Abstract:
Every so often African leaders and thinkers rediscover and reaffirm a future invoked by all sorts of names of hope and redemption: the African revolution, reawakening, reconstruction, rebirth, regeneration, renewal, resurrection, revival, and renaissance. These proclamations are part political propaganda, part cultural puffery, part collective prayer for new beginnings, for Africa's cruel history to pause and change course. They express a long, recurrent yearning for a usable future. This ache lies deep in the consciousness of a people with painful memories of suffering, struggle and survival. It is simultaneously a cry of anguish and a call to arms, a declaration of both panic and purpose, a desperate and determined battle to reclaim Africa's history and humanity, a desire for an Africanized modernity. Each generation articulates this poignant, perpetual dream in its way, reflecting no doubt the weight of the historical moment as manifested in the identification and location of the dominant challenges and possibilities.
