Book contents
- Boundaries, Communities and State-Making in West Africa
- African Studies Series
- Boundaries, Communities and State-Making in West Africa
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Maps
- Tables
- Acknowledgements
- Abbreviations
- 1 Centring the Margins
- Part I From Frontiers to Boundaries
- 2 Configurations of Power in Comparative Perspective
- 3 Port Cities, Frontiers and Boundaries
- Part II States and Taxes, Land and Mobility
- Part III Decolonization and Boundary Closure, c.1939–1969
- Part IV States, Social Contracts and Respacing from Below, c.1970–2010
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
- Index
- African Studies Series
2 - Configurations of Power in Comparative Perspective
Commerce, People and Belief to c.1880
from Part I - From Frontiers to Boundaries
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 08 June 2019
- Boundaries, Communities and State-Making in West Africa
- African Studies Series
- Boundaries, Communities and State-Making in West Africa
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Maps
- Tables
- Acknowledgements
- Abbreviations
- 1 Centring the Margins
- Part I From Frontiers to Boundaries
- 2 Configurations of Power in Comparative Perspective
- 3 Port Cities, Frontiers and Boundaries
- Part II States and Taxes, Land and Mobility
- Part III Decolonization and Boundary Closure, c.1939–1969
- Part IV States, Social Contracts and Respacing from Below, c.1970–2010
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
- Index
- African Studies Series
Summary
In the first section of this book, I am concerned with exposing the inner workings and spatial logics of societies in the Senegambia and the trans-Volta before the partition at the end of the nineteenth century. I also seek to understand the ways in which existing frontier regions were incorporated into boundary-making and how, in turn, the latter was integral to colonial state-making. I advance a case for viewing the relationship between boundaries and state-making in its West African context. Although I question the straightforward notion that institutions were transplanted from Europe to Africa, I also show how these processes were shaped by a longer engagement with the Atlantic world.
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- Chapter
- Information
- Boundaries, Communities and State-Making in West AfricaThe Centrality of the Margins, pp. 49 - 100Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2019