74.
The editors have been extremely careless. Such passages as "Sixtythree developing countries . were interviewed" should never have found their way into print. Jargon such as "The client is sometimes labeled the input to the educational system, sometimes as the throughput entity," is simply absurd when all the author means is "student." In addition, the author has ignored a mass of material from the late colonial period, specifically articles dealing with Anglo-phone Africa, widely available in such journals as African Affairs. His bibliography does not indicate that he has consulted the comprehensive dissertation by Dr. Dale on the history of education in Liberia.
There certainly is a need to study how mass communications can aid in developing national consciousness in new nations. Likewise, education must provide the necessary training for workers and management in these countries. But to be effective, the writing about such education should be intelligible, should in the wry humor of. one critic, "eschew obfuscation."!
Europe and Africa: From Association to Partnership. By Carol Cosgrove Twitchett. Westmead: Saxon House, 1978. Review by Clifford R. Lopin, Western Carolina University.
Neo-colonialism is an epithet commonly used today to attack special
relationships between former colonial countries and colonies. Even the Lom4 Convention of 1975, which commits the signatories "to establish, on the basis of complete equality between partners, close and continuing cooperation in the spirit of international solidarity," is sometimes seen as a new and more subtle instrument of imperialism. In order to assess accurately these allegations, a scholarly account of the evolution of the colonial empires
to an association of independent nations under the European Economic Community through the Yaound4 Convention to Lom4 is needed. That is exactly what Carol Cosgrove Twitchett has provided in the book under review. This book was assisted by the European Economic Community because of its "significant and original contribution toward European integration," and it does provide a favorable interpretation of the activities of EEC. Little evidence of bias exists, however, because Ms. Cosgrove has done her research so thoroughly and her writing so carefully.
The basic outline of the book involves events and documents which are well known. Ms. Cosgrove analyzes the documents carefully and includes political considerations which shaped the agreements and affected their implementation. For example, she discusses in some detail the French insistence on the association clauses of the original Rome Treaty. The opposition and eventual agreement of West Germany to this arrangement are explained. The heart of the association agreement, the Economic Development Fund, had some tough sledding at first and seemed to accomplish little. The author explains why this was true and what was done to make the EDF more effective later on. The transition from association to partnership was complicated by the granting of independence to most African states in the 1960s. This was handled