What do you think?
Rate this book
The Black Man's Burden: Africa and the Curse of the Nation-State
An absorbing, highly acclaimed examination of Africa's transition from colonialism to revolution to the social turmoil of today.
368 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1992
25 people are currently reading
828 people want to read
About the author
Basil Davidson
102 books76 followersBasil Risbridger Davidson was an acclaimed British historian, writer and Africanist, particularly knowledgeable on the subject of Portuguese Africa prior to the 1974 Carnation Revolution .
He has written several books on the current plight of Africa. Colonialism and the rise of African emancipation movements have been central themes of his work.
He is an Honorary Fellow of the London School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS).
From 1939, Davidson was a reporter for the London "Economist" in Paris, France. From December 1939, he was a Secret Intelligence Service (SIS)/MI-6 D Section (sabotage) officer sent to Budapest (see Special Operations Europe, chapter 3) to establish a news service as cover. In April 1941, with the Nazi invasion, he fled to Belgrade, Yugoslavia. In May, he was captured by Italian forces and was later released as part of a prisoner exchange. From late 1942 to mid-1943, he was chief of the Special Operations Executive (SOE) Yugoslav Section in Cairo, Egypt, where he was James Klugmann's supervisor. From January 1945 he was liaison officer with partisans in Liguria, Italy.
After the war, he was Paris correspondent for "The Times," "Daily Herald" ,"New Statesman", and the "Daily Mirror."
Since 1951, he became a well known authority on African history, an unfashionable subject in the 1950s. His writings have emphasised the pre-colonial achievements of Africans, the disastrous effects of the Atlantic Slave Trade, the further damage inflicted on Africa by European colonialism and the baleful effects of the Nation State in Africa.
Davidson's works are required reading in many British universities. He is globally recognized as an expert on African History.
He currently lives in Staffordshire.
He has written several books on the current plight of Africa. Colonialism and the rise of African emancipation movements have been central themes of his work.
He is an Honorary Fellow of the London School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS).
From 1939, Davidson was a reporter for the London "Economist" in Paris, France. From December 1939, he was a Secret Intelligence Service (SIS)/MI-6 D Section (sabotage) officer sent to Budapest (see Special Operations Europe, chapter 3) to establish a news service as cover. In April 1941, with the Nazi invasion, he fled to Belgrade, Yugoslavia. In May, he was captured by Italian forces and was later released as part of a prisoner exchange. From late 1942 to mid-1943, he was chief of the Special Operations Executive (SOE) Yugoslav Section in Cairo, Egypt, where he was James Klugmann's supervisor. From January 1945 he was liaison officer with partisans in Liguria, Italy.
After the war, he was Paris correspondent for "The Times," "Daily Herald" ,"New Statesman", and the "Daily Mirror."
Since 1951, he became a well known authority on African history, an unfashionable subject in the 1950s. His writings have emphasised the pre-colonial achievements of Africans, the disastrous effects of the Atlantic Slave Trade, the further damage inflicted on Africa by European colonialism and the baleful effects of the Nation State in Africa.
Davidson's works are required reading in many British universities. He is globally recognized as an expert on African History.
He currently lives in Staffordshire.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews
December 20, 2014
This book is subtitled "Africa and the Curse of the Nation-State", but I assume that this was added by a timid publisher, afraid that the more accurate subtitle "Africa and the Curse of Imperialism" would make the book less salable. It would nonetheless have better expressed Davidson's argument, for the curse of the nation-state is just one of many curses that have befallen Africa thanks to Western domination. Essentially, the pattern of Western imperialism ran as follows: first, the slave trade, in which the insatiable Western demand for slaves, underpinned with vast sums of money (mostly stolen from the Americas), undermined most African institutions and encouraged the growth of a politics of kinship networks. Second, the Scramble for Africa destroyed what African institutions remained (and also led to a vast increase in racism: in the mid-19th century, many of the officers of the British colony of Sierra Leone were black, but by the early 20th century such a thing would have been unheard of). After that, the imperialist powers declared that, as Africans had no institutions, it was their responsibility to give them some, but actually did nothing of the sort: instead, dictatorial colonial rule prevented the development of anything other than tribalism, while Europe extracted as much money as it could from its African possessions, at a pace that actually increased as said possessions got closer to independence. Finally, having left Africa in such a state that its division into nation-states on the Western European model was almost guaranteed to result in clientelist, Tammany Hall-style politics, the imperial powers not only insisted on dividing it into nation-states on the Western European model but also drew their boundaries in such a ridiculous way as to practically guarantee that they wouldn't be respected and the states they described would end up as failures. Then, as a capper, they sent experts (inevitably well-paid) to explain to the Africans what they were doing wrong.
