‘A truly amazing achievement by a truly amazing man.’ This was the verdict of one visiting economist upon this symposium and upon the man who conceived and organised the whole project, Dunduzu Chisiza, then Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Finance in the new Malawi Government. The imaginativeness of the concept, the painstaking planning of every detail, and the whole-hearted co-operation he obtained from all involved—these are a measure of the loss to Africa resulting from Mr Chisiza's death in September 1962.

This seminar was held in accordance with a resolution of the third session of the Economic Commission for Africa, which sponsored it jointly with the Department of Economic and Social Affairs of the United Nations; it was the first U.N. activity in the field of public administration in Africa. The participants included representatives from 17 African countries, and from the following specialised organisations: F.A.O., I.C.A.O., I.L.O., W.H.O., E.C.A., and the International Union of Local Authorities.

This Committee was incorporated as a non-profit organisation under the laws of New York State in September 1953, and began to appoint some full-time staff two years later. It was founded by a small group of individuals who felt the need for an American organisation which could give expression to the liberal American tradition in support of the African peoples struggling for freedom, equality, and independence. At the same time the Committee aimed to interpret the meaning of African events to the American people, and to introduce African leaders to the public.

Teaching and research in French universities on African history and contemporary problems are no longer the sole privilege of Paris. Several provincial universities, including Strasbourg and Bordeaux, have in fact well equipped research centres. Among these newly-developing programmes, special mention must be made of the University of Aix-Marseille. The long-standing connexions of the Marseille region with Africa, especially the Maghreb, have led to the establishment in recent years of a number of institutes and centres dealing with African affairs—first by the University, then by other local bodies in association with it.

This Colloquium on the Politics of Development and Different African Ways to Socialism was attended by delegates from 16 African countries, and observers from several others. They included such distinguished Africans as the Senegalese President, Léopold Sédar Senghor, who acted as host, and the Premier, Mamadou Dia; Jacques Rabemananjara, Malagasy Minister of Economic Planning; Auguste Anfuille, Gabon Minister of National Education; Mohamed El Moktar Marouf, Mauritainan Minister of Economic Planning; Asséfa Demisse, Ethiopian Deputy Minister of Finance; Boubou Hama, President of the National Assembly of Niger; Abdelmajed Chaker, Tunisian Scretary of Agriculture; Dr S. O. Biobaku, Pro-Vice Chancellor of the University of Ife, Nigeria; Osman Ahmed Hassen Somali Ambassador to France; and Namamodou Diakité Guinean Ambassdor to Senegal.

The Institute of Oriental and African Studies (Prague 1, Lazenska Str. No. 4), originally founded in 1922 by the Government, has since 1952 been an integral part of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences, the president of which is a member of the Government. The purpose of the Institute, under its director, Professor J. Prusek, is to foster research in Oriental and African languages, cultures, economics, and history; there are four departments, one of which is concerned with the Near East and Africa, and has 17 members of staff, headed by Dr. O. Klima. Four scholars are working on various aspects of African languages and literature: Dr K. F. Waridi-Ruzicka (Swahili and Bantu), Mr S. Pantucek (Berber), Mr P. Zima (Hausa and Yoruba), and Mr J. Hulec.

The purpose of this meeting, convened by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (E.C.A.), was to consider the position and prospects of Africa's major agricultural export commodities and to examine possible national and international measures for commodity stabilisation. Over 50 representatives attended from 17 African countries; the chairman was Mr O. I. Afe of Nigeria, and the vice-chairman was M Medoune Fall of Senegal.

‘Bread … before politics’ was the aim set for this session of E.C.A. in an early address by the Commission's retiring chairman, M Oumar Baba Diarra of Mali. Fittingly enough, these words were attributed to Cyrille Adoula, whose host government had been striving to transform those energies yielding Congolese friction into efforts to satisfy the basic needs of human existence, so appallingly evident on every hand to guests in Leopoldville. The conference agenda prepared through the initiative of E.C.A.'s secretariat was laden with economic questions of both short-and long-term significance.

To this American, some aspects of the Dakar colloquium were curiously nostalgic and unreal. They were reminiscent of the discussions of left-wing intellectuals in the early thirties—in the U.S. at least—when any proposed solution of a pressing social, economic, or political problem had first to be blessed by the appropriate ideological rationale or actually couched in ideological terms. The compulsion to make obeisance to socialist ideology before getting down to discussion of the concrete problems confronting African countries was apparent in many of the addresses. At the same time the discussion of the problems themselves and the solutions proposed frequently bore little relation to socialist ideology. Non-socialists might very well have discussed them in exactly the same terms and come up with the same conclusions or solutions.

African studies have hitherto been largely deficient in the attention given to that central element of culture which we Europeans call ‘art’ or ‘the arts’, but which traditional Africa did not compartmentalise either in name or in fact. Since the great changes through which Africa is passing are almost all in the direction of materialism and international conformity, it is not surprising, but none the less regrettable, that even anthropologists have usually accorded to African art a peripheral, though not always unhonoured status. This has now been boldly remedied by the inauguration in Souther Rhodesia of what it is hoped will be a regular series of international con gresses of African culture.

