It is a commonplace that the problems of African rural development are becoming increasingly complex--that is, they have grown more numerous, interrelated, and varied. This complexity has generated a multitude of development scenarios. Such scenarios encourage decision making along rigid and narrow patterns that ignore the diversity of local situations and national cultures. Among these is the doomsday scenario, applied to every nation on the continent, best captured in the phrase Everything worksàexcept in Africa. Emery Roe argues that crisis scenarios generated by an expert (usually non-African) elite are self-serving and counterproductive. Despite this, they go largely unchallenged, even when they fail to explain or predict. Except-Africa takes up the challenge of devising development scenarios that do justice to the continent's variegated reality.The book begins by defining what the author means by a development narrative. The subsequent chapters provide alternate scenarios to such dominant models. Chapter 2 sketches four counter-narratives to the tragedy of the common argument, while chapter 3 constructs the most innovative challenge to conventional ways of thinking about Sub-Saharan pastoralism in decades. Chapter 4 develops an alternative scenario of expatriate advising in Africa, while chapter 5 devises a counter-narrative to the all-too-common views about government budgeting in Nigeria, Kenya, and Ghana. Chapter 6 presents a case study and counter-narrative from Zimbabwe of a complex local government reform. The book concludes by moving beyond case material and specific situations to answer the most imperative question in African studies and rural development: What would a politics of complexity look like in Africa if complexity were seriously engaged?Contemporary African studies are dominated by narratives about power. Yet in African rural development, power interests are by no means always clear. Development issues are frequently contingent and provisional. Surviving the tangled fusion of narrative and reality requires a politics of complexity. Except-Africa will be an essential work in meeting that challenge.

Considering the current challenges to human progress, this reference book examines recent theories, policies, and sectoral priorities, as well as various social, economic, and administrative factors that impact worldwide modernization and development. The book emphasizes the fact that communities must evaluate continuously and adjust their program

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This open access textbook offers a critical introduction to human and economic development prospects in Africa revolving around three questions: where is Africa today, what explains the current state, and, given historical trends and what we know about the world, where do we think the continent will be in 2040? And, a final question: what can we do to create a better tomorrow? It models ambitious progress in health, demographics, agriculture, education, industrialization, technological leapfrogging, increased trade, greater stability, better governance and external support. The book reviews the future of work/jobs, poverty and the impact of climate change. A combined Closing the Gap scenario presents a forecast of what could be possible by 2040. Each chapter suggests which policies might accelerate prospects for each sector. Written in an accessible style, and supported by a range of pedagogical features, this textbook introduces undergraduate and graduate students to the contemporary human and economic development prospects in Africa.

This is a revised and updated edition in which the author examines the problems of post-colonial Africa. He contends that the problems have existed since independence in the sixties and have been made worse through the years by a combination of factors. It is a blunt assessment and prescribes some solutions to Africa's problems focusing on internal factors but without exonerating external forces from what has happened on the continent through the decades.