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World on Fire World on Fire World on Fire Page 36

by Amy Chua


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  37. See Harris, Patterns of Race in the Americas, pp. 61–63; Twine, Racism in a Racial Democracy; Marx, “Contested Citizenship,” pp. 179–80; and Marcus, “Melting Pot Coming to a Boil,” p. 1A.

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  38. Robinson, Coal to Cream, pp. 145, 181.

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  39. Anthony Faiola, “Peruvian Candidate Reflects New Indian Pride,” Washington Post, March 31, 2000, p. A1.

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  40. Finnegan, “Leasing the Rain,” p. 50.

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  41. See John Otis, “Popular Uprising,” Houston Chronicle, September 28, 2000, p. A16; Larry Rohter, “Bitter Indians Let Ecuador Know Fight Isn’t Over,” New York Times, January 27, 2000, p. A3; and Nicole Veash, “Ecuador on the Verge of Anarchy as Indians Revolt,” Independent (London), January 14, 2000, p. 16.

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  42. Veash, “Ecuador on the Verge of Anarchy as Indians Revolt,” p. 16.

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  43. My discussion of hip-hop in Brazil draws heavily on Jennifer Roth-Gordon, “Hip-Hop Brasileiro: Brazilian Youth and Alternative Black Consciousness Movements” (presented at the American Anthropology Association meeting held on November 18, 1999). See also Stephen Buckley, “Brazil’s Racial Awakening, Washington Post, June 12, 2000, p. A12.

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  Chapter 3

  1. See Chrystia Freeland, Sale of the Century: Russia’s Wild Ride from Communism to Capitalism (New York: Crown Business, 2000), which is based on Freeland’s personal interviews of the oligarchs. I draw extensively on Freeland’s book throughout the chapter. Other books covering the oligarchs include Paul Klebnikov, Godfather of the Kremlin: Boris Berezovsky and the Looting of Russia (New York, San Diego, and London: Harcourt, Inc., 2000), and Matthew Brzezinski, Casino Moscow (New York: Free Press, 2001).

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  2. See John Lloyd, “The Autumn of the Oligarchs,” New York Times Magazine, October 8, 2000, pp. 88–94.

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  3. Freeland, Sale of the Century, p. 128.

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  4. Ibid., p. 175; Klebnikov, Godfather of the Kremlin, p. 212.

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  5. For two rather different descriptions of the loans-for-shares deal, see Freeland, Sale of the Century, chapter 8, and Klebnikov, Godfather of the Kremlin, chapter 8.

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  6. As reported in Rachel Blustain, “Too Many Jews in the Kremlin?” Forward, April 4, 1997, p. 14.

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  7. See National Conference on Soviet Jewry, Anti-Defamation League, “The Reemergence of Political Anti-Semitism in Russia: A Call for Action” (presented to Secretary of State Madeline Albright on January 21, 1999), pp. 6–7, available at http://www.adl.org/international/russian_political_antisemitism.html, and The World Bank, World Development Report 2000/2001 (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001). Determining the size of the Jewish population in Russia is complicated by a number of factors. The main problem is definitional: Different Jewish groups (e.g., Orthodox Jews as opposed to Reform Jews) apply different standards in determining who “counts” as Jewish. In Russia, many individuals with a single Jewish grandparent, or even just a “Jewish-sounding” surname, self-identify, and are perceived by others, as Jewish. At the same time, because of the long legacy of anti-Semitism in the country, many Russian Jews are not open about their heritage.

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  8. On the Jews during the Middle Ages, see Solomon Grayzel, A History of the Jews (New York and Ontario: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1968), pp. 276–367, especially pp. 362, 365. See also Michael Grant, The Jews in the Roman World (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1973).

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  9. On the “commanding economic position” of the Jews in interwar Romania, see Barbara Jelavich, History of the Balkans: Twentieth Century (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), p. 160; in interwar Poland and Lithuania, see Ezra Mendelsohn, The Jews of East Central Europe Between the World Wars (Bloomington: Indiana University Press), pp. 23, 26, 226; and in interwar Hungary, see Peter Pulzer, The Rise of Political Anti-Semitism in Germany and Austria (rev. ed.) (London: Peter Halban Publishers, 1988), pp. 10–11, 13. An accessible summary of the economic history of the Jews in Europe can be found in Thomas Sowell, Migrations and Cultures: A World View (New York: Basic Books, 1996), pp. 238–82.

