Emmanuel O Oritsejafor – författare

Africa and the Global System of Capital Accumulation offers a groundbreaking analysis of the strategic role Africa plays in the global capitalist economy. The exploitation of Africa’s rich resources, as well as its labor, make it possible for major world powers to sustain their authority over their own middle-class populations while rewarding African collaborators in leadership positions for subjecting their populations into poverty and desperation. Middle-class obsessions such as computers, mobile phones, cars and the petroleum that fuels them, diamonds, chocolate – all of these products require African resources that are typically obtained by child or slave labor that helps to generate billionaires out of foreign investors while impoverishing most Africans. Oritsejafor and Cooper demonstrate that "primitive accumulation," believed by both Adam Smith and Karl Marx to be a process that precedes capitalism, is actually an integral part of capitalism. They also validate the thesis that capitalism incorporates racism as an organizing tool for the exploitation of labor in Africa and on a global scale. Case studies are presented on Nigeria, Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana, Liberia, Congo, Tanzania, Somalia, Angola, Namibia, Sao Tome and Principe, and South Sudan. There are also chapters analyzing the interests of Russia and China in Africa. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of African politics, development, and economics.

Africa and the Global System of Capital Accumulation offers a groundbreaking analysis of the strategic role Africa plays in the global capitalist economy. The exploitation of Africa’s rich resources, as well as its labor, make it possible for major world powers to sustain their authority over their own middle-class populations while rewarding African collaborators in leadership positions for subjecting their populations into poverty and desperation. Middle-class obsessions such as computers, mobile phones, cars and the petroleum that fuels them, diamonds, chocolate – all of these products require African resources that are typically obtained by child or slave labor that helps to generate billionaires out of foreign investors while impoverishing most Africans. Oritsejafor and Cooper demonstrate that "primitive accumulation," believed by both Adam Smith and Karl Marx to be a process that precedes capitalism, is actually an integral part of capitalism. They also validate the thesis that capitalism incorporates racism as an organizing tool for the exploitation of labor in Africa and on a global scale. Case studies are presented on Nigeria, Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana, Liberia, Congo, Tanzania, Somalia, Angola, Namibia, Sao Tome and Principe, and South Sudan. There are also chapters analyzing the interests of Russia and China in Africa. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of African politics, development, and economics.

Brazil had by far the largest number of enslaved Africans during the transatlantic slave trade and after liberation, many returned to Africa, leveraging their experiences of emancipation and resistance to support decolonization and state formation efforts. This book argues that the formation of African nation-states such as Nigeria, Ghana, and the Benin Republic simply wouldn’t have happened without the contributions of Afro-Brazilian returnees (Agudas).Drawing on extensive interviews and fieldwork in Ghana, Nigeria, Benin, and Togo, as well as archival research in these countries and also Brazil, the book demonstrates the role of Aguda communities in the political, social, and economic development of West African post-colonial states. It also highlights the role of Aguda Muslims in state formation after their return to the former slave coast of West Africa, most notably in Lagos, a city-state that at one point had the most significant presence of Agudas in West Africa.Tracing the history of the Agudas from the 1600s through the end of the 20th century, this important new study will be an important read for researchers across political science, history, public history, regional geography, sociology, and anthropology, tracing links between Africa and Brazil that remain important to the present day.

This collection takes on one of the most important and vexing issues in African development - the role played by African states in under-development on the continent - and shows how empowering resilient precolonial communities offers under-explored routes forward.Rather than comparing African states to states elsewhere, this book takes a unique bottom-up approach and compares how major ethnic communities within Africa have developed over time under various state systems. It begins with an investigation into major precolonial societies and the way in which they were affected by the slave trade and colonialism. It then offers individual case studies from the length and breadth of the continent, and in so doing, provides a near-comprehensive account of historical African community and state formation, including coverage of under-researched peoples such as the central African Fang, as well as of the Kongo, Benin, Akan, Kru, Oromo, and Ovambo communities. Each case study analyzes how postcolonial African states have functioned as self-interested political entities often times at the expense of the economic and political development of its Indigenous communities, who are forced into a pluralist state systems that set them in economic and political competition with each other. True improvement in the lives of everyday citizens proves to be possible only by empowering traditional knowledges and practices - and with that, Indigenous communities' capabilities for economic and political self-governance.Written by a significant contingent of African scholars, this collection contributes in its very practice to the decolonial policies it argues for, and is a must-read for researchers, upper-level students, and practitioners and policymakers interested in African development, African history, and post- and decolonial approaches to development.

This book looks at the fundamental issue of governance in Africa. After half a century of experimenting with democratic institutions, African countries are still ambivalent about the complete or absolute adoption of this form of governance. Africa lost tremendous human and natural resources in the struggle for political and economic independence. What form of governance African leaders adopt will determine how worthwhile this sacrifice has been to the African people. This issue is the major challenge facing Africa, and addressing it is of high urgency. Employing a political economy framework, this book provides some insights into to dealing with this complex issue of democratic governance in Africa.

In Indigenous Knowledge: An Alternative for Food Security and Wellness in Africa, Emmanuel O. Oritsejafor argues that Indigenous Knowledge (IK) needs to play a central role in addressing food insecurity because IK methods result in sustainable agricultural practices which improve wellness. The application of IK in global communities demonstrates why it is an invaluable development alternative. For instance, Native Indians in the America’s have survived over several generations using IK for agriculture and wellness purposes. Oristejafor establishes the severity and breadth of food insecurity on the continent of Africa and critiques the western-led development model which has proven to be inadequate in solving Africa's food security needs. In this regard, Oritsejafor suggests that indigenous knowledge(IK) should serve as one of the central models for addressing food security because it takes into account consideration for the specificities of local conditions and relies on the knowledge and the environment of African communities. Contrarily, he posits that the reliance on modern technologies have not been able to halve hunger and poverty in Africa.