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1 - Consensual decolonization: conditions, process, and the salient aspects of the Kenyan case

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 August 2010

Gary Wasserman
Affiliation:
Georgetown University, Washington DC
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Summary

Their purpose is to capture the vanguard, to turn the movement of liberation towards the right and to disarm the people: quick, quick, let's decolonize. Decolonize the Congo, before it turns into another Algeria. Vote the constitutional framework for all Africa, create the Communaute, renovate that same Communaute, but for God's sake let's decolonize quick.’

Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth

Decolonization was ‘the logical result indeed the triumph’ of Imperial policies and tradition.

Harold Macmillan

This initial chapter will set the stage. By making explicit the conditions and process of consensual decolonization it will establish a context, within which the study will focus on two aspects of Kenya decolonization. While the study will not ‘prove’ this prefiguration of a decolonization model, these initial generalizations will aid in establishing the importance and relevance of the processes of adaptation and bargaining to be studied. Toward this objective, the chapter will define the relevant terms, discuss the conditions and process of consensual decolonization, and introduce the salient feature and issue of the Kenyan case – elite adaptation, and the bargaining and resolution of the land question.

SOME DEFINITIONS

Decolonization, as generally understood, means the transfer of political authority from a colonial state to indigenous leaders within the framework of state sovereignty.

Type
Chapter
Information
Politics of Decolonization
Kenya Europeans and the Land Issue 1960–1965
, pp. 4 - 18
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 1976

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