Inside the OAU : Pan-Africanism in practice /

Amate, whose judgment is informed by two decades as a Ghanaian diplomat, has written an excellent descriptive history of the Organization of African Unity-its origins, structures, administrative and political functions, and committees. The book stresses three topics: the evolution of the OAU's institutional units, its contribution to liberation movements in Africa, and its efforts to promote African cooperation in matters related to both settling disputes among member states and providing assistance for socioeconomic purposes in the continent. Amate offers a wealth of detail about OAU activities and accomplishments that is often lost in politicized and overgeneralized accounts. The emphasis lies on internal functions and patterns of behavior within the OAU and at the UN, and on such matters as budgeting, growth of the secretariat, and African responses to issues that unite as well as divide OAU states. In effect, Amate has placed the OAU in perspective, softening sharp political differences and noting areas of achievement and success that are overlooked in other accounts, such as Yassim El-Ayouty and I. William Zartman's The Organization of African Unity After Twenty Years (CH, Sep '75) and Elenga M'buyinga's Pan Africanism or Neo-Colonialism? (CH, Feb '83). Appendixes contain charts of organizational units, budgets, and bureaus not readily found elsewhere. Upper-division and graduate students, and general readers.-M.E. Doro, Connecticut College