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  10. My discussion of Jews in tsarist Russia draws heavily on Zvi Gitelman, A Century of Ambivalence: The Jews of Russia and the Soviet Union, 1881 to the Present (2d expanded ed.) (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2000), especially chapter 1, and John Doyle Klier, Imperial Russia’s Jewish Question, 1855–1881 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), especially pp. 13–50, 285–331.

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  11. Gitelman, A Century of Ambivalence, p. 11.

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  12. Ibid., pp. 50, 52; Klier, Imperial Russia’s Jewish Question, 1855–1881, pp. 290–91, 311–13.

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  13. Gitelman, A Century of Ambivalence, pp. 14, 49–52; Sowell, Migrations and Culture, p. 64.

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  14. See Gitelman, A Century of Ambivalence, chapters 2, 5, and 6, especially pp. 151–54; Sowell, Migrations and Culture, pp. 271–72; and Paul Johnson, A History of the Jews (New York: Harper & Row, 1987), pp. 450–55, 568–72.

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  15. Freeland, Sale of the Century, p. 171.

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  16. See Annalise Anderson, “The Red Mafia: A Legacy of Communism,” in Edward P. Lazear, ed., Economic Transition in Eastern Europe and Russia: Realities of Reform (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1995).

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  17. Freeland, Sale of the Century, pp. 114–15.

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  18. Ibid., pp. 116–19.

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  19. Ibid., p. 118. See also Robert Cottrell, “Foreigners are reluctant but locals are confident,” Financial Times, July 2, 2001, p. 5.

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  20. Lloyd, “The Autumn of the Oligarchs,” p. 90.

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  21. Freeland, Sale of the Century, pp. 146–56, 194, 239–41.

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  22. Ibid., p. 148.

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  23. Ibid., pp. 121–26, 182–86.

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  24. Khodorkovsky’s wealth and holdings are documented in Bernard S. Black, Reinier Kraakman, and Anna Tarassova, “Russian Privatization and Corporate Governance: What Went Wrong?” Stanford Law Review 52 (2000): 1731–1803, pp. 1748, 1768; Oksana Yablokova, “Forbes List’s Rich Russians Get Richer,” Moscow Times, March 4, 2002, p. 1; and Sabrina Tavernise, “Fortune in Hand, Russian Tries to Polish Image,” New York Times, August 18, 2001, p. C3.

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  25. Freeland, Sale of the Century, p. 121.

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  26. See Black, Kraakman, and Tarassova, “Russian Privatization and Corporate Governance,” pp. 1754–55, and Tavernise, “Fortune in Hand, Russian Tries to Polish Image,” p. C3.

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  27. Black, Kraakman, and Tarassova, “Russian Privatization and Corporate Governance,” pp. 1771–72.

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  28. Freeland, Sale of the Century, p. 135.

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  29. Klebnikov, Godfather of the Kremlin, pp. 89–90.

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  30. For a vivid and detailed description of the Avva scheme, see Ibid., pp. 140–43.

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  31. Freeland, Sale of the Century, pp. 137–41. See also Daniel W. Michaels, “Capitalism in the New Russia,” Journal of Historical Review 16 (1997): 21–27, p. 24.

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  32. Freeland, Sale of the Century, pp. 141–45.

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  33. See Peter Baker, “An Unlikely Savior on the Tundra,” Washington Post, March 2, 2001, p. A1; John Lloyd, “A miracle worker,” Financial Times, January 6, 2001, p. 1; and Sabrina Tavernise, “An Aluminum Behemoth is Born in Russia,” New York Times, April 6, 2001, p. W1.

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  34. Freeland, Sale of the Century, pp. 127–33.

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  35. Ibid., pp. 128, 172–89.

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  36. Lloyd, “The Autumn of the Oligarchs,” p. 88.

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  37. “Putin says 1996 Chechnya pullout was ‘major error,’” BBC Summary of World Broadcasts, March 20, 2000.

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  38. “Putin versus the oligarchs?” The Economist, June 17, 2000.

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  39. Robert Siegel, Jacki Lyden, Lawrence Sheets, “Boris Berezovsky to release documentary in London,” All Things Considered, National Public Radio, February 21, 2002.

