Ghana, 1957-1966: Politics of Institutional Dualism by Benjamin AmonooReview by: Gerald M. McSheffreyCanadian Journal of African Studies / Revue Canadienne des Études Africaines, Vol. 17, No. 1(1983), pp. 133-134Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. on behalf of the Canadian Association of African StudiesStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/484672 .

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writers with long and continued experience in African affairs and has, by including different viewpoints, raised the critical questions on the interpretation of Soviet involve- ment in Africa in particular and in the Third World in general.

The collection could have benefitted from the inclusion of African writers themselves. It is imperative to understand how Africans view and respond to changing ideologies, especially foreign ones, at a time when African nations and leaders are seeking answers independent of super-power pressures.

Given the rapidity with which political changes take place and the uncertain alliances by the nation-states of the world and the super-powers, Albright leaves his readers with no doubt that Soviet influence is in no way diminishing, and, if anything, is on the increase, with international power struggles in Africa just beginning.

Chengiah RAGAVEN Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge University, Cambridge, England.

Benjamin AMONOO, Ghana, 1957-1966: Politics of Institutional Dualism. London: George Allen & Unwin (Publishers) Ltd., 1981, 242p.

Much has been said and perhaps more still needs to be said about politics in Ghana during the Nkrumah years. A lot of what was written about the period proved as illusionary as the socialism of the time while much that was written afterwards tended to take the form of political post-mortems whose purpose was to discern "what went wrong." Clearly, the direction of events in Ghana, and indeed in Africa as a whole, since that time places this question in wide perspective and perhaps even makes it irrelevant altogether. Consequently, there is reason to think that a more detached and dispassionate analysis would be extremely valuable before the historical mystification of Nkrumah currently underway makes this impossible.

Readers who approach this most recent work on the Nkrumah years in Ghana for such an analysis will be sorely disappointed, because there is little or nothing here that is likely to lead to any greater understanding of this period. Indeed, when one considers that the research for the thesis on which this book is based was carried out in 1969, this was almost inevitable. Whatever value the work might have had at that time is debatable, but twelve years later, one can only ask why it was published at all.

Amonoo's thesis, which is contained in the subtitle of the work, "The Politics of Institutional Dualism," can be summed up by the notion that politics in Nkrumah's Ghana was characterized by the marked sense of dualism which existed between the ruling party and the government bureaucracy. This is hardly an original insight and could be said to apply to any of the post-colonial states in Africa or elsewhere which inherited colonial-style bureaucracies and colonial-minded bureaucrats. We are never told whether Ghana was particularly unique in this respect because the book is entirely devoid of any comparative perspective which might have raised this potentially interesting issue. Surely, some reference to the Ghana experience in relation to that of Tanzania might shed

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some light on the possible compatibility or incompatibility of party and bureaucracy in Africa or elsewhere. Alas, all we get here is a lengthy and overly descriptive account of the incompatible relationship between party and bureaucracy; i.e., "dualism" at the central, regional and local levels of government. The source of this dualism is traced to the attitudes of the colonial-trained bureaucrats who continued to regard themselves as "politically neutral" and to the university which "insisted upon the maintenance of academic standards" and which "produced graduates who relished objective analysis." With Mr. Amonoo, the latter tradition has undoubtedly been upheld, but the results are hardly encouraging.

Gerald M. McSHEFFREY Etobicoke, Ontario.

Jon M. BRIDGEMAN, The Revolt of the Hereros. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1981, 192p.

As in the case of Zimbabwean historiography, the intensification of the liberation struggle in Namibia seems to have stimulated a wave of new publications about that beleaguered country. Predictably, most of these new studies have a contemporary focus.' Bridgeman's book, as well as Horst Dreschler's Let Us Die Fighting,2 both of which examine the imposition of German colonial rule and patterns of local resistance, are the most notable exceptions to this general trend in the literature.

1. Among the recent publications on Namibia are: International Defence and Aid Fund for Southern Africa. Namibia: The Facts. London: Inter-

national Defence and Aid Fund, 1980. International Defence and Aid Fund for Southern Africa. Apartheid in Namibia Today. London:

International Defence and Aid Fund, 1982. Department of Information and Publicity, SWAPO of Namibia. To Be Born a Nation: The

Liberation Struggle for Namibia. London: Zed Press, 1981. Catholic Institute for International Relations and British Council of Churches. Namibia in the

1980s: A CHR/BCC Position Paper. London: CIIR, 198 1. H.O. Sano, et al. Namibia and the Nordic Countries. Uppsala: Scandinavian Institute of African

Studies, 1981. M.D. Bomani and C. Ushewokunze. Constitutional Options for Namibia: A Historical Perspec-

tive. Edited by N.K. Duggal. Lusaka: United Nations Institute for Namibia, 1979. John Ya-Otto. Battle-Front Namibia. With Ole Gjerstad and Michael Mercer. Westport,

Connecticut: Lawrence Hill and Company, 1981. International Defence and Aid Fund for Southern Africa. Apartheid's Army in Namibia: South

Africa's Illegal Military Occupation. London: International Defence and Aid Fund, 1982. Stefan Sonderling. Bushwar-Bosoorlog-Buschkrieg (SWA/Namibia: The Defence Force in

Action). Windhoek: Eyes Publishing, 1980. Reginald Herbold Green. From Suedwestafrika to Namibia: the Political Economy of Transition.

Uppsala: The Scandinavian Institute of African Studies, 1981. S. Mshonga. Toward Agrarian Reform: Policy Options for Namibia. Lusaka: United Nations

Institute for Namibia, 1979. 2. Horst Dreschler, Let Us Die Fighting. (London, 1980).

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