The ‘Africa rising’ discourse continues to colour discussions about Africa’s economic and political development. The Governance, Security and Development Nexus: Africa Rising, edited by Kenneth Omeje, brings together scholars to discuss the extent to which Africa is uniformly rising, the sustainability of Africa’s rise, and the extent to which non-performing African states complicate the rise of Africa.8 More than this, the contributors of this volume are critical of the teleology of the neo-liberal model of development and situate their understanding of African governance and development by asking how Africa’s rise – if there is one – impacts the citizens and living conditions within African countries. Each of the contributors of this edited volume is trying to make sense of why Africa has not substantially transformed, despite the progress many African countries are making via economic indicators and substantial improvement in some areas of good governance and regional integration.
The volume is divided into four parts, which explore the conceptual background of the Africa rising narrative, the global dimensions of Africa rising, the regional dynamics, and the national contexts of Africa rising. The volume is ambitious in its attempt to cover the governance, security, and development nexus in breadth and depth. For instance, the book highlights interregional dynamics between Africa and the European Union (Chapter 3), security regionalism between the African Union and the Regional Economic Communities (REC s) (Chapter 11), state and society relations and state capacity in Somalia (Chapter 14), and policy recommendations to consider the prospects and challenges of the African Continental Free Trade Area (pp. 385–388). Each of the contributions in this volume take into consideration African actors’ performance across scales of governance.
While the contributions focus on a range of areas, many of the chapters rely heavily on secondary data. They are highly descriptive, limiting the ability to align with the empirical agenda laid out in the introduction of the volume. For example, chapter 4, on Africa–US trade relations, traces US foreign direct investment (FDI) in Africa. It suggests a declining influence of the United States in the region. Still, the conclusions in this chapter do not tie back to the volume’s impetus to examine the impact of the African Growth and Opportunity
Despite the excessive description by many of the contributors, the volume does offer interesting insights into the governance and development nexus. For example, in their chapter on economic growth, authoritarianism, and human rights, Aymar Nyenyezi Bisoka and Hilde Geens (Chapter 13) address the intersection of neo-liberalism, poverty reduction, and modernisation critique in Rwanda. The authors argue that the modernisation model used in Rwanda leads to domination of the population by the governing elite, which fosters authoritarian control (p. 267). Thus, while one would expect to see continued economic growth in Rwanda, the authors highlight that growth statistics obscure the well-being of poor people in the country. This chapter represents what this volume is trying to do: highlighting how African actors both buy into and deviate from conventional development practices while also questioning how governance practises impact the lived experiences of African citizens.
Another area where the volume offers potential for further research is in the periodisation of development. Many of the contributions do well to situate the empirical puzzles in a context of global developmental shifts over time. For example, Ibrahim Bangura proposes an insightful context around ‘economic convergence’ in the twentieth century as a response to Cold War politics and argues that economic convergence in this period is unique because it retains the competitive aspects of prototypical market demands while simultaneously creating the conditions for new market actors and stakeholders to emerge to change the nature of development aid (pp. 62–64).
Similarly, Temitope J. Laniran’s chapter on the political economy of Africa rising (Chapter 2) tracks the economic growth of sub-Saharan African countries from 1960 to 2017 and juxtaposes the growth trends in Africa with significant global events (pp. 33–35). Yet, while the periodisation is useful in situating the activities of African countries in a global context, the chapter does not develop the empirical connection between economic growth and leadership, which it attempts to do implicitly. Laniran offers an interesting puzzle alongside the
The contributors took on a seemingly impossible task of trying to understand and unpack the meanings and practices associated with the Africa rising narrative. The volume is strongest where contributors engage directly with the narrative and tackle questions that interrogate the variation of progress made by African states, such as Ethiopia’s economic growth (Chapter 12). However, while the editors have set up a fascinating and compelling empirical puzzle, the contributions could be more rigorous in terms of developing some theoretical perspectives, methodological approaches, or policy prescriptions that take up the mantle of critiquing the African rising narrative. It seems like the overall book is doing too much and could use a little more focus. Despite this, the collective volume offers an interesting and compelling survey that will be a valuable contribution to the Africa rising debate.
Among others, Kenneth Omeje is the director of the Manifold Crown Consulting Services in Bradford, United Kingdom, and a visiting professor at the Institute for Peace and Security Studies (IPSS) in Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia.