For the 50^th post of this blog, I deeply thought of what to write or which book to review. I then decided that I would write a reflection on the famous George Orwell’s Animal Farm.  I kept asking myself if I am capable of reviewing this, almost, century-old masterpiece!

In a synopsis, Animal Farm is a political fairy tale that narrates a rebellion carried out by animals against their owner/farmer- Mr. Jones.  The animals wanted to be free from exploitation. It was a revolution aimed at liberating the animals. They wanted dignity, independence, equality, free speech, education, and everything else that living creatures naturally desire.  These ideals were engraved in 7 commandments, a sort of a ‘National Anthem’ titled the Beasts of England’ and were symbolized by a green flag. The animals were successful in chasing Mr. & Mrs. Jones out of the farm and set up their own system. For them, “man is the only creature that consumes without producing…yet he is a lord of all animals” (p.4).  And that explains the summary (for the dumb animals such as goats) of the 7 commandments and the Beast of England – ‘four legs good, two legs bad’. The revolution seemed to be a success story in the beginning. Even when men (Mr. Jones and his friends) wanted to retake the farm, the animals were able to protect their territory and independence in what they famously called the ‘Battle of the Cowshed’. However, the leaders (pigs) led by Comrade Napoleon gradually changed towards the behaviors of ‘man’ whom they rebelled. He started by fighting hard against his fellow leader, Snowball. Napoleon and his fellow ‘leaders’ or rather rulers slowly killed the ideals that animals fought for including equality, freedom of speech and participation. The laws in the farm were gradually changing in favour of the ruling animals while exploiting other animals. There was no room for complaining and those who did were quickly shut down or threatened. There was no permission to challenge the ‘leader’- he was always ‘right’ as the hard working Boxer would confess like a creed that should not be proven. Killings happened in the farm and things were not in ‘cloud 9’ as the animals thought but they were ‘convinced’ to remained patriotic whatever the situation because the single aim was ‘not to be ruled by man’. However, Napoleon and his fellows in the ruling class ended up learning to walk on two legs and imitated everything that was of man…even their new friends were men…and the dumb goats changed the summary anthem to ‘four legs good, two legs better’.

Well, what can I say? Upon reflecting on this fairy tale, my mind thought of so many historical events at international level and local level too. At local level a lot of contemporary issues can also fit into George Orwell’s story. Although the Animal Farm was written in 1930s and published in 1945, the story is still relevant to political situations in many countries in the world.

Without going into much details, Orwell’s book kept me thinking of Russia, China, ‘independent’ Africa, multiparty Africa, Arab Spring, Capitalism, and Socialism…I could write a few pages on each of those from Orwell’s book but for this short entry allow me to write something short and general.

Citizens who feel that they are exploited or not free are usually prone to carry out a revolution if they get a right and (mostly) a charismatic leader. They revolt against what they perceive as an exploitative system with the aim of replacing it with a fair system that will make everyone equal and ensure freedom of participation, speech, etc. Such revolutions have been common in many parts of the world. Russia Revolution on 1917 and its aftermath, for example, had much influenced in George Orwell’s writings and in particular the Animal Farm. Of late we have seen “revolutions” in North Africa that ousted out decades old rulers/dictators. However, the question is always the sustainability of these hard fought for ideals in the hands of ‘leaders’- who often prefer titles such as “comrades” “brotherly leaders” and “revolutionary leaders”. Even the leaders that were ousted in North Africa, such as Muammer Gaddafi, had revolted against authoritative systems in their times but then changed to become dictators themselves. Since history repeats itself, one year after Tahrir Revolution, Mohamed Morsi, for example, the then new president, tried to accumulate more presidential power in his hands, which…too bad gave a justification to what I categorize as a ‘coup’.

 In Africa, we read about liberation struggles in the 1950s through to early 1980s. The aim was to remove colonialists out of our land and to gain dignity, independence, and freedom.  However, most of new African leaders (with few exceptions such as Julius Nyerere and Kenneth Kaunda) changed to become dictators, refusing to get out of power, and worked hard to be like the colonialists in style and many other things. They embraced colonial-like policies of exploitation and class division. They created an elite class in Africa, just like the pigs did in the animal farm.