Davidson doesn't put all the blame on the imperial powers, to be fair. The African intelligentsia was mostly equally anxious to adopt the nation-state model, partly due to their Western education and partly due to the fact that the Western powers made it very difficult for anyone to promote any other model (and partly, of course, due to their own venality and desire for power). And Davidson is appropriately contemptuous of the aid provided by the USSR, which was no more helpful than the former imperial powers were to the newly independent African states. His fundamental argument is that, as he says in the context of a discussion of the massive failure of Western agricultural experts to improve African agriculture (they tended rather to have the opposite effect, as readers of James C. Scott's "Seeing Like a State" will already know), "Africans aren't stupid." Before the imperialists arrived, Africa was not immured in a tribalistic barbarism: it had political and economic institutions that worked. They weren't perfect by any means, but the Africans knew that, and their institutions were slowly evolving until the imperial powers smashed them to smithereens. Their replacement by institutions developed under almost completely different circumstances (in particular, British/French/American parliamentarism depended to a considerable extent on the existence of a national bourgeoisie) has led to entirely predictable failure. Instead, Africa must develop its own institutions, and Davidson argues for a combination of pan-African nationalism -- national boundaries are, for the most part, not doing any African countries any good -- and devolution of power. Such a revolutionary transformation of African politics may have seemed more possible in 1991 than it does now, but subsequent events have certainly not made Davidson sound any less reasonable: in fact, rather the reverse.
The most interesting part of Davidson's book is his comparison of the situation in Africa with that in Eastern Europe. In particular, he argues that the decolonizing countries of Eastern Europe in the interwar period (before most of them were reabsorbed by another empire) reproduced essentially all the pathologies seen in post-independence Africa -- politics by kinship networks, government by military coup, widespread tribalism, etc. -- and for the same reasons: the nation-states they were given were incompatible with the institutions left over from the empires that had formerly contained them. Postwar Yugoslavia is his favorite example: he uses the quasi-decentralization under Tito as an example (if a far from perfect one) of the way that dispersed power can reduce ethnic rivalry, and the tragic consequences of recentralization following Tito's death as an argument against concentrated central power. (Over the next few years, the consequences would of course get more tragic, and Africa would shortly provide its own grim parallel.) In a way, though, the method here is just as important as the arguments: this kind of massive cross-cultural comparison is in itself an argument for the importance of institutions and history rather than ethnic characteristics, and its one that Davidson makes very well.
Davidson doesn't put all the blame on the imperial powers, to be fair. The African intelligentsia was mostly equally anxious to adopt the nation-state model, partly due to their Western education and partly due to the fact that the Western powers made it very difficult for anyone to promote any other model (and partly, of course, due to their own venality and desire for power). And Davidson is appropriately contemptuous of the aid provided by the USSR, which was no more helpful than the former imperial powers were to the newly independent African states. His fundamental argument is that, as he says in the context of a discussion of the massive failure of Western agricultural experts to improve African agriculture (they tended rather to have the opposite effect, as readers of James C. Scott's "Seeing Like a State" will already know), "Africans aren't stupid." Before the imperialists arrived, Africa was not immured in a tribalistic barbarism: it had political and economic institutions that worked. They weren't perfect by any means, but the Africans knew that, and their institutions were slowly evolving until the imperial powers smashed them to smithereens. Their replacement by institutions developed under almost completely different circumstances (in particular, British/French/American parliamentarism depended to a considerable extent on the existence of a national bourgeoisie) has led to entirely predictable failure. Instead, Africa must develop its own institutions, and Davidson argues for a combination of pan-African nationalism -- national boundaries are, for the most part, not doing any African countries any good -- and devolution of power. Such a revolutionary transformation of African politics may have seemed more possible in 1991 than it does now, but subsequent events have certainly not made Davidson sound any less reasonable: in fact, rather the reverse.