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  40. Ibid. (interviewing Moscow journalists Masha Lipman and Stanislav Kucher).

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  41. Brzezinski, Casino Moscow, pp. 180–81.

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  42. On Friedman, see Cottrell, “Foreigners are reluctant but locals are confident,” p. 5. On Khodorkovsky’s new attitude, see Maura Reynolds, “An ‘Oligarch’s’ U-Turn toward Probity,” Los Angeles Times, December 26, 2001, p. A26.

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  43. As reported in Barry Schweid, “Jewish group says Putin’s ‘instincts’ help fuel bias,” Seattle Times, March 16, 2001.

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  44. On Abramovich’s recent replacement by Geraschenko, see Andrei Grigoriev, “Twelve and a Half,” What the Papers Say, January 22, 2002, pp. 17–21. On the recent rise of political anti-Semitism, see National Conference on Soviet Jewry, “The Reemergence of Political Anti-Semitism in Russia,” pp. 1–4.

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  45. Judith Matloff, “Russians seek scapegoats in hard times,” Christian Science Monitor, August 13, 1999, p. 9.

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  46. Michael R. Gordon, “Russian Jews Turning Edgy as the Country’s Chaos Creates an Ugly Mood,” New York Times, March 9, 1999, p. A12.

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  47. National Conference on Soviet Jewry, “The Reemergence of Political Anti-Semitism in Russia,” p. 4.

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  48. Ibid., p. 5.

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  49. Ibid., p. 6; Matloff, “Russians seek scapegoats in hard times,” p. 9.

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  50. Nabi Abdullaev, “New Political Party Campaigns against Jews,” Moscow Times, February 28, 2002.

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  Chapter 4

  1. Ryszard Kapu´sci´nski, Another Day of Life (San Diego, New York, and London: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1987), pp. 10, 23–24, 66–67. For additional reading on Angola, see Gerald J. Bender, Angola under the Portuguese (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1978). See also Reference Center, “Virtual Historical Tour of Angola,” http://209.183.193.172/referenc/history/virtualtour.html and “Angola—A History,” http://www.africanet.com/africanet/country/angola/history.htm.

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  2. The World Bank, World Bank Country Brief on Angola, July 2001, available at http://www.worldbank.org/afr/ao2.htm.

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  3. David J. Lynch, “A Wary Nation Looks to a Time of Transition,” USA Today, December 15, 1997, p. 17A. The quote from Namibia’s President Nujoma is from “Namibia: President raps commercial farmers for firing workers ‘arbitrarily,’” BBC Worldwide Monitoring, March 29, 2001.

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  4. On the historical economic dominance of South Africa’s English speakers vis-à-vis the more numerous Afrikaners, see Milton J. Esman, “Ethnic Politics and Economic Power,” Comparative Politics 19 (1987): 395–418. General histories of South Africa include Michael Attwell, South Africa: Background to the Crisis (London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1986), and T. R. H. Davenport, South Africa: A Modern History (4th ed.) (London: Macmillan, 1991).

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  5. The statistics I cite on the persisting economic dominance of South Africa’s white minority, and the continuing mass poverty of the black majority, are from recent reports by South Africa’s Black Economic Empowerment Commission (2000 and 2001), available at http//www.bmfonline.co.za/bee_rep.htm. See also Maurice Hommel, “Escaping Poisonous Embrace of Racism,” Toronto Star, August 24, 2001, p. A21; “Skin Deep,” The Economist, July 21, 2001; Hardev Kaur, “Affirmative Action Plan Calls for Advancement of Blacks,” New Straits Times (Malaysia), May 24, 2001, p. 10; Hardev Kaur, “Blacks Continue to Live in Poverty,” New Straits Times (Malaysia), May 23, 2001, p. 10; and Christopher Ogden, “The Post-Miracle Phase,” Time International, September 16, 1996, p. 46.

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  6. On colonial Namibia, see Jan-Bart Gewald, Herero Heroes: A Socio-Political History of the Herero of Namibia, 1890–1923 (Athens: Ohio University Press, 2001). On the persisting extreme economic inequality between the white minority and the black majority, see the 2001 Country Review on Namibia written by CountryWatch.com and the World Bank Africa Live Database. See also The World Bank Group, “Namibia,” September 2000, available at http://www.worldbank.org/afr/na2.htm, and “Namibia,” The Economist, November 7, 1992, p. 49.

