British Courts Martial in North Africa, 1940-3

This article seeks to demonstrate that the exemplary aspectof military law was applied in courts martial cases in NorthAfrica between 1940 and 1943. It will show that there was aclear desire to make examples, which coincided with the preoccupationsof the High Command concerning the state of discipline and moralewithin the British Eighth Army. The article will reveal thatAuchinleck, Montgomery, and Alexander shared many common ideason discipline and morale, but that their concerns often overstatedthe scale of the supposed problem. These fears created an atmospherein which the details of individual cases were often overriddenin the name of discipline and military efficiency. Paradoxically,such an attitude only added to the High Command’s concerns,for by ensuring a high level of convictions, the outcomes ofcourts martial appeared to confirm the validity of its views.     

Brutes, beasts and empire: veterinary medicine and environmental policy in French North Africa and British India

The deep, and persistent, colonial roots of many contemporary environmental policies around the world have been increasingly recognized over the last decade. Research in the sectors of agriculture, forestry, human medicine, and public health has illuminated how environmental policies were constructed and utilized during the colonial period, as well as how many of these policies remain influential today. This paper examines the as yet little explored contribution of colonial veterinary medicine to the development and implementation of environmental policy. By comparing the experiences of the French in North Africa and the British in India, it demonstrates that some colonial veterinarians had a great deal of influence on environmental policy while others had very little. In French North Africa veterinarians played a significant role in developing rangeland management policies that impacted large swaths of these three territories, policies that can still be felt today. In British India, by contrast, the role of colonial veterinarians in developing environmental policy was much more circumscribed and, in the end, largely inconsequential. The paper suggests that three primary factors account for most of this dissimilarity: the differences in animal diseases present in India and the Maghreb; the differences between French and British veterinary education before the twentieth century; and the differences in colonial administration between the two European powers.     

Political dynamics in North Africa

North Africa is notable for the remarkable stability of its political systems despite the increasingly hostile social and economic environment in which they operate. In part this results from their current security engagement with Europe but more important, perhaps, is the shared political culture that informs them despite the great differences between them and their failure to fulfill the principles upon which they were, for the most part, founded. This is, in part, typified by the very similar mechanisms they have each developed to ensure political continuity, based either on monarchical succession or dynastic republicanism. It is less clear, however, that they will be able to resist the most recent challenges arising from Islamist social movements, although the new political dispensations that might emerge may not be so very different from their predecessors.     

The transition of British Africa

At the turn of the century British literary historians and critics, such as Geikie, Sharp, and Thomas, studied the influence of environment on the works of novelists and poets. In particular, the concepts of literary geographers and a writer's country were developed. Earlier deterministic approaches have been modified and more recent studies by Drabble, O'Brien and Pocock have looked at the totality of influences of place on the work of various writers.     

North Africa between Christians and Arabs

Vandals, Romans and Berbers. New Perspectives on Late Antique North Africa. Edited by Andy H. Merrills (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2004), xv + 347 pp. £55.00 cloth.     

Introduction: North Africa and Britain

This special issue of International Affairs seeks to stimulate more debate and interest in Britain on North Africa. This relatively neglected area of British foreign policy has largely been funneled through the European Union (EU), where the focus of policy has been on preventive security, above all policing against illegal migration and the spread of radicalism and terrorism. The main driver for regional change and potential insecurity is now demographic, evident in the high levels of youth unemployment across North Africa. In facing the challenge of leadership successions over the next decade, it is in the interest of the EU, and in turn, Britain, to engage more closely with North Africa's younger generations to ensure the region's longer term security and stability. Britain has few strong bilateral links with North African societies, however, with the exception of private sector investments in the energy sector and security cooperation. New investment opportunities and a demand for English language and other forms of training for employment could put Britain at an advantage in responding to North African demands for diversified international relationships. A greater focus is also needed on local development opportunities to assist new actors to assume their own economic and political roles, as a better means of delivering security and jobs than relying on central states to deliver both. The articles in this special issue offer new insights into developments in the region, as well as analyses of European and American policy responses to the challenges identified. A common theme is that the region has been held back by a combined lack of institutional safeguards and political participation, with negative impacts on the spread of the economic benefits of higher growth rates and investment. Authoritarian leaderships have proved reliable partners for the EU and Britain in the past, but will they continue to do so in future?     

The commercial possibilities of British Central Africa

EUROPE.

Hawick and the Border. By the late E. S. Craig, Advocate. Edited by the Rev. James Wotherspoon. Hawick: W. and J. Kennedy, 1927. Price 25s.

Wild Drumalbain, or The Road to Meggernie and Glen Coe. By Alasdair Alpin MacGregor. London : W. and K. Chambers Ltd., 1927. Price 7s. 6d.

