Why does Nigeria have a history of failed republics, failed governance as well as false starts and dead-ends on the path to economic development, social coherence, and peace? Is the Fourth Republic condemned to the fate of previous ones, or can it rise above the heavy weight ofthe past and chart a different path for itself? In this volume of 26 chapters, put together to honour one of Nigeria's foremost political scientists, four generations of political scientists, economists, political economists, sociologists, psychologists, international relations experts, lawyers, historians and specialists in literature from Africa and North America provide fresh and succinct insights on these and other posers in original essays that range from the theoretical to the analytical, from those that are historical and comparative to those that focus on the current situation in that important African country.

The essays focus on. four cardinal points that sin post Nigeria's perennial struggle for democracy and good governance as cause, effect and terrain. These are the structure, history, processes and dynamics of the country's putative federal system; governance issues; the formation and transformation of identities; and the global contexts of the production and reproduction of the Nigerian state, economy and society.

The book will be of great value to Nigerians, friends of Nigeria, and all those interested in understanding the path that has led Nigeria to its present, state and in finding alternative pathways to a future that is more democratic, better governed, and more developed.

After more than a decade of reform efforts in Africa, much of the optimism over the continent's prospects has been replaced by widespread "Afropessimism." But to what extent is either view well founded? Democratic Reform in Africa plumbs the key issues in the contemporary African experience - including intrastate conflict, corruption, and the development of civil society - highlighting the challenges and evaluating the progress of political and economic change.

Case studies of Botswana, Mozambique, Nigeria, and South Africa complement the thematic chapters, exploring the complex interactions between democracy and development.

Big dams built for irrigation, power, water supply, and other purposes were among the most potent symbols of economic development for much of the twentieth century. Of late they have become a lightning rod for challenges to this vision of development as something planned by elites with scant regard for environmental and social consequences, especially for the populations that are displaced as their homelands are flooded. In this book, Sanjeev Khagram traces changes in our ideas of what constitutes appropriate development through the shifting transnational dynamics of big dam construction.

Khagram tells the story of a growing, but contentious, world society that features novel and increasingly efficacious norms of appropriate behavior in such areas as human rights and environmental protection. The transnational coalitions and networks led by nongovernmental groups that espouse such norms may seem weak in comparison with states, corporations, and such international agencies as the World Bank. Yet they became progressively more effective at altering the policies and practices of these historically more powerful actors and organizations from the 1970s on.

Khagram develops these claims in a detailed ethnographic account of the transnational struggles around the Narmada River Valley Dam Projects, a huge complex of thirty large and more than three thousand small dams. He offers further substantiation through a comparative historical analysis of the political economy of big dam projects in India, Brazil, South Africa, and China as well as by examining the changing behavior of international agencies and global companies. The author concludes with a discussion of the World Commission on Dams, an innovative attempt in the late 1990s to generate new norms among conflicting stakeholders.

Among the constellation of states with interesting constitutional stories to tell, tiny Moldova holds a unique place. It is one of only a handful of countries that has ever switched the structure of its constitutional system midstream without experiencing a democratic breakdown. Whereas some countries, such as Nigeria, have been able to adopt a different kind of constitution following their return to democracy - after a military or authoritarian regime has been swept from power - only a handful have ever managed to change their institutions midstream without experiencing such an intervening crisis.

The Center for Global Development opened its doors in November 2001, just two months after the terrorist attacks of September 11. The terrorist network behind the attacks was based in Afghanistan, having been expelled from Sudan,a nd was associated with earlier fatal attacks against US targets in Kenya, Tanzania, and Yemen. These attacks constituted a wake-up call, in both the development and security communities, to a new, shared challenge. In the 21st century, a sensible national security strategy would have to tackle the risks to Americans of development failures in faraway places.