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Jean-Michel Severino and Olivier Ray. 2012. Africa's Moment. David Fernbach (transl.). Malden, MA: Polity Press. 317 pp.
According to popular publications such as The Economist and Time Magazine, Africa is rising. We are certainly living in Africa's moment. Yet for Jean-Michel Severino and Olivier Ray, this moment comes at a time when literature on the continent is outdated and lacking in clarity. In Africa's Moment, Severino and Ray set out to update our way of thinking about the continent. They do so without embracing either the Afro-pessimist or Afro-optimist camps. Instead, their book provides a general overview of Africa "at the time of its metamorphosis" and predicts how this metamorphosis will shape Africa's future. By metamorphosis, Severino and Ray refer to the demographic and development shifts on the continent in the late twentienth and early twenty-first centuries. Thus the focus of the book is primarily on population growth and economics.
Severino and Ray's biggest fear for African development is its rapid population growth and urbanization. They argue that African states will face a crisis of instability...