs, worse --- for this meant Portugal extending colonial methods similar to those used by Belgium in the neighboring Congo: forced labor, forcing agricultural quotas on native farmers and villages, and seizing of native lands for plantations.
This continued for decades with some initial success in making Angola profitable for Portugal. However, by the 1950s, Angolans were becoming positively desperate --- from poverty and man-made famine ---- to such an extent, Angolans in many locations resorted to burning coffee and cotton seed stores so that these could not be planted on lands needed by the people for their subsistence crops.
This exploded into revolution in 1961 with the Angolan Revolution. However, the resistance to Portugal was not unified --- subdivided into 3 rival movements -- MPLA, FNLA, and UNITAS --- whose divisions made it possible for a second rate light weight power like Portugal to hold onto Angola for another 14 years. Hitherto a backwater, now Angola became a free for all as it fell into the rivalry of the Cold War along with the desperate efforts of apartheid regimes of South Africa and Rhodesia to survive. Military weapons and soldiers (from some of these) for the various factions flowed in from the US, the Soviet Union, Cuba, the Congo, Rhodesia, and South Africa --- fueling a scorched earth, bloody regional war.
With Portugal's Carnation Revolution overthrowing its dictatorship, Portugal withdrew, and Angola gained her independence --- but the various factions in Angola continued into an Angolan Civil War that dragged on --- with some intervals of truce -- until 2002.
It would be wonderful if this history then had a tale of peace and prosperity for Angola after independence. Unfortunately, with the MPLA ultimately gaining power, its leader, Jose Eduardo dos Santos, took Angola onto a path all too well trodden by so much of the rest of post-c0lonial Africa --- the "Big Man" phenomenon -- where a dictator takes power, and then proceeds to enrich himself and his supporters at the expense of the rest of the people.
Despite becoming a major exporter of oil, some estimates are that, under dos Santos, a breathtaking sum for one of the world's poorest countries --- some $24 billion of Angola's petroleum earnings went to dos Santos, his family, and cronies --- at a time when the average Angolan was earning only a few hundred dollars annually.
I was starting to think that this history would end in this Big Man trajectory. However, it does end on a hopeful note. Dos Santos is no longer the President, and it does seem that Angolans, at long last, are gaining more control of their resources and, with it, are building a nation with a bright future --- Luanda is growing, public works and infrastructure are improving, and economic growth and tourism are on the rise.
Overall, not a real page turner. However, I am glad I read this and, from it, have a better understanding of the effects of colonialism upon Africa and of the history and culture of one of sub-Saharan Africa's up and coming nations.
December 28, 2019
A nice brief review of Angola's history from Portuguese colonialism through the civil war. Sadly, precolonial structures are only mentioned in passing: it would've been nice to have had a better sense of the political landscape of the area prior to colonialism. Otherwise, a well written account.
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October 9, 2022A well-written overview of the grimly fascinating history of modern Angola. Among the other takeaways, as so often is the case, is that Henry Kissinger is awful.
March 7, 2022
Angola has always been an enigma for me, I was even surprised when I found that it had as a lingua franca Portuguese and that they were Portuguese colonies. This encouraged me to pick up this book. I think for anyone who does not know anything about Angola, this book could be a great start. For a more common type of book of history may be there are other options. The style of Birmingham is without a doubt very light and heavily supported by first person account rather than the typical political or military analysis.
Most of the first chapters relegated on 19th century’s Angola are based on the account of traders and travellers to Luanda or to their other main areas along the Atlantic coast. Events are presented not with politicians or generals’ stories but of regular people. This is very interesting as it explains normal daily life, especially regarding slaves and the different racial relationships between blacks, whites and mestizos.
On the other side, much of the political turmoil, alliances, motives and developments are barely discussed. As Birmingham concentrates so much on daily lives across different times there is just so much possible to be filled out by the accounts of its different wars on the second half of the 20th century. First for independence, which came way too late thanks to Salazar in comparison with its African neighbours; then its first civil war including 3 different parties after independence and finally; its last civil war that could only be finalized after the death of one of the side’s leaders.