Dakar, Senegal, 26–30 March, and Freetown, Sierra Leone, 3–8 April 1963. These two conferences—both sponsored by the Congress for Cultural Freedom—arose out of an earlier meeting on inter-university co-operation held at Fourah Bay College in December 1961. The aim of both was to persuade African universities to integrate the teaching of African literature in French and English into their regular syllabuses, and to ensure that it is studied as literature, not for its curiosity or ethnographic value.

The hum of giant transformers and the roar of turbines at the underground power station beside the dam at Kariba, visited by conference members, offered an appropriate illustration to a paper by Dr. J. M. A. Lenihan on ‘Humanity and technology, or: Why teach physics?’; he had stressed that science and technology provide an indispensable stimulus to each other.

President Nkrumah, in opening this Congress in the Great Hall of the University of Ghana, called for the objective scientific study of Africa. He urged: ‘While some of us are engaged with the political unification of Africa, Africanists everywhere must also help in building the spiritual and cultural foundations of the unity of our continent.’ This appeal had in a sense already been answered by the arrival of scholars from nearly every State in Africa.

This U.N.E.S.C.O conference proved to be a most valuable complement to the Addis Ababa conference of May 1961, which had dealt with African education in general. Delegations attended from 31 countries, as well as observers from 13 non-African states and from international organisations and private foundations. Interest was concentrated mainly upon university development.

A panel of international economists recently assembled at the University of Ghana in response to a unique invitation to discuss the draft of Ghana's latest Development Plan. The distinguished guests included Professor C. Z. Bobrowski (Poland), Professor J. Bognar (Hungary), Professor H. C. Bos (Netherlands), Professor A. O. Hirshman (United States), Mr N. Kaldor (England), Professor W. A. Lewis (West Indies), Dr Abdel Rahman (Egypt), Professor K. N. Raj (India), Mr Dudley Seers (E.C.A.), Mr J. Weeks (Liberia), and Dr Abdullah Sikta (Libya). Their informed criticism and advice, based on wide experience of developing economies, will go a long way to ensure that the optimum use is made of Ghana's extensive economic resources to achieve rapid growth.

This conference was sponsored jointly by the Government of Tanganyika and the University College, Dar es Salaam, and was financed by the Ford Foundation. It was attended by delegates from African countries, some of whose legal systems have been influenced by common law, some by European civil law or Islamic law. Official representatives came from Ethiopia, Ghana, the Ivory, Coast, Nigeria, Northern Rhodesia, Nyasaland, Sierra Leone, the Sudan, Uganda, Kenya, Tanganyika, and Zanzibar. Some celebrated authorities on Islamic law and African customary law attended as observers, and contributed a great deal to the discussions. The chairman of the conference was the Tanganyikan Minister of Justice, Sheik Amri Abedi, and the secretary general was Mr P. J. Nkambo Mugerwa of the local Faculty of Law.

Without political freedom there can be no cultural freedom; a programme of cultural emancipation is dependent, therefore, on national liberation, and one would like to believe that this ‘therefore’ influenced the determination by the American Society of African Culture to focus more sharply not only on cultural exchanges but on the political battle for the mind of southern Africa. This fourth international conference, held at Howard University under the title ‘Southern Africa in Transition’, was ‘aimed at focusing widespread attention on the complex and difficult problems being faced by those struggling for freedom in this troubled area’. It was attended by an impressive group of Afro-American, white American, and European Africanists, together with African leaders of countries from the Congo to the Cape.

These conferences grew out of the new University's desire to offer more direct assistance for the development of East Africa. The objects were:

(1) to provide a forum for political leaders from all the East African countries and from some others, in which they could discuss matters of major public policy in an objective and private atmosphere;

(2) to provide a series of opportunities for these leaders to meet and gain a deeper understanding of each other; and

(3) to help establish the fact that the University of East Africa is anxious and able to be of use in facing practical problems.

Over 50 people attended this seminar, organised by the Department of Natural Sciences of U.N.E.S.C.O., including 32 specialists from 22 African university institutions. Documents had previously been submitted by each participating country, summarising the following data on science faculties: numbers of lecturers and students, capacity of departments, facilities for teaching and research, and development plans. The working languages were English and French; simultaneous interpretation was provided. The seminar was conducted mainly in plenary sessions; papers written mostly by U.N.E.S.C.O. consultants served as bases for discussing the teaching of specific subjects (mathematics, physics, geology, chemistry, and biology), the emphasis throughout being on first-year university work. More general topics included co-operation between university and government, and between African countries in science teaching.

In recent years many countries in tropical Africa have seen the growth of an urgent problem: unemployment among young people. Although in some areas local unemployment has been a continuing problem, this new, more serious form has emerged as a result of accelerated social change and demands difficult policy decisions. The problem arises from the rapid expansion of basic education without widespread facilities for further education and without many possibilities for labour absorption in the modern sector of the economy. Frequently the effect of primary schooling is to turn young people away from traditional means of making a living: those in villages reject farming and migrate to the cities to compete for the few wage-paid jobs. Each year the number of school leavers increases and the pool of unemployed grows.