 In the multiparty Africa, we see the same dangers. After 1990s, Africa opened up to ‘democracy’ in what scholars such as Samuel Huntington, calls “third wave” of democracy. Political parties emerged with the aim of removing old parties that had become so exploitative after independence.  There were hopes in Africa. But most of these new regimes (formed under the multiparty system) ended up becoming dictators and some even worse than the older parties’ regime. In Tanzania, my country, we have not been lucky to replace the old CCM with another political party regime. However, there is a wave of change- although gradual. Some political parties have managed to command considerable number of followers and if, all goes well, there are prospect that one day they will get into power. But power corrupts, even the increased popularity in these parties have already becoming a challenge and a root cause/source of nascent feelings of dictatorship.  It is something that we need to be careful so as we do not find ourselves in a worse situation like the animals.

 This is not to say that we need to stick with the one party throughout. NO and I repeat NOOOO!! with an emphasis. Multiparty is a good system and its ideals are crucial to ensure participation and democracy. Events of failure of multipartism in some African countries and to some extent what we are seeing in Tanzania, should not discourage Tanzanians from voting change! We have to embrace the ideals as long as we put in place checks and balances that will ensure ‘new leaders’ don’t hold on into power and become dictators. In his preface to the Ukrainine version, George Orwell himself complained that “nothing has contributed so much to the corruption of the original idea of Socialism as the belief that Russia is a Socialist country…” (p.118). I just hope what we have been witnessing, of late, with our main opposition party in Tanzania will not corrupt the meaning of democracy in Tanzania.

George Orwell’s book includes little stories and accounts that can teach us a whole lot of what happens in a contemporary world politics. I found it very interesting that Napoleon had secretly kept the dogs who came to threaten his opponents. For some reasons I relate this part of the story with real life examples in Tanzania political businesses (some Tanzanian educated youths are secretly kept (as Napoleon dogs) ready to threaten and devour anyone who will oppose their masters…I beg youths to refuse such roles).  In short, Animal Farm is a political fairy tale that leaders and citizens should read. History repeats itself and that is why reflections of the world politics in early 1930s by Orwell are still very fresh and applicable in our contemporary world.

 I cannot say anything more on this great book because I feel very incapable of writing anything  more concerning Orwell’s work.

Sadly, persistent poverty alongside high economic growth is what explains the current situation in Africa. This is reflected in increasing inequality among citizens of the same nations. Inequality, however, is not an African issue. It is becoming a ‘conventional’ condition in neoliberal world that we are now living.

To understand neoliberalism and its sustenance ‘methods’ even with chains of failure evidence, one has to read Chang’s book. The book provides a provoking explanation of neo liberal policies and their proponents, whom Chang calls ‘Bad Samaritans’.   The Bad Samaritans through the ‘Unholy Trinity’ of IMF, World Bank, and WTO promotes neo liberal policies, which are meant to benefit them at the cost of depriving developing countries.

Using a kind of “theory” he calls ‘Kicking away the ladder”, Chang uses historical evidence to explain how the Bad Samaritan are fighting against policies that they themselves deployed to get where they are. With vivid examples he explained how countries such as Britain and USA used protectionism to build up their infant industries but they are now, through WTO, restraining developing countries from deploying such policies. In the same way, the Bad Samaritan are still subsidising their industries often in subtle means such as through ‘Research  & Development’ while acting as if the world is operating in a free and fair trade.

Chang has covered different areas including patents and copyrights, corruption, democracy and free market, and cultural and development. His analysis is rich and of critical perspective, in which he would explain the rationale used by neoliberals (the Bad Samaritan) to justify their policies then he would counter them with historical and contemporary real life examples. He showed how ‘anti-neo-liberal policies’ such as protectionism and subsidies explain the economic development of East Asian countries such as Japan and South Korea.