The book is not bad and the way it is written is actually very interesting. It’s only problem is the lack of explanation regarding the complexities of the civil wars and its developments across the years. He also does not dives almost at all into the different tribes and its relationships. To be fair, this could also describe a different racial approach regarding whites and blacks, and between the different black communities, that so much overcomplicate other countries’ histories. It is clear that the approach made by Portuguese (at least until the Salazar time) was not so much driven by race but by class, similar as Brazil.
In all a quick book to read with interesting recounts of the life in Angola across two centuries and a basic understanding of Angola's general modern history, but with no much depth or political analysis about it.
Most of the first chapters relegated on 19th century’s Angola are based on the account of traders and travellers to Luanda or to their other main areas along the Atlantic coast. Events are presented not with politicians or generals’ stories but of regular people. This is very interesting as it explains normal daily life, especially regarding slaves and the different racial relationships between blacks, whites and mestizos.
On the other side, much of the political turmoil, alliances, motives and developments are barely discussed. As Birmingham concentrates so much on daily lives across different times there is just so much possible to be filled out by the accounts of its different wars on the second half of the 20th century. First for independence, which came way too late thanks to Salazar in comparison with its African neighbours; then its first civil war including 3 different parties after independence and finally; its last civil war that could only be finalized after the death of one of the side’s leaders.
The book is not bad and the way it is written is actually very interesting. It’s only problem is the lack of explanation regarding the complexities of the civil wars and its developments across the years. He also does not dives almost at all into the different tribes and its relationships. To be fair, this could also describe a different racial approach regarding whites and blacks, and between the different black communities, that so much overcomplicate other countries’ histories. It is clear that the approach made by Portuguese (at least until the Salazar time) was not so much driven by race but by class, similar as Brazil.
In all a quick book to read with interesting recounts of the life in Angola across two centuries and a basic understanding of Angola's general modern history, but with no much depth or political analysis about it.
April 21, 2021
Longue durée histories of Angola are thin on the ground and David Birmingham's effort struggles to fill this gap with only partial success. In my personal context I approached it as a companion piece both to his own A Concise History of Portugal and to Malyn Newitt's A Short History of Mozambique.
Indeed, Birmingham in his introduction laments the untimely death of Jill Rosemary Dias and seems almost to apologise that his book is not half the one she may have been piecing together on the same subject. I should very much have liked to read hers but we shall have to live with that disappointment.
Despite its brevity, A Short History of Modern Angola is quite dense and covers a lot of ground. Unfortunately the tone is quite sterile and it doesn't make for the easiest of reading. For a book that's somewhere in the no-man's land between popular history and academic work, it could have been much more engaging without sacrificing the quality of the scholarship.
For example, some more direct quotes from primary sources would serve to encourage a better comprehension of major figures and events, especially in more recent periods with more records on which to draw. Similarly, the almost complete absence of illustrations, photos, and maps rather impoverishes the material and could have livened it up substantially.
As it stands, the experience is definitely one of being told rather than shown the history, which is not the most palatable in concentrated doses. Birmingham also tries to address the problems of history being Euro-centric and even male-centric, though there is a limit to what can be done in this respect without further research and sources.
By comparison, Marion Wallace's A History of Namibia opens with a chapter by John Kinahan detailing the state of archaeological and anthropological research, whereupon both Wallace and Kinahan tied the history and historiography back to this wherever possible. Perhaps Dias might have attempted something similar but Birmingham's book lacks this depth.
The nine chapters (plus an appendix on the adventures of William Cadbury which is essentially a tenth) nevertheless give a solid overview of some of the major events, characters, themes, and geographic complexities of Angola's war-torn colonial and modern history.
Indeed, Birmingham in his introduction laments the untimely death of Jill Rosemary Dias and seems almost to apologise that his book is not half the one she may have been piecing together on the same subject. I should very much have liked to read hers but we shall have to live with that disappointment.
Despite its brevity, A Short History of Modern Angola is quite dense and covers a lot of ground. Unfortunately the tone is quite sterile and it doesn't make for the easiest of reading. For a book that's somewhere in the no-man's land between popular history and academic work, it could have been much more engaging without sacrificing the quality of the scholarship.