The most interesting part of Davidson's book is his comparison of the situation in Africa with that in Eastern Europe. In particular, he argues that the decolonizing countries of Eastern Europe in the interwar period (before most of them were reabsorbed by another empire) reproduced essentially all the pathologies seen in post-independence Africa -- politics by kinship networks, government by military coup, widespread tribalism, etc. -- and for the same reasons: the nation-states they were given were incompatible with the institutions left over from the empires that had formerly contained them. Postwar Yugoslavia is his favorite example: he uses the quasi-decentralization under Tito as an example (if a far from perfect one) of the way that dispersed power can reduce ethnic rivalry, and the tragic consequences of recentralization following Tito's death as an argument against concentrated central power. (Over the next few years, the consequences would of course get more tragic, and Africa would shortly provide its own grim parallel.) In a way, though, the method here is just as important as the arguments: this kind of massive cross-cultural comparison is in itself an argument for the importance of institutions and history rather than ethnic characteristics, and its one that Davidson makes very well.
Read
July 2, 2018An excellent, lucid analysis of how modern Africa came to be, as far as I can tell as an outside observer (as someone who has never once set foot on the African continent). It is, in essence, a narrative of collective failure -- failure on the part of colonialists, failure on the part of various purveyors of foreign aid, failure on the part of local elites and compradors. And, to emphasize his point, Davidson draws analogies with Eastern Europe, most of which was on the same rough level of technological development as Africa until the 20th Century. One of the better histories I've read lately.
January 11, 2009
A good critique of post-colonial development in Africa, though liberal and not a radical analysis on the imperial relationships that some might argue were purposefully constructed between African nations and Europe and the U.S.
January 30, 2016
Interesting topic, very boring writing.
August 12, 2022
Here's an enlightening book, explaining why most Africa countries, following their independence, went down into violence, dictatorships, civil wars and, for some, even ethnical cleanings.
The thing was, the European conquest of Africa also had led to a sharing of the continent, where members of the same tribes and nations suddenly found themselves divided up, and under the leaderships of different oppressors. These divisions, sadly, were not only firmly in place under colonial rules; they remained once such rules ended. It's the Africa as we know it: with borders traced with rulers, with no care whatsoever having been given to the people concerned. The consequences, of course, would be catastrophic...
Denouncing colonial and neo-colonial policies, Basil Davidson, also, point fingers at African themselves, who were incapable (unwilling?) to fully free themselves from such disastrous heritage. Here the more tragic indeed: generations of racist ideologies might have peddled the bogus views that Africans had no culture, no history, no valid and relevant political systems of their own prior to the arrival of White colonialists, yet such bogus preconceptions, having been digested even by those leaders fighting independence, ended up as shaping, too, the fate of most countries post-independence.
It seems counter-intuitive, and yet: because most of such leaders had been educated in the Western world, they, too, would end up by exacerbating the nationalisms which had been created by their Whites masters. Not all countries were affected, of course! Ghana, for instance, managed to escape such bloody divisions despite having had made-up borders that had thrown Ga, Ewe, and Asante (three different people with different languages!) under the same flag. Others, though, would not be so lucky; and the bloodbaths in questions would define their history for decades to come... Nationalisms crumbled into tribalism; political institutions, already facing the paradox of having to function as their European counterparts while deserving African cultures, seeded clientelisms; and, more often than not, the State merely represented the interests of the ruling elite and their tribes (or clans) as opposed to that of their people as a whole!
