The successor to Kenyatta and Britain: An Account of Political Transformation, 1929-1963, this book completes the first systematic political history of Jomo Kenyatta by examining the mechanisms of installing a neo-colonial regime in Kenya, and how such regimes were duplicated elsewhere in Africa. It analyzes the nature and extent of the collaboration between Kenyatta, Britain and Western intelligence services to install and protect his government in Kenya—a collaboration which is linked to some of Kenya's most intractable political, social and economic problems. Drawing heavily on primary sources, it examines the legacy of Kenyatta's regime, and how this legacy is felt in Kenya today.

Since independence from Great Britain in 1963, Kenya has survived five decades as a functioning nation-state, holding regular elections; its borders and political system intact and avoiding open war with its neighbours and military rule internally. It has been a favoured site for Western aid, trade, investment and tourism and has remained a close security partner for Western governments. However, Kenya's successive governments have failed to achieve adequate living conditions for most of its citizens; violence, corruption and tribalism have been ever-present, and its politics have failed to transcend its history. The decisions of the early years of independence and the acts of its leaders in the decades since have changed the country's path in unpredictable ways, but key themes of conflicts remain: over land, money, power, economic policy, national autonomy and the distribution of resources between classes and communities.While the country's political institutions have remained stable, the nation has changed, its population increasing nearly five-fold in five decades. But the economic and political elite's struggle for state resources and the exploitation of ethnicity for political purposes still threaten the country's existence. Today, Kenyans are arguing over many of the issues that divided them 50 years ago. The new constitution promulgated in 2010 provides an opportunity for national renewal, but it must confront a heavy legacy of history. This book reveals that history.

This is a study of political leadership and organization during the first thirty years of organized African politics in Kenya, from the formation of the Kikuyu Association after World War I to the first few months of the ‘Mau Mau’ Emergency. Its theme is the attempt of Africans to find an effective political voice, and it centres on the Kikuyu, the tribe upon which the British intrusion had the greatest physical and emotional effect and which was therefore the most active politically.