For example, some more direct quotes from primary sources would serve to encourage a better comprehension of major figures and events, especially in more recent periods with more records on which to draw. Similarly, the almost complete absence of illustrations, photos, and maps rather impoverishes the material and could have livened it up substantially.
As it stands, the experience is definitely one of being told rather than shown the history, which is not the most palatable in concentrated doses. Birmingham also tries to address the problems of history being Euro-centric and even male-centric, though there is a limit to what can be done in this respect without further research and sources.
By comparison, Marion Wallace's A History of Namibia opens with a chapter by John Kinahan detailing the state of archaeological and anthropological research, whereupon both Wallace and Kinahan tied the history and historiography back to this wherever possible. Perhaps Dias might have attempted something similar but Birmingham's book lacks this depth.
The nine chapters (plus an appendix on the adventures of William Cadbury which is essentially a tenth) nevertheless give a solid overview of some of the major events, characters, themes, and geographic complexities of Angola's war-torn colonial and modern history.
August 27, 2022
There aren't many books available from which one could learn about Angola, or at least I haven't found many. This book's title seemed promising, however the contents completely missed the mark for me.
I think I can count my grasp of Angola facts on one hand, and that might still be an exaggeration. Sadly this author's cursory, clipped writing style left me completely out of my depth, and I gave up quickly.
In my opinion, the best history books explain, rather than list facts. They immerse the reader in the unfolding of events; they show causes and effects, and allow a person to fully understand how one thing relates to another. This book does not do that: it runs you through a rushed version of what happened, and that's that.
I suppose if you already have a pretty good grounding in Angolan history, this might be a decent reference considering the overall dearth of books on the topic. But beyond that, I would not recommend this book.
I think I can count my grasp of Angola facts on one hand, and that might still be an exaggeration. Sadly this author's cursory, clipped writing style left me completely out of my depth, and I gave up quickly.
In my opinion, the best history books explain, rather than list facts. They immerse the reader in the unfolding of events; they show causes and effects, and allow a person to fully understand how one thing relates to another. This book does not do that: it runs you through a rushed version of what happened, and that's that.
I suppose if you already have a pretty good grounding in Angolan history, this might be a decent reference considering the overall dearth of books on the topic. But beyond that, I would not recommend this book.
December 20, 2020
3.5 stars.
It's a history book through and through, but accessible and informative for someone who rarely reads non-fiction outside of more sensational pop history. The author was rather Eurocentric at times and I found once we reached post-colonial history the book could have gone into a touch more depth on the politics of the MPLA, as there's notably no time dedicated to *who* President Dos Santos even is, he just kinda appears in the last chapter on second name basis.
It's a history book through and through, but accessible and informative for someone who rarely reads non-fiction outside of more sensational pop history. The author was rather Eurocentric at times and I found once we reached post-colonial history the book could have gone into a touch more depth on the politics of the MPLA, as there's notably no time dedicated to *who* President Dos Santos even is, he just kinda appears in the last chapter on second name basis.
August 13, 2022
It's important to read about the wide range of terrors inflicted by European, in this case Portugal, and learn the accounts of how subjugated people in far away lands were exploited and destroyed.
The sad part, for many uneducated minds in the west, is that they believe this level of systemic mistreatment is history. We STILL use and abuse the developing countries, but instead of governments directly causing extreme harm, they go through corporations to conduct human rights violations so that we receive cheap goods. All carefully organized through the bloody hands of a third party.
Read their stories from the past; learn about how this is continues to happen today.
The sad part, for many uneducated minds in the west, is that they believe this level of systemic mistreatment is history. We STILL use and abuse the developing countries, but instead of governments directly causing extreme harm, they go through corporations to conduct human rights violations so that we receive cheap goods. All carefully organized through the bloody hands of a third party.
Read their stories from the past; learn about how this is continues to happen today.
October 29, 2019
Informative and interesting
May 9, 2026
Short. Easy read but not much real detail I did not know
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews