Global Shadows: Africa in the Neoliberal World Order
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"Speaking rationally about Africa is not something that has ever come naturally. This book is a tour de force. James Ferguson shows that a radical critique of the most obtuse and cynical prejudices about Africa can be made without one repeating and perpetuating these prejudices under some other guise." Achille Mbembe, author of On the Postcolony "Global Shadows is one of the most thoughtful, provocative, intelligent books written about Africa in a very long time. Without romancing the postcolonial moment--or minimizing the very real problems faced by the people of a continent often said to be eclipsed by, overshadowed in, the new global order--it raises in the most profound possible way the question of what precisely Africa is in the twenty-first century: a place, a predicament, an imaginative object, a discursive trope, a 'place-in-the-world' whose economies and social orders, governance and geography, are undergoing bewilderingly complex transformations. A must-read by a distinguished scholar, Global Shadows will be widely cited for many years to come." John Comaroff, University of Chicago "... Global Shadows is a major gift to the discipline. It is a confident, thorough and thought-provoking book that raises important questions not only abou the idea of Africa but also about the future of anthropology."--JRAI, Sept 2007
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Both on the continent and off, "Africa" is spoken of in terms of crisis: as a place of failure and seemingly insurmountable problems, as a moral challenge to the international community. What, though, is really at stake in discussions about Africa, its problems, and its place in the world? And what should be the response of those scholars who have sought to understand not the "Africa" portrayed in broad strokes in journalistic accounts and policy papers but rather specific places and social realities within Africa? In "Global Shadows", the renowned anthropologist James Ferguson moves beyond the traditional anthropological focus on local communities to explore more general questions about Africa and its place in the contemporary world.Ferguson develops his argument through a series of provocative essays which open - as he shows they necessarily must - into interrogations of globalization, modernity, worldwide inequality, and social justice. He maintains that Africans in a variety of different social and geographical locations increasingly seek to make claims of membership within a global community, claims that contest the marginalization that has so far been the principal fruit of "globalization" for Africa.Ferguson contends that such claims demand new understandings of the global centred less on trans-national flows and images of unfettered connection than on the social relations that selectively constitute global society and on the rights and obligations that characterize it. Ferguson points out that anthropologists and others who have refused the category of Africa as empirically problematic have, in their devotion to particularity, allowed themselves to remain bystanders in the broader conversations about Africa. In "Global Shadows", he urges fellow scholars into the arena, encouraging them to find a way to speak beyond the academy about Africa's position within an egregiously imbalanced world order.
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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3 reviews
16 of 16 people found the following review helpful
Africa through an innovative lens
6 Nov 2007
Format:Paperback
Ferguson has obviously been embedded in African studies for a considerable length of time, and this series of essays reflects that in its depth. As indicated in the introduction, the author works to evaluate the relationship between Africa and globalization from a pan-Africanist view. Using a series of case studies from his own research and others, Fergussen succeeds in painting a picture of a globalized Africa that often goes beyond conventional understandings of the continent.
As a student of international development, I have almost exclusively looked at Africa through the lense of humanitarian crisis. This book provides the reader an opportunity to engage with the continent in a much more complex sense. I would certainly recommend it as the best text on Africa I've read so far.
As a student of international development, I have almost exclusively looked at Africa through the lense of humanitarian crisis. This book provides the reader an opportunity to engage with the continent in a much more complex sense. I would certainly recommend it as the best text on Africa I've read so far.
A must-read for NGO workers, students interested in Africa, or interested in the developing world
12 Mar 2012
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
After spending a few months researching, working, and living in South Sudan and South Africa for several months I began to cringe when I heard people talk about "Africa" as if it was a unitary place whose population was relatively homogenous where all the countries experienced the same problems and were basically interchangeable. Many area studies specialists have scoffed at the do-gooder perspective of "Africa" that often treats the massive continent as if it was a single country. Ferguson moves past this academic snobbery and engages a cross-section of African locations, problems, and possibilities from the perspective of the "place-in-the-world" or concept of "Africa" as the broader world has tended to see it - and indeed as the West basically created it, first through colonial policies and then through structural adjustment and similar "neoliberal" or economically "neo-colonial" strategies that largely sidelined popular rule on the continent. Starting from the perspective of a historical juncture at which African people were robbed of their democratic voices at the same time as African states began to be blamed for the problems that had been created through failed globalizing economic policies, Ferguson moves through the social, environmental, and political ramifications of Africa's location in the "shadows" of the value-extracting developed world and of the "shadow" markets and practices that are involved in popular perceptions of Africa. While the five-star rating by no means indicates that I agree with all of Ferguson's perspectives or that I bought all of his arguments, it does mean that from my perspective, this work was very thought-provoking and useful and I would highly recommend it to anyone engaged in NGO work, studying Africa, or interested in the international political and economic order's effects on the developing world. An interesting, very readable, and stimulating book.
4 of 18 people found the following review helpful
Ecellent book
4 April 2007
Format:Paperback
I love this book
Writing style is amazing and the information is inspiring
I recommend this book 100%
Writing style is amazing and the information is inspiring
I recommend this book 100%
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