Abstract
The organizational structures, force doctrines, recruitment policies, and behavioral patterns of armed forces in Africa are deeply rooted in the colonial past. It is for this reason that any study of coercive apparatuses and processes in contemporary West Africa must begin with a brief consideration of how the colonial state pursued its security imperative and the impact this had on the postcolonial political landscape. Continuities in colonial and postcolonial state formation are not confined to the security realm but security provisioning is one of the areas where postcolonial arrangements most resemble their colonial antecedents. These legacies have shaped both the organization of military establishments and the relationship between armed regulars and mass publics.
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Notes
Ruth First, Power in Africa (New York: Penguin, 1971), p. 27.
Crawford Young, The African Colonial State in Comparative Perspective (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994), pp. 73–74.
See Garnet Wolseley, “The Negro as Soldier,” Forthnightly Review (December 1888), p. 87. Garnet Wolseley led British forces in the second Ashanti-British war (1869–1874).
See Josiah Wedgwood, Memoirs of a Fighting Life (London, 1941), pp. 134–135.
Abioseh Nicol, “West Indians in West Africa,” Sierra Leone Studies, June 13, 1960, p. 15.
A. Haywood and F.A.S. Clarke, The History of the Royal West African Frontier Force (Aldershot: Gale and Polden, 1964), p. 5.
Anthony Clayton and David Killingray, Khaki and Blue: Military and Police in British Colonial Africa (Athens: Ohio University Press, 1989), p. 145.
Thomas Cox, Civil–Military Relations in Sierra Leone (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1976), p. 30.
James Coleman and Belmont Brice, “The Role of the Military in Sub-Saharan Africa,” in John Johnson (ed.), The Role of the Military in Underdeveloped Countries (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1962), p. 371.
Patrick Manning, Francophone Subsaharan Africa 1880–1985 (London: Cambridge University Press, 1988), p. 67.
See Myron Echenberg, Colonial Conscripts: The Tirailleurs Senegalais in French West Africa, 1857–1960 (London: Heinemann, 1991) for a detailed history of the Tirailleurs Senegalais.
Shelby Davis, Reservoirs of Men: A History of the Black Troops of French West Africa (Geneva: Librairie Kundig, 1934), p. 54.
See John Chipman, French Power in Africa (London: Basil Blackwell, 1989), p. 117.
Carlos Wiese, quoted in Malyn Newitt, Portugal in Africa (London: C. Hurst and Co., 1981), p. 52.
See Anne Pitcher, Politics in the Portuguese Empire (London: Oxford University Press, 1993), p. 258.
Christopher Fyfe, A History of Sierra Leone (London: Cambridge University Press, 1962), pp. 582–3.
A. A. Afrifa, The Ghana Coup: 24th February 1966 (London: Frank Cass, 1966), pp. 93–105.
Simon Baynham, “The Subordination of African Armies to Civilian Control: Theory and Praxis,” Africa Insight, 22 /4 (1992), p. 260.
See David Rapoport, “The Praetorian Army: Insecurity, Venality and Impotence,” in Roman Kolkowicz and Andrzej Korbonski (eds.), Soldiers, Peasants and Bureaucrats: Civil Military Relations in Communist and Modernizing Societies (London: Allen and Unwin, 1982), p. 264.
These figures cover the period 1956–2001. For details, see Patrick McGowan, “African Military Coups d’etat, 1956–2001: Frequency, Trends and Distribution,” Journal of Modern African Studies, 41 /3 (2003), pp. 339–370.
See Guy Martin, “Francophone Africa in the Context of Franco-American Relations,” in John Harbeson and Donald Rothchild (eds.), Africa in World Politics: Post–Cold War Challenges (Boulder: Westview Press, 1995, p. 176.
For an excellent discussion of Nigeria’s role in the maintenance of peace and security in West Africa, see Adekeye Adebajo, Building Peace in West Africa: Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea-Bissau (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 2002).
See Samuel Decalo, Coups and Army Rule in Africa: Studies in Military Style (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1976), p. 70 for details.
Anton Bebler, Military Rule in Africa: Dahomey, Ghana, Sierra Leone and Mali (New York: Praeger, 1973), p. 79.
Jerry Rawlings, quoted in “Not a Coup… a Revolution,” West Africa, January 11, 1982, p. 70.
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© 2004 Jimmy D. Kandeh
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Kandeh, J.D. (2004). Historicizing the Militariat. In: Coups from Below. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4039-7877-6_4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4039-7877-6_4
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