Editorial from ROAPE Volume 19 Number 53
African Jigsaw

In 1991 ROAPE addressed the key issues confronting Africa: its place in ‘the new world order’ ; the struggle for resources; its dialogue with various fundamentalisms; and - running through them all - the search for democratic solutions to its development crisis. In our first editorial of 1991 we took stock of the dramatic changes sweeping the global political economy and their significance for Africa. We discussed the implications of the ending of the cold war at a time of deepening recession and continued restructuring. We considered the implications of approaches to world events in the US, Japan and Europe and the consequences of the collapse of stalinism an eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. Most of these changes, we argued, posed serious challenges - and many dangers - to Africa struggling to cope with debt, economic decline and political crises.