Melber, Henning. The Rise of Africa’s Middle Class: Myths, Realities and Critical Engagements. 1st ed. Vol. 10. Uppsala; London: Zed Books, 2016. https://doi.org/10.5040/9781350251168.

Across Africa, a burgeoning middle class has become the poster child for the 'Africa rising' narrative. Ambitious, aspirational and increasingly affluent, this group is said to embody the values and hopes of the new Africa, with international bodies ranging from the United Nations Development Programme to the World Bank regarding them as important agents of both economic development and democratic change. This narrative, however, obscures the complex and often ambiguous role that this group actually plays in African societies. Bringing together economists, political scientists, anthropologists and development experts, and spanning a variety of case studies from across the continent, this collection provides a much-needed corrective to the received wisdom within development circles, and provides a fresh perspective on social transformations in contemporary Africa.

Source: Book description

Melchiorre, Luke. “Generational Populism and the Political Rise of Robert Kyagulanyi – Aka Bobi Wine – in Uganda.” Review of African Political Economy, August 22, 2023, 1–22. https://doi.org/10.1080/03056244.2023.2245729.

This article analyses the political rise of the Ugandan opposition leader, Robert Kyagulanyi, aka Bobi Wine, arguing that he has a deployed a novel type of generational populism – a mobilising political discourse which frames the struggle between ‘the people’ and ‘the elite’ in generational terms, defining the former in relation to their status as youth, and in antagonistic opposition to an elite, which is depicted as defending a gerontocratic political order. At a theoretical level, the article broadens political science’s conception of populism, by introducing a new subtype of the political phenomenon which demonstrates the importance of intergenerational dynamics in the construction of the discursive categories of ‘the people’ and ‘the elite’. While it argues that Kyagulanyi’s success demonstrates the potential of populism in African countries to electorally challenge incumbent regimes, by helping to build political coalitions across ethno-regional lines, incorporating previously excluded social groups into the political process, it concludes by stressing that Kyagulanyi’s political project has failed to offer any real ideological alternative to the neoliberal orthodoxy that has characterised President Museveni’s Uganda over the last four decades.

Source: Article abstract (tandfonline.com)

Meneses, Maria Paula. “Singing Struggles, Affirming Politics: Mozambique’s Revolutionary Songs as Other Ways of Being (in) History”. In Mozambique on the Move: Challenges and Reflections edited by Sheila Khan, Maria Paula Meneses, Bjørn Enge Bertelsen, 254–278. Brill 2019.

Music is a fundamental mode of political expression and a political enactment. In the early years of independent Mozambique, revolutionary songs, broadcasted by the leading nationalist force, FRELIMO, became a significant part of developing a new sense of belonging to an alternative political project, of becoming Mozambique.

[Source: Chapter abstract as culled from researchgate.net].

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Mershon, Carol. "What effect do local political elites have on infant and child death? Elected and chiefly authority in South Africa." Social Science & Medicine 251(2020): 112902.

Mershon argues that traditional authority has local power and the potential to affect public goods. She questions how electoral pressure and chiefly authority affect social welfare by examining the response of traditional authority in supplying public goods such as pipe born water and sanitation services in South Africa as political elites invest and implement public goods and service delivery. The fact that political elites can determine where and who gets access to drinking water for example, gives room for political manipulation. As more and more African countries seek to grow their democracies, traditional leaders who are mostly unelected elites also serve as vote brokers for party politicians and in turn get to control the provision of public goods in their communities. Mershon describes the relationship between the African ‘local’ voters and their chiefs as complex, based on reciprocity and to some extent, exploitation. In Mershon’s study she finds out that the majority of black African households in S.A were more likely to face child or infant mortality under the age of five. Where the chiefs are strong(influential,) the mortality rate was much lower. Also, households in districts where voter turnout was high, had a relatively lower probability of infant and child death. Most significantly, her study showed that where the ANC party dominance coincides with strong chiefly authority, voter turnout rises and thereby reduces the likelihood of infant and child deaths.

Meschac Gaba

Artist (Painting)

Location: Benin

instagram.com/meschacgaba/?hl=en

Meyer, Laure. Art and Craft in Africa: Everyday Life, Ritual, Court Art. Paris: Editions Terrail, 1995.

The beautiful African objects presented in this book bear witness to the diverse esthetic and technical accomplishments of more than 100 African tribes, revealing the innate beauty of simple objects such as bowls, baskets, and masks, plus elaborate examples of weaponry, textiles, beadwork, and jewelry.

[Source: Google Books].

Ifan Ifeanyi Michael

Filmmaker

Location: Nigeria

instagram.com/thinkifan/?hl=en

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Mistry, Jyoti, Antje Schuhmann, Katharina von Ruckteschell, Max Annas, Tsitsi Dangarembga, Jihan El-Tahri, Beti Ellerson, Taghreed Elsanhouri, Henriette Gunkel, and Katarina Hedrén, eds. Gaze Regimes: Film and Feminism in Africa. Johannesburg: Wits University Press, 2015.

Gaze Regimes is a bricolage of essays and interviews showcasing the experiences of women working in film, either directly as practitioners or in other areas as curators, festival programme directors or fundraisers. It does not shy away from questioning the relations of power in the practice of filmmaking and the power invested in the gaze itself. Who is looking and who is being looked at, who is telling women’s stories in Africa and what governs the mechanics of making those films on the continent? The interviews with film practitioners such as Tsitsi Dangarembga, Taghreed Elsanhouri, Jihan El-Tahri, Anita Khanna, Isabel Noronhe, Arya Lalloo and Shannon Walsh demonstrate the contradictory points of departure of women in film – from their understanding of feminisms in relation to lived-experiences and the realpolitik of women working as cultural practitioners. The disciplines of gender studies, postcolonial theory, and film theory provide the framework for the book’s essays. The contributors who provide valuable context, analysis and insight into, among other things, the politics of representation, the role of film festivals and the collective and individual experiences of trauma and marginality which contribute to the layered and complex filmic responses of Africa’s film practitioners.

[Source: Wits University Press].