The first articles in this issue of Transformation broach the subject of ethnicity which has become increasingly salient to debates about the future of South Africa. The Nigerian social scientist Claude Ake considers that blanket hostility to expressions of ethnic identity and community in Africa have been misguided. Ethnicity has been a vibrant and legitimate construction of civil society, not simply a manipulated idea from outside. Africa must advance through recognising and working with identities that exist rather than through self-alienation.
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