African Capitalism: The Struggle for Ascendency (African Society Today) - Softcover

Kennedy, Paul T.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0521319668 ISBN 13: 9780521319669

Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 1988

Synopsis

For many years, the prevailing view of African capitalism stressed its dependence on state and foreign capital and therefore its inability to make a significant contribution to African development. Drawing upon material from a number of countries and a range of academic disciplines, this 1988 book provides an analysis of African capitalism which offers a much more positive view of its role. The book suggests that a number of major constraints have combined to obstruct the emergence of dynamic African capitalist bourgeoisies: foreign competition, the cultural climate, the dependency factor in African economic life, the evolving class structure, the quality of indigenous enterprise and the nature of politics, ideology and state power. All these are assessed and found to be significant, but in the final analysis, it has been in the arena of politics and ideology, centred on the struggle to exercise state power, that the fate of private indigenous capitalism has so often been determined.

About this title

Book Description:

Drawing upon material from a number of countries and a range of academic disciplines, this 1988 book, provides an analysis of African capitalism which offers a much more positive view of its role than the prevailing view of its dependence on state and foreign capital.

About this edition

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Publication date: 1988
• ISBN 10: 0521319668
• ISBN 13: 9780521319669
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 244