Teaching Comparative

Teaching about sovereignty

Blessing-Miles Tendi's op-ed piece from The Guardian on the politics of Zimbabwe and Africa would be a great tool for teaching about sovereignty.

Yes, you might have to add an explanatory introduction about British imperialism, diamonds, Cecil Rhodes, Rhodesia, ancient Zimbabwe, ZANU, Mugabe, and racism, but those are good things for students to learn about as well.



There's also a lesson about applying standards from one place (Europe) to another place (Africa). That might raise interesting questions about the universality of ideas like "human rights."

Why Africans keep quiet on Mugabe

"Western countries continue to express frustration at the reluctance of African states to present a united front against Robert Mugabe's undemocratic re-election as president of Zimbabwe.

"At the heart of this disappointment is a failure to appreciate that, in spite of Africa's elegantly worded declarations about espousing human rights and democracy, these ideals continue to be trumped by the principle of sovereignty.

"Modern African and European conceptions of sovereignty are influenced by different historical experiences. The determining historical experience of the former is external conquest, domination and exploitation at the hands of colonial forces. The formative experience of the latter is the second world war, in which untold destruction, along with the Holocaust, instigated grave shock and revulsion in the European psyche...

"For Africa, a lesson of the colonial experience is that if states do not safeguard their sovereignty, they risk falling prey to external forces of domination and exploitation...

"In addition to history, a key impediment to this evolution is western double standards. America ignores Uzbekistan's poor human rights record and Russia's atrocities in Chechnya because they are allies in its "war on terror", but imposes targeted sanctions on Zimbabwe..."

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Labels: concepts, pedagogy, sovereignty

posted by Ken Wedding @ 7:56 AM