Having been raised in South Korea and witnessed the economic transformation over a few decades and now a professor at Cambridge University, Chang mixes his personal experience, insight of developing world, and academic rigour to bring forth arguments and counter arguments that help us to understand neoliberalism.

The book covers areas that ‘economics’ books will not touch. These include discussion on culture and development. I particularly loved the provoking title of the chapter, “ Lazy Japanese and Thieving Germans”….can you imagine at one point, the Japanese were known as lazy?? …to cut the story short, we Africans should not get baptised into stereotyped description of us and our continents. We need to work hard and prove those stereotypes wrong.

 At some point in the book, in particular when Chang was discussing ‘corruption’ and ‘patents/copy rights’, I got really scared and almost not agreeing with him. Actually, readers who are not careful might get it all wrong. However, at the end of each of those chapters, an objective reader will understand the arguments. In all those chapters, I learnt to be critical even when things that we hate are used as justification for certain policies.

This book is crucial for African policy makers who blindly embrace neo-liberal policies. Reading the chapter on Foreign Direct Investment  (Titled ‘The Finn and the Elephant”), I could never stop thinking about my country-Tanzania. I don’t know the details of our FDI contracts and so I can’t comment much, but from the hindsight, I think we need to revisit the contracts and be more careful to protect our very own manufactures (or we only have producers?) against   foreign companies.

(May be that’s why Chang only cites the example of Tanzania (the donor darling) once in reference to HIV/AIDS drugs…)

 Well, on a different note, while reading the book, I could not stop thinking of Acemoglu and Robinson book ‘Why Nations Fail’… I now think the two authors put a blind eye to the ‘kicked ladder’ when they tried to explain their theory.

 All in all, as readers we need to read more widely before getting baptised into one idea. Reading widely helps us to have a balanced view of situations informed by critical analysis of information from different sources.

Finally, I would advice political economists students (undergraduate) and even upper levels to read this book. It will give them a critical step towards understanding the polarised world of increasing inequality amidst economic growth. Most importantly, it will urge them to fight the unfair policies and ‘save’ humanity!

****In Short, I will say Americanah is a tapestry of a disturbingly beautiful love story woven with so many threads of different colours that reflect the daily realities of life in a globalized world.

 As I was looking through my friends’ reading lists for 2013, I noticed a number of books that I might also read in 2014. One of these was Americanah by sweet bright Chimamanda. Although I had never read any of her books, I had read some of her articles on the Guardian and also listened to her talk on TED.  My friend likes her a lot and has praised her work to me a number of times. He referred to her in his provoking Guardian article. So during my Christmas holidays in South-Africa, I went to the Exclusive Book Store and picked Americanah determined to start reading it as soon as I finish the book that I was reading. The mistake was, I opened the first page of the book when I had resumed to work…and my wish for the next four days of work was to get home and read it. I didn’t bring the book to the office with me because I would have to sacrifice office hours reading it. This is how excellent the book is.  My dad asked me, what book are you reading now? I said…it’s a book, that if I were the Minister of Education, I’d make it a set book for Secondary School English literature syllabus.

The book is a fiction that captures so many mini stories depicting many aspects of realities in people’s daily lives. It crosscuts through city life, village life, developed world lifestyles and developing world lifestyles. She is capturing globalization in a mastery literary style. It is set in three continents – a really big plus! Upon reflecting the book (am not attempting to do any comparison here or something of the sort), I thought of a book my dad bought for me about ten years ago- the Lexus and the Olive Tree– I really cant remember the details of that book, but it’s title just made a lot more sense in the Americanah.  The book connects the modernity with traditions or rather brings globalization to the reality of our daily lives.  To understand globalization, one has to simply read Americanah before dealing with difficult academic explanations to it.

There is a huge focus on issues of race, perfectly portrayed by a considerable number of pages devoted to explain the blogging career of Ifemelu and some of the Raceteenth posts. However, thinking of the book as mainly about race is to see a narrow picture of it.  In this beautiful but disturbing love story of Ifemelu and Obinze,  Chimamanda has managed to bring into the picture single motherhood, culture, tribalism immigration,  divorce, poverty, religion, language, academia, and business. The book is like a tapestry woven with so many threads of different colours that reflect the daily realities of life.

