THE CURSE OF BERLIN, Africa after the cold war

414 pp., paperback, Pietermaritzburg, 2010

Preface by Ali Mazrui.

Adekeye Adebajo focuses on Africa's quest for security, leadership and unity, with chapters on Africa's security institutions, the roles played by South Africa, Nigeria, China, France and the USA, and the significance of Nelson Mandela, Cecil Rhodes, Thabo Mbeki, Kwame Nkrumah, Barack Obama, and Mahatma Ghandi.

"...an intellectually and morally courageous analysis of Africa's place in the world, a tracing of its traumatic history, not to bemoan it, but to understand where Africa has come from, to appreciate where it is at present, and to shed light on where it is headed." Professor Francis M.Deng, UN Special Adviser on the Prevention on Genocide

"This superbly written and ambitiously conceived work takes us through the last two decades of Africa's international relations with critical acumen. With an unusual eye for both the big historical picture and the telling detail, this eloquent study is full of relevance for understanding the continent's current predicament." Dr Ricardo Soares de Oliviera, Oxford Univerity

Adekeye Adebajo has been Executive Director of the Centre for Conflict Resolution (CCR), Cape Town, since 2003. His other books include "South Africa in Africa" and "From Global Apartheid to Global Village: Africa and the United Nations".