If I knew then what I know now

Today I read over my old blog posts from when I lived in Arivaca Arizona. At that time I did not think I would ever get an academic job. If I had to do it again I would have done things differently. First, I probably would not have bothered to apply to any jobs in the US. I now know I never had a shot of even getting an interview with any US institution. Having a PhD from the UK and no teaching experience basically eliminated me from the first round of any search. No amount of publications could overcome this second disability. Anybody who tells you that publications are what get you hired as an assistant professor in the US is lying to you. I see this lie repeated a lot on academic blogs and I wish it would stop. Second, I would have sent an application to every history department in English speaking Africa regardless of whether they were advertising openings or not. While having a British degree hurt me a lot in the US job market since my degree is from SOAS not Oxford or Cambridge I believe it would have helped me in the African market. Not surprisingly the School of Oriental and African Studies is known and respected in Africa. This was the second university in Africa I even looked at and I got the job on the basis of my CV and publications without the need for an interview. Finally, I would have done a lot more to project myself as a generalist rather than a specialist. Universities are not looking for people to teach on the subject of their PhD dissertation. They are looking for people who can teach the broad outlines of several centuries of the history of whole continents. I honestly did not fully realize how far removed the daily work of a university lecturer is from the process of getting a PhD when I lived in Arivaca.

A Brief History of Communism in Africa

Despite Soviet rhetoric under Lenin and Stalin denouncing imperialism and colonialism there was little Soviet support of movements seeking independence in Africa before the 1960s. Most anti-imperialist activity undertaken by Moscow during this time focused on Asia. Even here, however, rhetoric trumped actual material assistance. As a result the vast majority of independence movements in Asia succeeded under non-Communist leadership. Nehru and Gandhi in India, Jinnah in Pakistan, and Sukarno in Indonesia to name only the leaders of the three most populous Asian states to gain independence after World War II, threw off European colonial rule without establishing a Soviet style system. The only successful anti-colonial movement to establish a communist government was the Viet-Minh under Ho Chi Minh fighting against French colonial rule. In 1954 they established a communist regime in North Vietnam after the signing of the Paris Accords with France. Successful communist revolutions after Stalin’s death were few until the 1970s. After North Vietnam there was only Cuba in 1959 and South Yemen in 1969. Successful communist revolutions against colonial regimes were even rarer. Cuba was already an independent state leaving only the British colony of South Yemen as an example of communism replacing colonialism between 1954 and 1975. The British and French empires collapsed in Africa without any communist governments replacing them. It was only in the mid-1970s that communism established a foothold on the African continent with the collapse of the imperial regimes of Ethiopia and Portugal.

Although Soviet support for national liberation movements in Africa gets rhetorical and limited material support starting in the early 1960s under Khrushchev it is only later under Brezhnev that this support becomes significant. Soviet support for national liberation movements in southern Africa such as the MPLA in Angola, FRELIMO in Mozambique, ZAPU in Rhodesia, SWAPO in Namibia, and the ANC in South Africa sought to buy the allegiance of these movements should they ever come to power. In the case of Angola and Mozambique this strategy was successful. In Rhodesia, the USSR bet on the wrong horse. Robert Mugabe’s ZANU movement came to power rather than ZAPU. In Namibia and South Africa the Soviet Union’s favored movements came to power, but they did not establish communist regimes. Moreover, the ANC came to power after the USSR disintegrated and ceased to exist as a state.

The first communist government in Africa was not established until 1974. The overthrow of Emperor Selassie in Ethiopia that year made it the first state in Africa to pursue the Soviet model of development. The collapse of the Portuguese Empire led to the establishment of two other Soviet style states in Africa that promptly allied themselves with the USSR, Angola and Mozambique. The MPLA in Angola and FRELIMO in Mozambique had received Soviet military assistance during their existence as guerilla organizations fighting against Portuguese rule. Upon the removal of Portuguese soldiers from Africa in 1975 they continued to receive Soviet military hardware as well as Cuban soldiers in their struggle against armed anti-communist movements backed variously by Rhodesia, South Africa, and the USA. Today Angola and Mozambique are at peace and the ruling parties have largely dismantled the Soviet style economic structures created in the 1970s.

Overall communist movements had limited success in Africa. Outside of South Africa, there were no organized communist parties prior to World War II. Communism came to power in Ethiopia through a military coup and in Angola and Mozambique through guerilla organizations more influenced by Castro’s Cuban Revolution than Lenin’s Bolshevik Revolution. Africa provided a weak social, organizational, and ideological environment from which communist movements could develop. Asia proved to be much more fertile ground for such movements. Communist governments came to power in China, North Korea, Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia and at one time strong communist parties or movements existed in Burma, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Indonesia.

What I did today

Today I had to get a prescription renewed. The medical system here is pretty efficient. I would say it is comparable to the British NHS system with which I am familiar.  But, I wish the doctors would give me a prescription for longer than a month. It seems silly to spend a couple of hours every month just to get a prescription renewed. I hope the next time I go I can get more than a month.

Another trip to the mall

Yesterday I went to Accra Mall. It was crowded as usual. It amazes me that while in the US almost everything is made in China at the Game store almost everything is made in South Africa. Some of it like my Logik kettle is not made very well. I still have to return it since it is still under warranty, but in the meantime I have purchased a more expensive and hopefully more durable kettle.

Thanks for Commenting

Thanks for commenting people. Since 4:00 pm yesterday I have gotten five comments on my blog. That is more comments than I have gotten in the last two months.