Basil Davidson's is a damning picture, not only because he puts colonial powers face-to-face to with their responsibilities, but, also, because he doesn't exonerate Africans either, whom he shows as having been complicit in their own tragedy. It's a brilliant analysis.
The thing was, the European conquest of Africa also had led to a sharing of the continent, where members of the same tribes and nations suddenly found themselves divided up, and under the leaderships of different oppressors. These divisions, sadly, were not only firmly in place under colonial rules; they remained once such rules ended. It's the Africa as we know it: with borders traced with rulers, with no care whatsoever having been given to the people concerned. The consequences, of course, would be catastrophic...
Denouncing colonial and neo-colonial policies, Basil Davidson, also, point fingers at African themselves, who were incapable (unwilling?) to fully free themselves from such disastrous heritage. Here the more tragic indeed: generations of racist ideologies might have peddled the bogus views that Africans had no culture, no history, no valid and relevant political systems of their own prior to the arrival of White colonialists, yet such bogus preconceptions, having been digested even by those leaders fighting independence, ended up as shaping, too, the fate of most countries post-independence.
It seems counter-intuitive, and yet: because most of such leaders had been educated in the Western world, they, too, would end up by exacerbating the nationalisms which had been created by their Whites masters. Not all countries were affected, of course! Ghana, for instance, managed to escape such bloody divisions despite having had made-up borders that had thrown Ga, Ewe, and Asante (three different people with different languages!) under the same flag. Others, though, would not be so lucky; and the bloodbaths in questions would define their history for decades to come... Nationalisms crumbled into tribalism; political institutions, already facing the paradox of having to function as their European counterparts while deserving African cultures, seeded clientelisms; and, more often than not, the State merely represented the interests of the ruling elite and their tribes (or clans) as opposed to that of their people as a whole!
Basil Davidson's is a damning picture, not only because he puts colonial powers face-to-face to with their responsibilities, but, also, because he doesn't exonerate Africans either, whom he shows as having been complicit in their own tragedy. It's a brilliant analysis.
July 7, 2012
Still one of the best books on Africa I have ever read. If you like historical pairs, why not historical triplets, or quadruplets, or even sextuplets. His ability to put things into a historical timeline that crosses continents and literatures, brings old events into contemporary light. It's all about fractals. Funny how history is repreated.
February 23, 2023
One of the most impactful books I've read in my life.
August 24, 2014
Truthfully provoking!!!
January 31, 2025
This was the book that propelled me to spend a year on the continent. I was drawn to the title which I presume to be a play of words (in the antebellum american south slave owners often referred to their slave holdings as the "white man's burden" as if, though slavery, they had the odious responsibility for keeping the black man civilized). The big takeaway of this book is that the entire continent of Africa is demarcated into nation states that are primarily the construction of the colonizer. The borders of these states pay more attention to the geopolitical concerns of the colonizers than it did to either natural geography or ethnic identity. As a consequence holding these nation states politically together, especially post colonization, is both difficult and maddening. While the global elites like to imagine that African statehood is problematic because of some perceived failing of the inhabitants, the truth is such states struggle because of the “Black man’s burden”, defined here as the legacy of colonial map making - of state borders imposed upon the inhabitants without any meaningful input from the people most concerned. I believe the author was among the first to articulate this to a non-indigenous audience.
March 21, 2020
It's a fine read but very distinct from his other books. It's far More ideological and it lacks his usual jubilant tone. It's a dour and very personal subject to him and you can feel his pain reading it.
