Unpopular sovereignty : Rhodesian independence and African decolonization /

Examining the various constitutions and elections and the debates surrounding them in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) between 1965 and 1980, the author (Univ. of Florida) lays bare the complex ideological and political gymnastics surrounding questions related to citizenship and the franchise in a country that decolonized from the British Empire only to retain a white minority government that nevertheless sought to couch its legitimacy to rule in terms other than race or nationality. White settlers used "a hodgepodge of institutions and laws and practices . . . to maintain what they refused to call white rule but instead relabeled as responsible government by civilized people." At the same time, these whites "did not claim to be 'the people' worthy of sovereignty but instead claimed membership in an empire, the West, or an anticommunism that had no national boundaries." Therefore, the transition from Rhodesia to Zimbabwe did not follow a prototypical linear path from empire to nation-state, as oversimplified narratives often present, but rather a meandering path beset by confounding questions about what, if anything, Rhodesia was, and what, if anything, a Rhodesian should be. A valuable resource for historians of Africa, decolonization, or settler colonialism. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Graduate students, faculty. --Matthew M. Heaton, Virginia Tech