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‘If you want to understand Nigeria’s history in one succinct go, this is a very good choice.’ Noo Saro-Wiwa Known as the African Giant, Nigeria's story is complex and often contradictory. How, despite the ravages of colonialism, civil war, ongoing economic disappointment and most recently the Boko Haram insurgency, has the country managed to stay together for a hundred years? Why, despite an abundance of oil, mineral and agricultural wealth, have so many of its people remained in poverty? These are the key questions explored by Richard Bourne in this remarkable and wide-ranging account of Nigeria's history, from its creation in 1914 to the historic 2015 elections and beyond. Featuring a wealth of original research and interviews, this is an essential insight into the shaping of a country where, despite the seemingly dashed optimism that was raised at independence, there still remains hope 'the Nigeria project' may still succeed.
No one in 1980 could have guessed that Zimbabwe would become a failed state on such a monumental and tragic scale. In this incisive and revealing book, Richard Bourne shows how a country which had every prospect of success when it achieved a delayed independence in 1980 became a brutal police state with hyperinflation, collapsing life expectancy and abandonment by a third of its citizens less than thirty years later. Beginning with the British conquest of Zimbabwe and covering events up to the present precarious political situation, this is the most comprehensive, up-to-date and readable account of the ongoing crisis. Bourne shows that Zimbabwe's tragedy is not just about Mugabe's 'evil' but about history, Africa today and the world's attitudes towards them.
For over twelve years in the first half of the nineteenth century, Giuseppe Garibaldi, the hero of Italian unification, lived, learned and fought in South America. He was tortured, escaped death on countless occasions, and met his Brazilian wife, Anita, who eloped with him in 1839. From then on, she would share in Garibaldi's personal and political odyssey, first in the breakaway republic of Rio Grande do Sul in southern Brazil, and then as Montevideo's admiral and general in the Uruguayan civil war. Richard Bourne breathes life and understanding into these spectacular South American adventures, which also shed light on the creation of Italy. Garibaldi's Redshirts liberated Sicily and Naples...
Ex-President Lula of Brazil has a life that reads like a film script. The child of a dysfunctional family, his early life was one of poverty and chaos. In the 1970s, at a time when his country and continent were ruled by right-wing dictators, he switched from football-mad metalworker to militant trade union leader. Dissatisfied with the power of existing parties to bring about change, he founded the Partido dos Trabalhadores, the Workers Party. He was elected as president in 2002 and again in 2006. As a progressive leader in a globalizing world, he has walked a difficult tightrope in international relations with the US, Africa and the Middle East; and in trying to improve the lot of poor and black Brazilians at home. Lula of Brazil is an objective study of an unfinished political odyssey; the story of one man set against the contemporary history of a major emerging power. From climate change to inequality, Lula and his country are grappling with the greatest challenges facing the modern world.