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Adapting to Drought
This book embodies the results of thirteen years of research in drought-prone rural areas in the semi-arid zone of northern Nigeria. It describes the patterns of adaptive behaviour observed among Hausa, Ful'be and Manga communities in response to recurrent drought in the 1970s and 1980s. The question of desertification is explored in an area where the visible evidence of moving sand dunes is dramatic blame are examined in relation to the field evidence. A critique is offered of deterministic theories and authoritarian solutions. Professor Mortimore demonstrates a parallel between the observable resilience of semi-arid ecosystems and the adaptive strategies of the human communities that inhabit them and suggests policy directions for strengthening that resilience.
Sustainable Land Management in the Tropics
Bringing together case studies from Kenya, Benin, Cameroon and the Philippines, this volume provides a multidisciplinary overview of the economics of natural resource management in Tropical regions, at household and village level. By comparing a wide array of climatic and economic conditions, it examines the effect of location and access to the market - as well as the importance of national policies - have on soil and water conservation. The book not only analyzes the benefits of soil and water conservation based on econometric studies, but also assesses the costs involved. In doing so it challenges commonly held assumptions about poorer community's ability to finance such measures.
Displacement and the Politics of Violence in Nigeria
This volume examines the religious, ethnic, and class basis of political insecurity in Nigeria that has resulted in the maintanance of military rule in the 1990s. Political repression and secular strife have made it difficult for the democratic opposition to end military dictatorship.
The End of Desertification?
The question in the title of this book draws attention to the shortcomings of a concept that has become a political tool of global importance even as the scientific basis for its use grows weaker. The concept of desertification, it can be argued, has ceased to be analytically useful and distorts our understanding of social-environmental systems and their resiliency, particularly in poor countries with variable rainfall and persistent poverty. For better policy and governance, we need to reconsider the scientific justification for international attempts to combat desertification. Our exploration of these issues begins in the Sahel of West Africa, where a series of severe droughts at the end o...
Politics, Property and Production in the West African Sahel
Through a number of case studies from the West African Sahel, this book links and explores natural resources management from the perspectives of politics, property and production.
Understanding FDI-Assisted Economic Development
It is nowadays well accepted that both economic growth and development are highly dependent on improving not just the availability of capital, but also access to technological capabilities, infrastructure and resources. This has gone hand-in-hand with an increasing economic liberalization of most developing countries. The role of the MNE as a viable source of both capital and technology is one of the key features of this new openness. In the process of embracing FDI as a solution to the myriad of economic ills - something even the World Bank has begun to do - little attempt is made to understand the rationale and the costs associated with this policy stance. Simply put, FDI is not a condition sine qua non for development. Too much emphasis has been placed on attracting FDI, and not on understanding how to optimise the benefits for the host economy. This volume aims to encourage and promote research related to these issues. This volume was previously published as a special issue of the European Journal of Development Research.
Population and Development
Population and Development addresses important issues at the heart of the problems of developing countries. How these countries address the common difficulties of population growth, including mortality and fertility decline, population redistribution including internal migration and urbanization, and also international migration, for both source countries and for destination countries. How and why has population change affected development – both positively and negatively? How and why has development affected population change – both growth and distribution? The book opens with an introduction, preceding the ten substantive chapters, covering some of the broader issues for population stu...
Roots in the African Dust
The image of Africa in the modern world has come to be shaped by perceptions of the drylands and their problems of poverty, drought, degradation, and famine. Michael Mortimore offers an alternative and revisionist thesis, dismissing on theoretical and empirical grounds the conventional view of runaway desertification, driven by population growth and inappropriate land use. In its place he suggests a more optimistic model of sustainable land use, based on researched case studies from East and West Africa where indigenous technological adaptation has put population growth and market opportunities to advantage. He also proposes a more appropriate set of policy priorities to support dryland peoples in their efforts to sustain land and livelihoods. The result is a remarkably clear synthesis of much of the best work that has emerged over past years.
African Politics in Comparative Perspective
This revised and expanded second edition of African Politics in Comparative Perspective reviews fifty years of research on politics in Africa and addresses some issues in a new light, keeping in mind the changes in Africa since the first edition was written in 2004. The book synthesizes insights from different scholarly approaches and offers an original interpretation of the knowledge accumulated in the field. Goran Hyden discusses how research on African politics relates to the study of politics in other regions and mainstream theories in comparative politics. He focuses on such key issues as why politics trumps economics, rule is personal, state is weak and policies are made with a communal rather than an individual lens. The book also discusses why in the light of these conditions agriculture is problematic, gender contested, ethnicity manipulated and relations with Western powers a matter of defiance.
Environmental Policies and NGO Influence
This book examines the conditions under which non-governmental organisations (NGOs) may exert influence on policies to conserve and sustainably use natural resources in sub-Saharan Africa. The book is unique in bringing together NGO campaigners in three African countries with academics specialising in development studies, systems and environmental policy.
