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The Lived International
The Lived International is a poetic account of Stephen Chan’s personal engagement in International Relations. It speaks to the inadequacy of an abstract voyeurism while the problems of the world are death, devastation and underdevelopment. Drawn from a lifetime of travel and engagement, and from both published and hitherto unpublished poetry, forming a parallel list to the author’s academic works, the book seeks to inject into debate the sense that language, spoken and written discourse alone, are not a sufficient claim to ‘bearing witness’, and that even activism from afar can often fail to understand a human condition that afflicts the majority of the world’s population. Chan demonstrates that a life of praxis, living international relations, yields more insights than a life of theory alone.
The Morality of China in Africa
Edited with authority by the influential and respected Stephen Chan, this unique collection of essays gathers together for the first time both African and Chinese perspectives on China's place in Africa. The book starts with an excellent introductory essay from Stephen Chan, written in his usual elegant prose and featuring some very fresh insights organised with great clarity. Featuring useful historical context, this brave book analyses the "moral" aspects of the policies and ensuing migration. The book completely undermines existing assumptions concerning Sino-African relations, such as that Africa is of critical importance for China; that China sees no risk in its largesse towards Africa; and that there is a single Chinese profile/agenda. The resulting collection touches the issue of racism but is equally about moments of pure idealism and 'romance' in Sino-African history.
African Political Thought
African liberation is often seen in terms of heroism, but seldom in terms of thought. Even Sartre, in his preface to Frantz Fanon’s seminal The Wretched of the Earth, wrote of the ‘native’ with his coiled muscles about to explode into rebellion. The African and the black person are denied the condition of philosophy, apparently driven only by frustration and anger. Stephen Chan’s new book charts the long history of African political thought, from the years of North American slavery, through the development of modern African nationalism and the difficulties of governing new states, to Africa’s political philosophy today, taking on the world as an equal. He dwells at length on major ...
Spear to the West
A probing, at times startling, long essay on how the threat of jihadism has shaped our societies since 9/11.
Meditations on Diplomacy
Diplomacy is an evolving practice in terms of historical circumstance and changing national interests. History and interests do not always coincide. This book explores in brief, pungent case examples, the challenges diplomacy faces today as actors seek to change history and undermine interests.
Against Decolonisation
Decolonisation has lost its way. Originally a struggle to escape the West’s direct political and economic control, it has become a catch-all idea, often for performing ‘morality’ or ‘authenticity’; it suffocates African thought and denies African agency. Olúfẹ́mi Táíwò fiercely rejects the indiscriminate application of ‘decolonisation’ to everything from literature, language and philosophy to sociology, psychology and medicine. He argues that the decolonisation industry, obsessed with cataloguing wrongs, is seriously harming scholarship on and in Africa. He finds ‘decolonisation’ of culture intellectually unsound and wholly unrealistic, conflating modernity with colo...
Mugabe
On 21st November 2017 Robert Mugabe resigned as President of Zimbabwe after 37 years in power. A week earlier the military had seized control of the country and forced him to step down as leader of the ruling Zanu-PF party. In this revised and updated edition of his classic biography, Stephen Chan seeks to explain and interpret Mugabe in his role as a key player in the politics of Southern Africa. In this masterly portrait of one of Africa's longest-serving leaders, Mugabe's character unfolds with the ebb and flow of triumph and crisis. Mugabe's story is Zimbabwe's - from the post-independence hopes of idealism and reconciliation to electoral victory, the successful intervention in the inter...
Fidel Castro and Africa’s Liberation Struggle
The post-1959 Cuban government’s engagement with Africa, which was led by its charismatic and revolutionary leader, Fidel Castro, had two connecting dimensions: military internationalism and humanitarian internationalism. While African states and societies benefited immensely from these engagements, it was Fidel Castro’s military assistance towards the decolonization of and the pushback of Apartheid South Africa that received the loudest attention and ovation in the developing world. Fidel Castro, this book argues, was never motivated by economic, selfish, or geopolitical considerations; but rather, by the altruism and the certainty of his worldview and by the historical connection betwe...