A Highland Parish: A History of Fortingall. By Alexander Stewart. With a Foreword by Professor W. J. Watson. Glasgow: Alex. MacLaren and Sons, 1928. Price 10s. 6d.

Spain from the South. By J. B. Trench. London : Methuen and Co. Ltd., 1928. Price 10s. 6d.

Marching Spain. By Mr. V. S. Pritchett. London: Ernest Benn Ltd., 1928. Price 10s. 6d.

Pass‐Staaten in den Alpen. Albrecht Haushofer. Berlin‐Grunewald: Kurt Vowinckel, 1928. Preis M 10.

Italy from End to End. By H. Warner Allen. London : Methuen and Co. Ltd., 1927. Price 10s. 6d.

ASIA.

Humanity and Labour in China. By Adelaide Mary Anderson, D.B.E., M.A. London: Student Christian Movement, 1927. Price 10s. 6d. net.

Sketches of Vanishing China. By Arthur H. Heath. London: Thornton Butterworth Ltd., 1927. Price 30s. net.

The British Connection with India. By K. T. Paul. Student Christian Movement, 1927. Price 5s.

The Ordinary Man's India. By A. Claude Brown, M.B.E. London: Cecil Palmer, 1927. Price 10s. 6d.

A Tour in Southern Asia. By Horace Bleackley. London: John Lane, The Bodley Head Ltd., 1928. Price 12s. 6d.

Magic Ladakh: An Intimate Picture of a Land of Topsy‐Turvy Customs and Great Natural Beauty. By “Ganpat” (Major M. L. A. Gompertz, 10th Baluch Regiment, Indian Army), author of The Road to Lamaland, Harilek, The Voice of Dashin, etc. London : Seeley, Service and Co. Ltd., 1928. Price 21s. net.

AFRICA.

Kenya from Within: A Short Political History. By W. M'Gregor Ross, B.A., M.Sc., B.E., M.Inst. C.E., sometime Assistant Engineer, Uganda Railway Construction, 1900; Director of Public Works, East Africa Protectorate (later Kenya Colony), 1905–1923; also Member of Legislative Council, 1916–1922. London : George Allen and Unwin Ltd., 1927. Price 18s. net.

The Black Journey. By Georges‐Marie Haardt and Louis Audouin‐Ddbreuil. London : Geoffrey Bles, 1928. Price 16s.

Nigeria under British Rule. By Sir W. N. Geary, Bart. London: Methuen and Co. Ltd., 1927. Price 16s. net.

A History of South Africa. By Professor Eric A. Walker. London: Longmans, Green and Co. Price 12s. 6d. net.

On the Trail of the Veiled Tuareg. By Dugald Campbell, F.R.A.I., author of In the Heart of Bantuland. London: Seeley, Service and Co., 1928. Price 21s. net.

AMERICA.

A Wayfarer in the West Indies. By Algernon Aspinall, C.M.G. London: Methuen and Co. Ltd., 1927. Price 7s. 6d.

To the Foot of the Rainbow. By Clyde Kluckhohn. London: Eveleigh Nash and Grayson Ltd., 1928. Price 12s. 6d.

Old Trails and Roads in Perm's Land. By John T. Faris. London: J. B. Lippincott Co., 1927. Price 25s. net.

The South American Handbook, 1928. Edited by J. A. Hunter. London: South American Publications Ltd. Price 2s. 6d. net.

AUSTRALIA.

Adventures in the Big Bush. By Cyril Grant Lane. London: Hutchinson and Co., 1928. Price 18s.

POLAR.

Etah and Beyond; or, Life within Twelve Degrees of the Pole. By D. B. Macmillan. London: Chapman and Hall Ltd., 1928. Price 21s. net.

Antarctica: A Treatise ore the Southern Continent. By J. Gordon Hayes. London : The Richards Press, 1928. Price £2, 2s. net.

GENERAL.

Peoples and Problems of the Pacific. By J. Macmillan Brown. 2 vols. London: Ernest Brown, 1927. Price 50s. net.

The Human Habitat. By Ellsworth Huntington. London: Chapman and Hall Ltd., 1928. Price 15s.

The Voyage of the "Caroline” to Van Diemen's Land and Batavia in 1827–38. By Rosalie Hare. With additional chapters by Ida Lee. London: Longmans, Green and Co. Ltd., 1927. Price 15s.

Human Migration and the Future: A Study of the Causes, Effects, and Control of Emigration. By J. W. Gregory, F.R.S., D.Sc., Professor of Geology in the University of Glasgow. London : Seeley, Service and Co. Ltd., 1928. Price 12s. 6d. net.

Grenzen: In ihrer Geographischen und Politischen Bedeutung. Dr. Karl Haushofer. Berlin‐Grunewald : Kurt Vowinckel, 1927. Preis M. 18.

EDUCATIONAL.

