Queen Elizabeth II and the Africans

Narrating Decolonization, Postwar Commonwealth, and Africa's Development, 1947 - 2022
Erscheinungsjahr 2024
ISBN: 978-94-6270-434-3
Verlag: Leuven University Press

Buch, Englisch, 270 Seiten, Format (B × H): 156 mm x 234 mm, Gewicht: 386 g

First book-length study by an African writer that incorporates the trials and triumphs of Queen Elizabeth II, tracing her contributions to African affairs

The road to Queen Elizabeth II’s implementation of African reforms was rough, especially in the first two decades following her ascension to the throne. In this book, Raphael Chijioke Njoku examines Queen Elizabeth II's role in the African decolonization trajectories and the postcolonial state's quest for genuine political and economic liberation since 1947. By locating Elizabeth at the center of Anglophone Africa's independence agitations, the account harnesses the African interests to tease out the monarch's dilemma of complying with Whitehall's decolonization schemes while building an inclusive and unified Commonwealth in which Africans could play a vital role. Njoku argues that to gratify British lawmakers in her complex and marginal place within the British parliamentary system of conservative versus reformist, Elizabeth’s contribution fell short of African nationalists’ expectations on account of her silence and inaction during the African decolonization raptures. Yet ultimately, the author concludes, she helped build an inclusive and unified organization in which Africans could assert and appropriate political and economic autarky.

This publication is GPRC-labeled (Guaranteed Peer-Reviewed Content).

This book will be made open access within three years of publication thanks to Path to Open, a program developed in partnership between JSTOR, the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS), University of Michigan Press, and The University of North Carolina Press to bring about equitable access and impact for the entire scholarly community, including authors, researchers, libraries, and university presses around the world. Learn more at https://about.jstor.org/path-to-open/

Autoren/Hrsg.

Chijioke Njoku, Raphael

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Weltgeschichte & Geschichte einzelner Länder und Gebietsräume Geschichte einzelner Länder Afrikanische Geschichte
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Geschichtliche Themen Postkoloniale Geschichte, Nationale Befreiung und Unabhängigkeit

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Preface

Abbreviations

Introduction

Chapter 1—The House of Windsor: African Subjects and the Princess-Queen

Chapter 2—Deconstructing the 1947 Cape Town Speech: Decolonization Rhetoric and the Commonwealth

Chapter 3—The Cold War: African “Radicals” and Her Royal Stateliness, 1953–1961

Chapter 4—Her Majesty’s Africa Tour-De-Force: Feasting with the Obedient, the Noble, and the Nonconformist, 1961–1989

Chapter 5—Majestic Milestones: The Commonwealth and Africa’s Development

Chapter 6—King Charles III and Africa’s Commonwealth Future

Conclusion

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Über Autor(innen)

Chijioke Njoku, Raphael
Raphael Chijioke Njoku, PhD, is an African history and global studies professor at Idaho State University.