The New Scramble for Africa

by Padraig R. Carmody

Overview

Once marginalized in the world economy, the past decade has seen Africa emerge as a major global supplier of crucial raw materials like oil, uranium and coltan. With its share of world trade and investment now rising and the availability of natural resources falling, the continent finds itself at the centre of a battle to gain access to and control of its valuable natural assets. China's role in Africa has loomed particularly large in recent years, but there is now a new scramble taking place involving a wider range of established and emerging economic powers from the EU and US to Japan, Brazil and Russia.

This book explores the nature of resource and market competition in Africa and the strategies adopted by the different actors involved - be they world powers or small companies. Focusing on key commodities, the book examines the dynamics of the new scramble and the impact of current investment and competition on people, the environment, and political and economic development on the continent. New theories, particularly the idea of Chinese "flexigemony" are developed to explain how resources and markets are accessed. While resource access is often the primary motive for increased engagement, the continent also offers a growing market for low-priced goods from Asia and Asian-owned companies. Individual chapters explore old and new economic power interests in Africa; oil, minerals, timber, biofuels, food and fisheries; and the nature and impacts of Asian investment in manufacturing and other sectors.

The New Scramble for Africa will be essential reading for students of African studies, international relations, and resource politics as well as anyone interested in current affairs.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780745637525
Publisher:	Polity Press
Publication date:	04/26/2013
Sold by:	JOHN WILEY & SONS
Format:	eBook
Pages:	246
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

Padraig Carmody is Senior Lecturer in Geography at Trinity College Dublin.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: The New Scramble, Geography and Development.

Chapter 2: Old Economic Power Resource Interests and Strategies in Africa.

Chapter 3: New Economic Power Resource Interests and Strategies in Africa.

Chapter 4: Driving the Global Economy: West African and Sahelian Oil.

Chapter 5: Minerals: Powering, Connecting and Wiring the Globe: From Uranium to Coltan.

Chapter 6: Furnishing and Feeding the World? Timber, Biofuels, Food and Fisheries.

Chapter 7: Markets and The Embedding of Asian Investment: Evidence from Zambia.

Chapter 8: Can African Unscramble the Continent?

Editorial Reviews

Winner of the Geographical Society of Ireland's Book of the Year Award

"Essential to observers of Africa's politics and international relations."
Global Journal

"Carmody’s skill is not merely in his assiduous efforts to pool a huge array of information, but also in not getting carried away with political rhetoric. Everything here is backed up with statistical data and from numerous, wide-ranging sources.  Though fact-heavy, The New Scramble for Africa is a remarkably accessible work on economic development."
The Ecologist

"The single most useful book I have ever read about the continent."
Metro Eirann

"Carmody's tone is not moralistic. Just a procession of facts and conclusions. A cataract of catastrophe. What Pakenham does for literature, Carmody achieves in scholarship."
Irish Examiner

"A must-read for anyone responsible for formulating strategy for organisations aiming to impact Africa, in order to understand the impact of the current forces at work, which need to be taken into  consideration to formulate a well-grounded response to the challenges Africa is facing today."
Development in Practice

"A seminal study of the nature of resource and market competition in Africa."
African Business

"An excellent reference source for those interested in understanding the new scramble."
Africa Studies Quarterly

"A well-informed, nuanced and empirically rich contribution based on an impressive body of material. At the same time, the book is well structured and accessible even for non-specialists on the region."
Regional Studies

"A rare and nuanced examination. It skillfully handles the complex history and theories of Africa’s underdevelopment and provides much guidance to scholars and advocates wishing to have a deeper, critical understanding of the challenges African states will confront in this century."
Global Environmental Politics

"Carmody argues forcefully that the current trends evoke the late-nineteenth-century scramble for Africa, during which a handful of European powers carved up the continent in pursuit of its natural resources, and his book is full of arresting anecdotes and provocative claims about the nature of the competition."
Foreign Affairs

"Useful resource, particularly for undergraduate students wishing to gain an accessible and empirically rich introduction to key themes surrounding Africa’s external relations with both eastern and western 'partners'."
International Affairs

"A very illuminating insight into imperialism's second scramble for Africa."
Permanent Revolution

"A timely book that deserves to be read by a broad audience of Africanists. It successfully captures the major challenges resulting from the deepening engagement of foreign actors on African grounds."
Progress in Human Geography

 "Carmody provides an intelligent and readable insight into a complex and rapidly changing subject. By working through specific resources, and by including a wide spectrum of western and non-western actors, he is able to set out a nuanced and detailed analysis of these dynamic relations. This is an essential text for anyone seeking to get to grips with the 'new scramble for Africa'."
Emma Mawdsley, Newnham College, Cambridge

"Pádraig Carmody's insightful volume challenges the orthodoxies of 'new' economic geography to point to the salience of power and politics in the new scramble for Africa. The book is a very readable welcome addition to the literature from one of geography's foremost scholars of African development."
Howard Stein, University of Michigan

"Carmody's book on accumulation and power in Africa is amongst the most nuanced and most persuasive I've read. Given recent Asian-African dynamics, this is a crucial time for a new overview of the Scramble."
Patrick Bond, University of KwaZulu-Natal School of Development Studies

From the Publisher