Visions of African Unity: New Perspectives on the History of Pan-Africanism and African Unification Projects(African Histories and Modernities)

This collection of essays analyzes different iterations of African unity, exploring the political and cultural visions that informed projects aimed at African unification. It explores the cultural, economic and non-state aspects of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) as the principal institution dedicated to the cooperation of African states, from its establishment in 1963 to its transformation into the African Union (AU) in 2000, as well as how ideas of African unity shaped the Cold War and African liberation struggles. Bringing together contributors from a diverse range of disciplinary backgrounds across Africa, Europe and the US, this book investigates the ideological origins and historiography of Pan-African and unification projects, and considers how African intellectuals, leaders and populations engaged with these ideas. 

Table of Contents:
1. Introduction.- Part I Imagining and Debating African Unity.- 2. A Different Kind of Union: An Assassination, Diplomatic Recognition, and Competing Visions of African Unity in Ghana-Togo Relations, 1956–1963.- 3. Thinking East African: Debating Federation and Regionalism, 1960–1977.- 4. Kwame Nkrumah and the All-African Trade Union Federation: Labour and the Emancipation of Africa.- 5. African Unity and the Process of Integration from the Grassroots: The Case of Mali and Senegal.- Part II The Impact of African Liberation and Cold War on African Unity.- 6. Visions of Unity: Southern Africa and Liberation.- 7. Between Continent and Country: Botswana, National Liberation, and Pan-Africanist Challenges, 1960s–1980s.- 8. The Trajectory of Liberation: Insurgencies from Portuguese Colonialism and Their Contribution to Pan-Africanism and Solidarism Within an Emerging African International Society.- 9. In Between Cold War politics: The OAU Consultative Committee and Anglo-American Diplomacy in the Nigerian Civil War, 1967–1970.- 10. 'Between their hands a fabulous geography is born': The Maghreb Generation and the Fight to Decolonize and Unite Africa’s Minds.- Part III From The OAU to the AU: Historical Trajectories.- 11. Embracing State Security: The Peace and Security Norms and Structures of the Organisation of African Unity, 1963–1993.- 12. What a Difference a Decade Makes: Understanding Security Policy Reversals Between the Organisation of African Unity and the African Union.- 13. Reflections About the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights Twenty Years After the Ouagadougou Protocol.- 14. Unity or Identity? How the Ambivalences of the African Union’s Collective Identity FormationPlay Out in Contemporary African Politics. The Case of the 2015 Burundi Crisis.- 15. How Africa Can Unite.- Part IV Postscript.- 16. Key Primary Information Sources Emanatingfrom the Organization of African Unity (OAU) and the African Union (AU): From the Lagos Plan of Action to Agenda 2063.

About the Author :
Matteo Grilli is a postdoctoral fellow in the International Studies Group at the University of the Free State in Bloemfontein, South Africa. He specializes in decolonization and Pan-Africanism. He is the author of Nkrumaism and African Nationalism: Ghana’s Pan-African Foreign Policy in the Age of Decolonization (Palgrave Macmillan, 2018). Frank Gerits is Assistant Professor in the History of International Relations at Utrecht University, the Netherlands. He previously held postdoctoral positions at New York University, USA, and the University of the Free State in Bloemfontein, South Africa.