Citizenship in post-independence Africa

The legal and political framing of contemporary African citizenships are inextricably linked to the continent’s history of colonisation by European powers. The carving up of the continent, and the imposition or dissolution of political institutions and boundaries without respect for the pre-existing polities, was followed by the intermittent adjustment of borders and jurisdictions among the colonial powers, and then the reimposition of smaller political units after, what was in most places, a sudden transition to independence with little time for the development of new institutions within the borders of the new states. This chapter reviews the impact not only colonisation had on countries’ post-independence citizenship, but also the impact of decolonisation and how these newly independent countries handled nation-building.