Author: Schwab, Peter
Hardback; Book; Map, Notes, Bibliography, Index
288 pages
Published: October 2001
Palgrave Macmillan
ISBN: 031224018X

Can Africa survive? Many of the nations of Africa have all but ceased to exist as organized states: tyranny, disease, civil war, and ethnic conflict threaten to completely disintegrate the region. Schwab offers a clear, authoritative portrait of a continent on the brink. Globalization and an accompanying level of economic health has passed over Africa. Added to these factors is a patronizing attitude from the West that change in Africa must take place within Western parameters, a United Nations that has a lack of any real power, and a U.S. foreign policy in Africa that is unclear. Looking to South Africa as an example of successful Western support of an African nation, Schwab suggests that the U.S. should use its leverage to help democrats into positions of power and then work wiSchwab discusses how myriad Subsaharan African states have all but ceased to exist as organized entities, with some spiralling into complete disintegration. He concludes with a discussion of whether Africa can survive this crisis situation and a consideration of the appropriate Western response.