May be out of my own faith/cultural reservations, there are a number of things that I didn’t like in the book. First, I didn’t like how the story ended- Obinze divorcing his wife, who had not done anything wrong.  Although it can be argued that falling out of love is a perfect reason to divorce, I still think it’s unfair and more than anything I’m a bit worried about the implication of such stories in African literature that we encourage our children to read…or is it the reality of globalization? – The infusion of ‘global (western)’ culture in Africa? Second, she narrated stories about girls dating rich married men for material purposes. Although we saw how bad things turned for Aunty Uju when The General died, it was still not scary. Other similar cases seemed ok to the end such as Ranyinudo’s. Even Ifemelu re-started her love-relationship again with Obinze while he was married leading to divorce. I think Chimamanda should have been more careful and go beyond to show negative consequences….  Third, I think the novel will relate more to the emerging middle class group in Africa and not to other groups in African society- may be this is a credit  (on the other side) as discourse on the emerging middle class is now trending and in need of more debates. But not every person in Africa can easily relate to it.

All in all, the novel is a masterpiece and reflects a reality on the ground. I kept laughing and sharing so many scene stories with my sister on the phone because I could relate to them and knew that my sister will understand the stories and why am laughing.

If you have time, please read this book…it’s a classic, easy read, and enjoyable novel.

****Best Characters (the ones I love most apart from the main characters)- Iloba, Emenike, Dike,  and Boubacar

It’s almost two in the morning and I’ve spent almost half an hour going through my 2013 books. I couldn’t pick a favorite, each book I read was a favorite in its own special way. I’m the kind of reader who develops a bond with whatever it is am reading. I’ve discovered over the years that I choose what to read depending on the mood am in at that particular time. If am in the mood for something intellectually stimulating and fun at the same time then I opt for the politics and any serious reads covering politics. As a student of comparative politics; most of my choices tend to lean that way. I’ve discovered that it’s the only way to stay informed and relevant in the field.

So what did I read this year that’s worth sharing? I was going through my 2013 reads and am extremely disappointed as I write this. I didn’t get to read as much as I would have loved to. I’ll be very honest and admit that I’ve only read eleven books so far (half read books don’t count; neither do school books). Having a fulltime job and being a fulltime student has made it difficult for me to read as much as I would have loved to.

For some reason, my choice of books this year kept taking me to the Middle East; a region I’ve been obsessed with ever since I read about Pharaoh’s dreams and the deliverance of the people of Israel from Egypt in the bible. Queen Noor of Jordan, Khaled Hosseini and Atiq Rahimi made me feel like I had been to Jordan, Iran and Afghanistan.

Leap of Faith by Queen Noor

I bought Queen Noor’s Leap of Faith by accident after getting lost in Palma de Majorca’s narrow streets and ending up in a second hand English book store. I must have spent an hour there going through the wide selections of books. I was spoilt for choices and I reluctantly picked Queen Noor’s book because the old store owner wanted to close the store for his siesta.

I started reading the book the same day and I just couldn’t put it down. I fell in love with the journey she took me on. From her childhood as Arab-American Lisa Halaby, growing up in affluent parts of LA and New York, her years at Princeton, to meeting King Hussein of Jordan and becoming Queen Noor of Jordan. The emotions she put into her memoir said it all; she had found her way into the heart of the King and his people.

The Queen not only tells her love story but that of the Jordanian people too. Their search for peace among Arab states; their struggles and all the fascinating things that made her fall in love with Jordan and its people. For those interested in the Middle East, I’d highly recommend this book. It’s a highly informative book that gives the reader a clear understanding of Jordanian politics, Jordanian struggles and various Middle Eastern issues. The private discussions she held with her late husband made me understand the Israeli-Palestinian conflict even better, and why no solution has worked since the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.

