This article considers the marginalization of precolonial history from mainstream Africanist scholarship in recent decades, and argues that this can be understood in the context of a scholarly culture that attributes an exaggerated significance to the history of the twentieth century. The article highlights some of the work that continues to be done on Africa's deeper past, with a view to demonstrating the enormous value of such research in elucidating present-day issues. It also argues, however, that work on the modern period is preponderant, and that there is a clear tendency toward historical foreshortening, evidenced in recent scholarship on such topics as conflict and ethnicity.

Mauritius's unusual welfare state dates back to the introduction of non-contributory old-age pensions in 1950. This article examines the origins of this reform, focusing on the interactions between political actors in both Mauritius (local planters, political activists, and the colonial government) and London (the Colonial Office and Labour Party). Faced with riots among unorganised sugar estate workers in 1937, the colonial administration considered welfare reforms as part of a package intended to substitute for political change. The nascent Mauritian Labour Party used its links to the British Labour Party to apply additional pressure on the Colonial Office and, hence, the Governor in Mauritius. Welfare reform was stalled, however, by resistance from, initially, the governor and, later, the Colonial Office. It took partial democratisation in 1948 to push the local administration towards reluctant reform. The choice of tax-financed old-age pensions reflected the combination of a small and open economy, the absence of surplus land, poorly organised workers, and an effective state.

This article examines a rehabilitation program for disabled Ghanaians developed by Kwame Nkrumah's government between 1961 and 1966. Arising at a time when Nkrumah was moving away from welfarism in favor of a ‘big push’ for industrialization, rehabilitation sought to integrate disabled citizens into the national economy as productive workers. Nkrumah's program was preceded by a colonial rehabilitation project during the 1940s for disabled African soldiers. The colonial initiative drew heavily on the British model of social orthopaedics, which equated citizenship with work. This philosophy resonated with Nkrumah's vision of national development based on full employment. Although its economic focus had troubling implications for citizenship and welfare, Nkrumah's rehabilitation program was unique among newly independent African states, and it arguably produced a positive legacy.

The fall of colonial regimes across Africa was accompanied by the rise in expectations for rapid and inclusive rural economic progress. In Zambia, the cooperative production unit was one of two key initiatives at the centre of the United National Independence Party's ambitious development efforts. The other was the tractor. By following these two interlinked initiatives in the years immediately following independence, this article contributes to the under-explored history of early postcolonial development. It argues that both the power of expert groups and the level of continuity between late colonial and postcolonial development was not always as great as has recently been suggested. Cooperative mechanization policies emerged from a confluence of competing claims over knowledge, power and resources. However, as is demonstrated, they also reflected more fundamental tensions in the development endeavour between the prioritization of economically efficient mass production, and inclusive development for the masses.

The dramatic urban change taking place on the African continent has led to a renewed and controversial interest in Africa's cities within several academic and expert circles. Attempts to align a growing but fragmented body of research on Africa's urban past with more general trends in urban studies have been few but have nevertheless opened up new analytical possibilities. This article argues that to move beyond the traps of localism and unhelpful categorizations that have dominated aspects of urban history and the urban studies literature of the continent, historians should explore African urban dynamics in relation to world history and the history of the state in order to contribute to larger debates between social scientists and urban theorists. By considering how global socio-historical processes articulate with the everyday lives of urban dwellers and how city-state relationships are structured by ambivalence, this article will illustrate how historians can participate in those debates in ways that demonstrate that history matters, but not in a linear way. These illustrations will also suggest why it is necessary for historians to contest interpretations of Africa's cities that construe them as ontologically different from other cities of the world.