More on working in Africa

This semester I spent a lot of time adjusting to life on a new continent. This is the fourth continent I have lived on in the last ten years. Which I think is part of the coming globalization of academic labor. Had I stayed in the US, I am pretty sure I would have had to stop looking for an academic job eventually. To date I have only had one phone interview for a US position in seven years during which I sent out hundreds of applications. I am not exactly sure why there is so much competition for lousy academic jobs in the US compared to much better academic jobs in places like Ghana. But, I suspect I got lucky in getting here before the competition realized that there are universities outside of the US, Canada and Europe.

I Love International Students

I did not realize it until recently, but we get paid a nice bonus for grading the final exams of our international students. I had two international students in my class. Both of them did quite well. When I turned in the marking sheet with their grades into the International Programs Office today I just had to sign two forms and they gave me 50 cedis in cash. That is not bad at all.

Classes

We had a department meeting today. Among the items on the agenda were class assignments for next year. Nobody has more than two classes to teach each semester. Since we get paid a straight salary rather than on a per class basis,  I am very pleased with this teaching load.

Comments

I am pretty sure this blog has the fewest number of comments per a reader of any blog in the history of the Internet. I am not exactly sure why. Is it because nothing I write is interesting enough to comment on?

Grading Final Exams

I have 27 more final exams left to grade. I got through a big pile last night. I am definitely going to try and finish them all this week.

Today

Today I learned that Pizza Inn makes lousy pizza. I had been craving pizza for days and decided to try the South African based chain since the burger at the related Chicken Inn is not bad. I am sorry that I did. The pizza crust was flavorless and as far as I could tell there was no sauce on it.

Today I also learned that Ghana has delicious avocados. I should have just skipped the pizza and gone for the avocados. For the price of a medium pizza and coke I could have bought 10 large avocados.

Thoughts on the end of the semester

My first semester at the University of Ghana went pretty fast. I still have exams to grade, but I should be finished before the end of next week. The British style set up of one lecture a week and one or two tests a semester for each class is a lot less work intensive for instructors than the American system. It appears that it also may be more effective in getting students to learn. They have to do the assigned reading if they want to pass the class.

It is now raining on an almost daily basis. Thankfully, I have not seen many mosquitoes come out yet. Since most students are done with their exams, a lot of them are leaving campus. Every day there seems to be a constant exodus of students for the summer break.

Since I taught a 400 level class full of final year students I will probably not see most of my former students again. They will be going on to do other things. But, I am pretty confident that they left my class with more knowledge than they had in January.

Is there a Neo-Colonialism?

If colonialism is primarily a system of economic exploitation rather than political domination then the creation of independent states does not necessarily end colonial relationships. The situation of continuing colonial economic relationships between former colonies and European powers like the UK and France is generally referred to as neocolonialism. This relationship is characterized by the export of raw materials to the former colonizing powers in Europe and the importation of finished goods from those same countries. Yet, without any political control to enforce this relationship I fail to see how it is truly colonial. A lot of former colonies in Asia have managed to move away from such trade patterns first by engaging in import substitution and then the export of manufactured goods. A move away from the export of raw materials to the use of those materials to produce finished goods is certainly also possible in Africa. There already is a lot more manufacturing in Africa than I think most people outside the continent realize.

Grading Exams

I have now graded 15 out of 85 final exams. Most of them are pretty good. I have not come across any that were absolutely horrible yet.

Rain

Today it rained really hard. But, I managed to avoid getting soaked. Fortunately, the few times I needed to go out, the rain had relented.

Africa Unity Day and the Decline of Pan-Africanism

Tomorrow is Africa Unity Day. But, the university has scheduled my exam on that morning. I know that the university would not schedule an exam on certain other holidays such as Christmas. Indeed my lecture on Good Friday was cancelled due to the holiday. So I am wondering if the fact that my exam is on Africa Unity Day is indicative of the general decline in recent decades of Pan-Africanism as an ideology with an actual goal rather than just something people give lip service to?

Given the success of the European Union, a lot of aspects of Pan-Africanism would appear to be quite beneficial not only to Africans, but other people as well. An African version of a Schengen visa for instance would make travel easier for people from outside Africa as well as increasing tourist revenue for African countries. The costs of goods would also decrease within Africa as it became cheaper to move them within Africa due to the elimination of trade barriers. Yet, despite the benefits of greater economic cooperation, the ideology of Pan-Africanism seems to have declined in direct proportion to the rise of Pan-Europeanism in the form of the EU during the last fifty years.

I do not think political unification of Africa was ever a realistic goal. The continent is too large and diverse. But, there certainly could be a lot more unity than there is currently. A lot of artificial barriers to the movement of people and goods still exist in Africa. A greater commitment to actually realizing Pan-African goals could substantially reduce these barriers.

Tomorrow

Tomorrow my students take their final exam. I hope I can get all 85 of them graded before Monday. Then I am officially done with the semester. I do not teach again until August.

Gender, Geography, and Genre

I have noticed that a lot of the mystery writers I have been reading lately are both women and write about the US South. The success of women mystery writers using the South as a setting seems to have taken off some time in the 1990s. But, it does seem odd that so many mysteries written in the last two decades take place in the former Confederate states. The Midwest in contrast is greatly underrepresented.

Progress

I finally feel I have made real head way in taking care of what should be rather routine matters, but caused me great difficulty. Now that those problems are solved, I can look forward to grading final exams on Wednesday. After I finish grading the exams I will be done for the semester.

Daily Life in Ghana

To be honest I never thought until recently that I would live and work in Africa. But, as I have noted the experience has been very positive in a number of ways. I will say that life here in Ghana is a lot more similar to that in the US than I would have thought several years ago. Globalization has made the technological basis of life similar across formerly very dissimilar countries. When combined with the fact the official language here is English, Ghana has not been a really great culture shock for me. I have not encountered anything that strikes me as really strange here. Mostly the people here are polite, friendly and helpful. That is not always the case in the US.  But,daily life here is not radically different from that in the US.