Africa's Development Impasse: Towards a Political Economy of Transformation

Orthodox strategies for socio-economic development have failed spectacularly in southern Africa. Neither the developmental state nor neoliberal reform seems able to provide a solution to Africa's problems.

Africa's Development Impasse analyses this failure and explores the potential for alternatives. Examining why Botswana, Zimbabwe and South Africa have been unable to overcome a debilitating colonial legacy, the book argues that it is time to rethink the political economy of development. Building on the path-breaking work of post-development theorists, Stefan Andreasson navigates a new way through the current development impasse.

This important fusion of theory with empirical case studies is essential reading for students of development politics and Africa.

Stefan Andreasson is lecturer in comparative politics at Queen's University Belfast.