An Introduction to Oceanography: With Special Reference to Geography and Geophysics. By James Johnstone, D.Sc. Second Edition, completely revised. London: Hodder and Stoughton Ltd., 1928. Price 15s. net.

Field Astronomy for Engineers and Surveyors. By David Clark, M.A., B.Sc. London: Constable and Co. Ltd., 1926. Price 10s. 6d. net.

Handbook of Commercial Geography. By Geo. G. Chisholm, M.A., B.Sc., Hon. LL.D. (Edin.). Eleventh edition, revised and edited by L. Dudley Stamp, D.Sc., B.A. (Lond.). London: Longmans, Green and Co. Ltd., 1928. Price 25s.

Maps, their History, Characteristics, and Uses. By Sir Herbert George Fordbam. Second Edition. Cambridge : University Press, 1927. Price 6s. net.     

British government policy in sub-Saharan Africa under New Labour

British government policy in Africa under Labour has been motivated by a combination of humanitarianism and self-interest. The policy has been shaped principally by the Department for International Development (DFID), but also by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) and by Prime Minister Tony Blair himself, as he has become more interested in Africa issues. The main focus of the policy has been on poverty reduction and development. The approach has been multi-dimensional, aiming to tackle the principal obstacles to development such as conflict, HIV, debt, governance and trade barriers. The UK has sought to increase its leverage in Africa by working multilaterally with its allies and through the UN, the World Bank and the EU. But the policy has been hampered by the inherent difficulty of promoting sound development policies in weak states, by a lack of UK leverage to affect change, and by a UK preference for statist solutions. Strategic and commercial objectives pursued by the FCO and the prime minister have sometimes appeared as being at odds with the developmental objectives of DFID. Post-9/11 concerns have reinforced the UK's motivation for dealing with Africa's problems, particularly the problems of weak and failed states. But western policies related to the war on terror may give rise to new contradictions and complicate the UK's developmental efforts in Africa.     

Modernising colonialism: The British Labour movement and Africa

The article evaluates the widely held view that the Attlee governments lacked a distinctive approach to colonial affairs by examining the Labour movement's post-war, institution building activities in Kenya. In Labour's colonial policy deliberations, Kenya was the focus of particular attention and is used as a case study to shed light on the Labour leadership's wider imperial concerns and objectives. From the 1920s, the Labour party advocated that the colonies be encouraged to develop trade unions, co-operatives and local government. Some tentative moves in this direction were made in 1930 by Ramsay MacDonald's administration but it was not until Labour came to power in 1945 that, in response to international pressure and the nationalist challenge, significant steps were taken to promote institutions which would organise the African masses. The argument advanced is that Labour leaders drew on their movement's historical traditions to encourage forms of African economic and political activism which were likely to stabilise colonial rule.     

Reformulating Identities: British Settlers in Early Nineteenth-Century South Africa

This paper examines the formation of a colonial identity among settlers from the British Isles who were relocated to the eastern frontier of the Cape Colony in 1820. It suggests that material aspirations united certain of the settlers in a political programme, and thus began the erosion of imported class (and other) divisions. However, it argues that their establishment as a capitalist colonial class is an insufficient explanation for their construction of a shared and emotive British settler identity. The settlers modified their inherited discourses of class, race, gender and nationality in order to forge solidarity, and the imperative for solidarity derived not so much from their mutual desire for accumulation, but from a corresponding collective insecurity. Not only were settlers afraid of Khoikhoi labour rebellion and Xhosa reprisals for land loss; they also feared abandonment by a seemingly unsympathetic metropole. Their aggressive capitalist endeavour, and collective fear of its destabilizing consequences, were two sides of the same coin, informing the development of a unifying social identity. The paper goes on to consider the mechanisms through which that identity was sustained, including acts of landscape representation, the textual generation of collective memory and the practice of communally binding, quotidian, gendered routines.     

Troubled Traditions: Female Adaptive Education in British Colonial Africa

This article examines African female education reform between the wars as a conjuncture of transnational philanthropic initiatives and state and missionary objectives on the ground. Through a comparative treatment of four schools in West, East and South-Central Africa, it shows that the search to recover and re-create the authentic African subject was a gendered process that aimed to critique one brand of colonialism (settler and industrial capitalism) by bolstering another (indirect rule). The schools at Achimota (Gold Coast), Kabete (Kenya), Hope Fountain (Southern Rhodesia) and Mbereshi (Northern Rhodesia) all idealised women’s traditional education as the key to offsetting the dangers of modernisation and preserving the integrity of the social body, and ‘adapted’ their curricula accordingly to their perception of women’s normative economic and social roles. However, the internal contradictions of this project stymied any possibility of implementing it in a cohesive way, and even its advocates and architects were often forced to admit the limits of tradition as a coherent logic or redemptive force. The gendered contours of adaptation, therefore, showed the potential of education to destabilise as much as to reinforce the shifting paradigms of the colonial project.