He devoted considerable time to Europe and those sections are far less passionately written. It undergoes an undesirable tone shift while discussing any region besides Africa. The book's incessantly repetitive, the same claims with slightly altered anecdotes are repeated throughout. It gets tiresome, the book could have been 100 pages shorter and retained the same impact. It's also less educational on African history and mostly devoted to contemporary politics. If you want to learn about lesser known African history read any of his other books, if you want political pontification choose this one
He devoted considerable time to Europe and those sections are far less passionately written. It undergoes an undesirable tone shift while discussing any region besides Africa. The book's incessantly repetitive, the same claims with slightly altered anecdotes are repeated throughout. It gets tiresome, the book could have been 100 pages shorter and retained the same impact. It's also less educational on African history and mostly devoted to contemporary politics. If you want to learn about lesser known African history read any of his other books, if you want political pontification choose this one
November 10, 2018
A reasonable overview of the nation state formation process in Africa and its issues; further illustration of the fact that “the balance of power” is something that evolves between institutions and individuals over time and can’t be simply imposed upon a society.
I approach history books with practical purposes in mind - that said, I award two stars, because I didn’t feel that I gained many valuable insights or learning from reading this work.
I approach history books with practical purposes in mind - that said, I award two stars, because I didn’t feel that I gained many valuable insights or learning from reading this work.
October 29, 2019
Half-treatise, half-textbook almost- an accessible, narrative read (with a somewhat bizarrely positioned chapter on nationalism in the middle, that almost reminds you of Hobsbawm/Gellner's modernist arguments about the nation-building. Personally I don't buy that nationalism was an inherently European construct. But the writing is sympathetic, with a focus on the agency of the people mattering most to Africa- that is, Africans- and worth a read.)
August 16, 2022
Will no doubt be reading this book several more times, the rest of my life. Just phenomenal and thought provoking, as it is unmissably instructive. My only gripe is that it was at times too heavy and dense to read. Just can't read this book on "autopilot".
July 23, 2020
The content is compelling and very good analysis but very densely written and not always as engaging as I would have expected
May 24, 2023
This was a tough read. The subject matter is intriguing but written in a very dull voice.
October 10, 2014
Gives insight in the (failed) nation-state forming process in Africa. To understand this Davidson (not Davisson!) goes back in time and tells the history from the pre-colonial times, when already nations with structured societies and state forms existed. Then he explains how the colonial period and the one after the liberations didn't contribute to the nation-state forming process as both periods were based upon European concepts and not on African origines. The sad story is that the old society forms almost vanished and that a European copy in the end doesn't seem to work, Africa has to invent again it's own way. After having read this book I discussed with a friend how it could be that you don't see this problem in Asia, he (an Asian himself) told me Asians cultures and societies had been more persistent and better preserved throughout the colonial times, except for the parts of Asia that weren't colonialized at all, where obviously there was no such problem. The language/terms used in the book are somewhat repeating which makes it a bit dry, but the content with its wide implications makes it interesting.
Read
October 6, 2012An excellent study by the greatest popular historian of Africa. Davidson asks can the crisis of the nation-state in Africa be best understood comparatively with the crisis of the nation-state and ethnic conflict in Eastern Europe? This is an important contribution for two reasons. First, Africa is too often evaluated as "the dark cotninent" where there is perennial irrational forces from tribalism to civil war. Where European history can go through many atrocities and it is perceived these are exceptions to a basic decency and civilization that has always been its halmark. Davidson, who was an intelligence officer in the British army during World War II and helped fight fascism in Yugoslavia, is an excellent person to examine these questions. With that background, he went into the forests with the freedom fighters in Angola and Guinea-Bissau and this is why he became an outstanding informative scholar and friend of African liberation. He is a concise writer, who always affirms African civilization and self-government.
May 7, 2007
Whatever the author had to offer from the book was lost on me. Fighting to stay awake through the dry, boring prose was an uphill and, ultimately, losing battle.
April 17, 2008
While the writing style in this book takes some time to get used to following, the author has a lot to say with some very valid points. It made me think.
January 29, 2014
The language is a little impenetrable at times but the big points stand out. Well worth the read to understand why nations are not the easiest way forward to development.
February 13, 2015
A good textbook, but goes back and forth with chronology, confusing. You may feel differently, enjoy!
Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews