ABSTRACT
Nineteen hundred and sixty was the year of triumph of African nationalism. Yet as the coups of 1966 soon underlined, the independent states were not yet nations. A conclusion drawn from this, and one that is reinforced by the prevalent academic theories of political development, is that African leaders should forego their concern with their neighbors and focus their attention solely on the internal tasks of nation building. But such a conclusion is too simple. It is one thing to turn inward to internal
development in Nigeria or Congo-Kinshasa, but it is open to question whether any degree of concentration on internal problems would bring about significant economic or political development in Togo, Upper Volta, or Chad. Two-thirds of the independent African states have only a few million inhabitants and per capita incomes of under a hundred dollars a year – a small market for industrialization and a thin base over which to spread the overhead of services that go along with sovereign status.1 Several states, for instance Malawi, Gambia, and Dahomey, are dependent on the former colonial power for support of their recurrent budgets as well as for capital expenditure. It is doubtful whether African microstates can achieve a level of economic development on the basis of their present size which will allow them to develop governmental institutions capable of providing sufficient and effective rewards and punishments necessary for rapid nation building. In other words, some sort of external arrangements with other African states may be a necessary condition for internal nation building. Otherwise, military interventions which periodically focus attention on internal order will merely be part of a dreary cycle. Why then has there been so little progress on improving the external conditions
of development in Africa? Why have African leaders accepted the boundaries arbitrarily determined on the drawing boards of nineteenth century European chancellories? In the eyes of some younger African elites, the explanation lies in the
selfishness of the current generation of African leaders. In the eyes of some outside observers, the explanation lies in the intensity of African nationalism. The purpose of this chapter is not to provide solutions but to demonstrate the inadequacy of the above explanations and to interpret the dilemma of African nationalist leaders who are concerned about the development of their small states.