You’d be surprised at how connected to the Middle East you’ll feel after reading Queen Noor’s memoir. I was checking out tickets to Amman even before I was done reading the book; only to realize that getting a visa to Jordan was a nightmare. I guess it’s the Queens description of the exotic and fascinating kingdom that aroused some wanderlust in me. Am yet to visit Jordan, and if I ever do, I’ll definitely visit all the beautiful landmarks she described in her memoir.

And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini

Ever read a book that left you confused? That’s how I felt while reading Khaled Hosseini’s And the Mountains Echoed. I had read Hosseini’s first two works and I couldn’t wait to read his third. His two previous books had created pictures for me. I felt like I had been to Afghanistan after reading The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns. I learnt quite a bit from his first two works. Hosseini told his country’s beautiful history through the characters in his books; from the times of King Amanullah Khan, to Zahir Shah, to life under the dreaded Taliban.

For some reason, I thought his third book would take me from where A Thousand Splendid Suns had left off. It did in a way but not entirely. The book begins in 1952, with the tale of a man on a long journey across the Afghan dessert to Kabul with his son and daughter. The man has taken the journey to Kabul in order to sell off his daughter to a wealthy couple. It is the separation of the man’s children’s that starts of a complex tale.

Unlike his previous two books, I found it hard to be emotionally involved with the characters in this book. The characters kept changing and I really had a hard time keeping up with the constant plot turns. On one chapter Hosseini has you in Kabul, Paris in the next one, and on to some Greek island in the next. The start was really good but the complex plot twists had me struggling to finish it. This is a book that requires total focus if one is to understand the entire plot. I’m actually considering reading it one more time.

Peace from Broken Pieces by Iyanla Vanzant

I hate to admit it, but I read this book in 2012 and read it two more times this year. If you are struggling to find yourself, this is the book for you. Vanzant begins her story by narrating how she lost her daughter to cancer. She then takes the reader back to her childhood, struggling to raise her children as a single mother while working her way through college, to finally making it as a New York Times best-selling author.

Just when the reader thinks Vanzant has finally found peace, the story takes a different turn. Her marriage ends in divorce by email, she ends up flat broke, her million-dollar home facing foreclosure and contemplating suicide. It’s from Vanzant’s loss that the reader gets taken on a journey through self-awareness and spirituality. I loved the book because it felt like an inspiring lesson about rising from the ashes of our past. If you’ve ever been to some dark places in your life; this is the book for you. It will make you reflect, cry and inspire you.

A Journey Through Darkness by Margareth Maganga

I was lucky to receive A Journey Through Darkness from the author herself, during the LetsRead launch that was held in Dar es Salaam in October. I had flown to Dar es Salaam to attend the launch and I could tell Miss Maganga was an inspiration the minute we started talking. We had a few minutes to chitchat before the ceremony begun and it was then that I knew I would enjoy reading her book. She gave me a signed copy which I begun reading the same day but had to stop because I didn’t want my sister to see me crying all the time.

I resumed my reading on the flight home, and it was then that I understood the message Miss Maganga had written on my copy. “Life has a way of throwing curve balls at us, but it’s for you to grab the ball and throw it in the direction you want.”  Miss Maganga went to bed and woke up blind five years ago. She could have given up that day; instead she held on to her dreams, went on to partially recover her sight and got herself a law degree. I’d highly recommend her book. It’s a fun and familiar read, describing places that are familiar to us. If you are thinking of supporting our own authors; Miss Maganga’s book would be a great start.

So, what else did I read in 2013 and which books were a total bore? Fifty Shades of Grey takes the number one spot. Why did I waste my money on buying it?  I’ll share all the other titles in part two of this aticle. I’ll also share the books that I didn’t get to finish, why I didn’t finish them and what I’m planning to read this year. I’ve already started working on my 2014 reads, and most of them happen to be recommendations from friends. I’m curious to find out whether they are my kind of books. If there’s one thing I know for sure; then it’s the fact that books have taken me places and they will keep taking me places. Knowing that makes me open a book even after a 16-hour long day!