The world's first attempt at a scholarly historicisation of the African crisis of development, this book interrogates the problem of national integration within the context of ethno-religious and cultural pluralism. Here, top scholars offer refreshing insight into the prospects for transforming Africa into a super-power of the third millennium. The breadth and depth of coverage and analytical rigour unites the essays, providing one of the most comprehensive and authoritative treatments of the subject in recent years.

This book analyzes the concept “true federalism” to examine whether there are definable dimensions of power-sharing that make ‘true federalism.’ The author takes a critical look at dimensions on political restructuring in Nigeria, which have been termed “true federalism.” The work fills a significant gap in the existing literature on the theory and practice of federalism. The project will be useful to the students and professors of African Studies, political science, Nigeria federalism, public administration and policy. Additionally, the monograph will be interesting to the general public who seek to know more about contemporary issues in Nigeria.

This book offers a thematic study of key debates in the history of the ethnic politics, democratic governance, and minority rights in Nigeria. Nigeria provides a framework for examining the central paradox in post-colonial nation building projects in Africa – the tension between majority rule and minority rights. The liberal democratic model on which most African states were founded at independence from colonial rule, and to which they continue to aspire, is founded on majority rule. It is also founded on the protection of the rights of minority groups to political participation, social inclusion and economic resources. Maintaining this tenuous balance between majority rule and minority rights has, in the decades since independence, become the key national question in many African countries, perhaps none more so than Nigeria. This volume explores these issues, focusing on four key themes as they relate to minority rights in Nigeria: ethnic and religious identities, nationalism and federalism, political crises and armed conflicts.

Looking at the experiences of other federal societies across the globe this volume interrogates the problem of national integration within the context of ethno-religious and cultural pluralism, and presents exciting prospects for the resolution of the National Question. Compelling and indispensable, this work is the most comprehensive and authoritative treatment of the subject in recent years.

Minorities of the oil-producing states are seriously disturbed by the inequity that is apparent from the existing principles of revenue allocation in Nigeria. In taking issues with them and other southern advocates of new revenue allocation criteria, the dominant north's organic intellectuals have always relied on the obvious concentration of economic and commercial activities in southern Nigeria to refute the argument that the north is the greater beneficiary of Nigeria's wealth. Scholarly contribution to the ethno-regional debate on the equity of resource allocation has been anchored to the same popular platform, namely, the criteria for inter-governmental revenue allocation. It is as if they absolutely embody the revelation about equity or inequity of resource allocation in Nigeria where the federal government has retained between 48.5 per cent and 56 per cent of the federation account, let alone revenues unpaid into this account. This study marks a departure from the orthodox focus on Nigeria's ethnic problems, including the contentious demand of the southern minorities for an increase in the weight assigned the principle of derivation, by examining federal expenditures to determine the distribution of federal presence, and thus winners and losers, bearing in mind that the entire country is federal government's coverage.

The 1990s were marked by democratic reforms throughout Africa, which went in tandem with decentralization reforms. The chapters of the volume all highlight the gradual changes that have taken place since. Long-term structural uncodified factors – be it societal, economic, geographic, demographic – seem to have interacted with the constitutional clauses introduced during the reforms. Some chapters look at how decentralization slowly gave way to recentralization because none of the new subnational entities were politically and economically strong enough to balance off the center; some look at how inherent deficiencies in infrastructure and personnel at the subnational level brought the central government back in; some look at how different subnational units ended up working differently due to differences in demographic and social factors; some look at how uncodified factors came to determine how national politics functioned; some look at how decentralization created new conflicts between ethnic groups competing for the control of the new entities; some look at how decentralization blew new life into traditional authorities. This book was original published as a special issue of Regional and Federal Studies.