Geopolitical Transition and State Formation: The Changing Political Geographies of Angola, Mozambique and Namibia

Journal of Southern African Studies

Volumn 19, Issue 1, 1993, Pages 6-28

  Sidaway, James D ^a   Simon, David ^b  

^a UNIVERSITY OF READING   (United Kingdom)

^b UNIVERSITY OF LONDON   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

DEVELOPING COUNTRY; GEOPOLITICAL TRANSITION; GEOPOLITICS; IDEOLOGY; POLITICAL GEOGRAPHY; RESTRUCTURING PROCESS; STATE FORMATION; TERRITORIAL ORGANISATION; TERRITORIAL REORGANISATION; WHITE MINORITY RULE;

ANGOLA; MOZAMBIQUE; NAMIBIA;

EID: 0027470256     PISSN: 03057070     EISSN: 14653893     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/03057079308708344     Document Type: Article

References (46)

1. The authors would like to thank all of the people in Mozambique and Namibia who offered advice and information on the themes of this paper. Heather Browning, Justin Jacyno and Judith Fox drew the maps, while Lillian Wong's assistance in tracing details on Angola is gratefully acknowledged. The responsibility for any inaccuracies, however, rests with the authors.
2. David Simon, ‘The Ties That Bind: Decolonisation and Neo-Colonialism in Southern Africa‘, in Chris Dixon and Mike Heffernan (eds.), Colonialism and Development in the Contemporary World (London, 1991), pp. 21-45; David Simon, ‘Independent Namibia One Year On‘, Conflict Studies No. 239, Research Institute for the Study of Conflict and Terrorism (London, 1991).
3. The concept of a geopolitical transition is elaborated in Peter Taylor, Britain and the Cold War; 1945 as Geopolitical Transition (London, 1990). Recognising that geopolitics is a social and historical construct, Taylor defines a geopolitical transition as a simultaneous change in geopolitical code and geopolitical world order. Reduced to its basics a ‘geopolitical code is the operational code that a government uses to make sense of the world; in short, ‘the political geography assumptions informing foreign policy’ (p. 13). A geopolitical world order is the overreaching framework - ‘the relatively stable organisations of the world that come to be generally accepted as the way in which the world works’ (p. 17) - within which particular governments devise operational codes. A geopolitical transition also involves a fundamental re-evaluation of places as ‘security commodities’ accompanied by mass changes in the images of ‘other’ places. In this paper we are able to explore only some of the elements of these themes, and the concept of a geopolitical transition deserves further development in a southern Africa context.
4. See James D. Sidaway and David Simon, ‘Spatial Policies and Uneven Development in the “Marxist-Leninist” States of the Third World‘, in David Simon (ed.), Third World Regional Development: A Reappraisal (London, 1990), pp. 24-38.
5. Simon, ‘Independent Namibia One Year On'; B. Wood, ‘Preventing the Vacuum: Determinants of the Namibia Settlement‘, Journal of Southern African Studies, 17, 4 (1991), pp. 742-763.
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13. Ibid, pp. 9-10.
14. Quoted in Somerville, Angola, Politics, Economics And Society, p. 167.
15. Financial Times, 28 November 1988.
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19. Financial Times, Survey, ‘Angola‘, p. 3.
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27. Robert H. Jackson, Quasi-States: Sovereignty, International Relations and the Third World (Cambridge, 1990); Robert H. Jackson, and Carl G. Rosberg, “Why Africa's Weak States Persist: The Empirical And The Juridical In Statehood‘, World Politics, 35, 1 (1982), pp. 1-25.
28. James D. Sidaway, ‘Mozambique: Destabilisation, State, Society and Space‘.
29. Direcao Nacional de Geografia e Cadastro, Divisao Territorial (Maputo, 1986); James D. Sidaway, ‘Contested Terrain: Transformation And Continuity Of The Territorial Organisation In Post-Independence Mozambique‘, Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie (Amsterdam), 82, 5 (1991), pp. 367-376.
30. For details of these alterations see Fernando Pillao, Mocambique, Evolugdo da Toponimia e da Divisao Territorial 1974-1987 (Maputo, 1989).
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33. Republic of Namibia, Government Gazette, 338, 8 April 1992.
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36. Republic of Namibia, ‘Constitution of the Republic of Namibia‘, Government Gazette 1, 21 March 1990.
37. Republic of Namibia, Government Gazette, 469, 470 and 471, 31 August 1992.
38. Republic of Namibia, Report by the First Delimitation Commission of Namibia on the Determination of Regions, Constituencies and Local Authorities (1991). One of the present authors (David Simon) served as the specialist advisor to the Commission.
39. Republic of Namibia, Government Gazette, 368, 3 March 1992.
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45. Otto Roesch, ‘Renamo and the Peasantry in Southern Mozambique: A View from Gaza Province‘, paper presented to the symposium, Mozambique: Contemporary Issues and Current Research, Oxford University, 23 February 1991.
46. ‘Genesis of the Third Force’ Africa Confidential (London), 32, 9 (1991); Independent (London), 11 June 1991.