The Fate of Africa (gnv64) torrent

The Fate of Africa: A History of the Continent Since Independence (Revised & Updated)
by Martin Meredith
PublicAffairs | 2011 | ISBN: 1610390717 | English | 816 pages | ePUB/PDF | 3/13.2 mb
http://www.amazon.com/The-Fate-Africa-Continent-Independence/dp/B006PDS9X6
PDF conversion is mine.

The value of Meredith's towering history of modern Africa rests not so much in its incisive analysis, or its original insights; it is the sheer readability of the project, combined with a notable lack of pedantry, that makes it one of the decade's most important works on Africa. Spanning the entire continent, and covering the major upheavals more or less chronologically—from the promising era of independence to the most recent spate of infamies (Rwanda, Darfur, Zimbabwe, Liberia, Sierra Leone)—Meredith (In the Name of Apartheid) brings us on a journey that is as illuminating as it is grueling. The best chapters, not surprisingly, deal with the countries that Meredith knows intimately: South Africa and Zimbabwe; he is less convincing when discussing the francophone West African states. Nowhere is Meredith more effective than when he gives free rein to his biographer's instincts, carefully building up the heroic foundations of national monuments like Nasser, Nkrumah, and Haile Selassie—only to thoroughly demolish those selfsame mythical edifices in later chapters. In an early chapter dealing with Biafra and the Nigerian civil war, Meredith paints a truly horrifying picture, where opportunities are invariably squandered, and ethnically motivated killings and predatory opportunism combine to create an infernal downward spiral of suffering and mayhem (which Western intervention only serves to aggravate). His point is simply that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely—which is why the rare exceptions to that rule (Senghor and Mandela chief among them) are all the more remarkable. Whether or not his pessimism about the continent's future is fully warranted, Meredith's history provides a gripping digest of the endemic woes confronting the cradle of humanity.

Table of Contents
PART I
Chapter 1 - THE GOLD COAST EXPERIMENT
Chapter 2 - REVOLT ON THE NILE
Chapter 3 - LAND OF THE SETTING SUN
Chapter 4 - L ' AFRIQUE NOIRE
Chapter 5 - WINDS OF CHANGE
Chapter 6 - HEART OF DARKNESS
Chapter 7 - THE WHITE SOUTH
PART II
Chapter 8 - THE BIRTH OF NATIONS
Chapter 9 - THE FIRST DANCE OF FREEDOM
Chapter 10 - FEET OF CLAY
Chapter 11 - A HOUSE DIVIDED
Chapter 12 - DEATH OF AN EMPEROR
Chapter 13 - THE COMING OF TYRANTS
Chapter 14 - IN SEARCH OF UJAMAA
Chapter 15 - THE PASSING OF THE OLD GUARD
Chapter 16 - THE SLIPPERY SLOPE
Chapter 17 - THE GREAT PLUNDERER
Chapter 18 - WHITE DOMINOES
PART III
Chapter 19 - RED TEARS
Chapter 20 - FAULT LINES
Chapter 21 - THE SCOURGE OF AIDS
Chapter 22 - THE LOST DECADE
Chapter 23 - THE STRUGGLE FOR DEMOCRACY
Chapter 24 - A TIME OF TRIUMPH
PART IV
Chapter 25 - IN THE NAME OF THE PROPHET
Chapter 26 - BLACK HAWK DOWN
Chapter 27 - THE GRAVES ARE NOT YET FULL
Chapter 28 - WHERE VULTURES FLY
Chapter 29 - BLOOD DIAMONDS
Chapter 30 - NO CONDITION IS PERMANENT
Chapter 31 - THE HONOUR OF LIVING
Chapter 32 - BLACK GOLD
Chapter 33 - A DEGREE IN VIOLENCE
Chapter 34 - SOMEWHERE OVER THE RAINBOW
Chapter 35 - OUT OF AFRICA
CHAPTER NOTES
SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
INDEX