The incorporation of Africa, and indeed, the Global South in general through colonial violence, territorial conquest, dispossession and enslavement beginning in the fifteenth century not only entrenched arbitrary borders, ethnic and racial differentiation, but also the legacy of postcolonial identity crises, state fragility and intractable violence over citizenship rights/autochthony leading to mass human displacement, genocide, economic dependence/debt crises, authoritarianism and bad governance. For example, since the 1990s in DR-Congo and the broader Great Lakes Region identity conflicts and struggles for the control of land, local power and mineral resources have intensified since the overthrow of the Mobutu autocracy in 1996. Major global powers including the US, China and France have vested interests in DR-Congo’s vast mineral resources. The 1994 Rwanda genocide and the subsequent regional refugee crises further inflamed the civil war in eastern DR-Congo. It is estimated that the wars in DR-Congo has led to the death of over four million people. In Sudan, the centralization of power among predominantly Arabized elites such as General Omar el-Bashir (whose regime was overthrown by the military following a mass civil society driven demonstration) led to the exclusion of other ethnic groups in the outlaying provinces. El-Bashir’s authoritarian rule as well as the exclusion of other cummunities in the governance of the country are contributory factors to the 2003 rebellion and subsequent genocide in Darfur; where over one million people were killed and another two million crossed the border as refugees in Chad. Sudan remains at the brink of disintegration as the incumbent military regime battles an internal revolt. The referundam of 2011 also led to the secession of the south to form an independent Republic of South Sudan; a country that is also ravaged by internal power struggles within the ruling SPLM. The legacies/afterlives of Belgian and British colonial rule in DR-Congo and Sudan, respectively; as well as contemporary regimes of ‘humanitarian’ interventions, are essential in understanding the dynamics of the crises in these countries, the Great Lakes Region and the broader African continent. Drawing on the theoretical insights of postcolonial approaches (Said, Bhaba, Mamdani, Mudimbe, Mbembe and Ake) as well as decolonial/colonial paradigms (Quijano, Mignolo, Maldanado-Torres, Ndlovu-Gatsheni) this paper argues that the coloniality of power which unpacks the global entanglement of Africa within the world economy provides us with relevant analytical frames to unpack the afterlives of colonial empire and the v in Africa. I argue that Eurocentric claims of universal “civilizing mission” which was deployed to rationalize Europe’s violent conquest and enslavement of ‘Other’ racial groups from the 1490s, set the pillars of the contemporary global economy. Africa, and indeed the Global South, I contend have been entangled in an unequal global economy through the coloniality of power, militarism and Empire; and that political independence per se, may not guarantee sovereign equality and autonomy. The paper concludes that decolonizing the political field necessarily requires decolonizing the social, economic and cognitive frames of knowledge production that will open the space for Africa’s structural transformation and productive engagement in global affairs.

Coloniality and the Afterlives of Empire: Rethinking Africa’s Global Entanglements

章节
发表日期：

2026年

查看全文

Dauda Abubakar

摘要

The incorporation of Africa, and indeed, the Global South in general through colonial violence, territorial conquest, dispossession and enslavement beginning in the fifteenth century not only entrenched arbitrary borders, ethnic and racial differentiation, but also the legacy of postcolonial identity crises, state fragility and intractable violence over citizenship rights/autochthony leading to mass human displacement, genocide, economic dependence/debt crises, authoritarianism and bad governance. For example, since the 1990s in DR-Congo and the broader Great Lakes Region identity conflicts and struggles for the control of land, local power and mineral resources have intensified since the overthrow of the Mobutu autocracy in 1996. Major global powers including the US, China and France have vested interests in DR-Congo’s vast mineral resources. The 1994 Rwanda genocide and the subsequent regional refugee crises further inflamed the civil war in eastern DR-Congo. It is estimated that the wars in DR-Congo has led to the death of over four million people. In Sudan, the centralization of power among predominantly Arabized elites such as General Omar el-Bashir (whose regime was overthrown by the military following a mass civil society driven demonstration) led to the exclusion of other ethnic groups in the outlaying provinces. El-Bashir’s authoritarian rule as well as the exclusion of other cummunities in the governance of the country are contributory factors to the 2003 rebellion and subsequent genocide in Darfur; where over one million people were killed and another two million crossed the border as refugees in Chad. Sudan remains at the brink of disintegration as the incumbent military regime battles an internal revolt. The referundam of 2011 also led to the secession of the south to form an independent Republic of South Sudan; a country that is also ravaged by internal power struggles within the ruling SPLM. The legacies/afterlives of Belgian and British colonial rule in DR-Congo and Sudan, respectively; as well as contemporary regimes of ‘humanitarian’ interventions, are essential in understanding the dynamics of the crises in these countries, the Great Lakes Region and the broader African continent. Drawing on the theoretical insights of postcolonial approaches (Said, Bhaba, Mamdani, Mudimbe, Mbembe and Ake) as well as decolonial/colonial paradigms (Quijano, Mignolo, Maldanado-Torres, Ndlovu-Gatsheni) this paper argues that the coloniality of power which unpacks the global entanglement of Africa within the world economy provides us with relevant analytical frames to unpack the afterlives of colonial empire and the v in Africa. I argue that Eurocentric claims of universal “civilizing mission” which was deployed to rationalize Europe’s violent conquest and enslavement of ‘Other’ racial groups from the 1490s, set the pillars of the contemporary global economy. Africa, and indeed the Global South, I contend have been entangled in an unequal global economy through the coloniality of power, militarism and Empire; and that political independence per se, may not guarantee sovereign equality and autonomy. The paper concludes that decolonizing the political field necessarily requires decolonizing the social, economic and cognitive frames of knowledge production that will open the space for Africa’s structural transformation and productive engagement in global affairs.