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  7. See Nicholas Stein, “The De Beers Story: A New Cut on an Old Monopoly,” Fortune, February 19, 2001, p. 186.

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  8. See Ibid., p. 186; Rob Edwards, “Mining Giant Goes to Court,” Scotsman, April 20, 1997, p. 8; and Daniel J. Wakin, “Surf’s Up in Swakopmund,” Ottawa Citizen, December 4, 1999, p. K6. The 2000 sanitation statistic is based on The World Bank, World Development Report 2000/2001 (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001).

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  9. For further reading on Zimbabwe (formerly Rhodesia), see David Blair, Degrees in Violence (London and New York: Continuum, 2002), and Robert Blake, A History of Rhodesia (London: Eyre Methuen, 1977).

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  10. Jeremy Hardy, “Farming Today,” Guardian (London), April 8, 2000, p. 22.

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  11. See “State lists 57 more white farms for Mugabe land grab,” Deutsche Presse-Agentur, September 15, 2000, and Simon Baynham, “Redistribution of Land Angers Many,” Jane’s Intelligence Review, February 1, 1998, p. 13.

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  12. My account of Cholmondeley and the decadent years of Kenya’s Happy Valley is based on James Fox, White Mischief (New York: Random House, 1982). See also Louise Tunbridge, “Whites take up politics ‘to halt Kenya’s decay,’” Daily Telegraph, December 23, 1997, p. 19.

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  13. My description of the Kenyan Cowboys draws on Danna Harman, “Past echoes in infamous Kenyan club,” Christian Science Monitor, February 15, 2001, p. 1. On the Leakeys, see Tunbridge, “Whites take up politics ‘to halt Kenya’s decay,’” p. 19, and “Big-game safari,” The Economist, July 31, 1999.

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  14. John M. Cohen, “Ethnicity, Foreign Aid, and Economic Growth in Sub-Saharan Africa: The Case of Kenya” (Development Discussion Paper 520, Harvard Institute for International Development, November 1995). See also Paul Kennedy, African Capitalism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988); Frank Holmquist and Michael Ford, “Kenya: State and Civil Society the First Year after the Election,” Africa Today 41 (1994): 5–25; and Shin-wha Lee and Anne Pitsch, “Kikuyu, Kisii, Luhya, and Luo in Kenya,” October 1999, http://www.cidcm.umd.edu/inscr/mar/kenkik.htm.

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  15. See Bill Berkeley, “An Encore for Chaos?” Foreign Affairs, February 1996.

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  16. For a wonderful description of the Onitsha Marketplace, and Africa generally, a mu
st-read is Ryszard Kapu´sci´nski, The Shadow of the Sun, Klara Glowczewska, trans. (New York and Toronto: Alfred A. Knopf, 2001), pp. 298–305.

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  17. See Donald L. Horowitz, Ethnic Groups in Conflict (Berkeley, Los Angeles, and London: University of California Press, 1985), pp. 27–28, 154–55, 164–66, 243–49.

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  18. See Ibid., pp. 112, 153, 245–46.

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  19. Probably the best English source on the economically dynamic Bamiléké in Cameroon is Victor T. Le Vine, The Cameroon Federal Republic (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1971). More recent articles documenting the market dominance of the Bamiléké are James Brooke, “Informal Capitalism Grows in Cameroon,” New York Times, November 30, 1987, p. D8, and Richard Everett, “The Bamiléké—Merchant Tribe of Cameroon,” Record, August 10, 1986, p. A48.

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  20. On Rwanda, see Philip Gourevitch, We wish to inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with our families (New York: Picador USA, 1998), especially chapter 4, and Gérard Prunier, The Rwanda Crisis: History of a Genocide (New York: Columbia University Press, 1995), especially pp. 26–45. On Burundi, see Rene Lemarchand, Burundi: Ethnocide as Discourse and Practice (Cambridge and Washington, DC: Cambridge University Press and Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 1994).

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  21. An excellent discussion of the highly successful (and recently deported) Eritrean business community in Ethiopia can be found in Noah Benjamin Novogrodsky, “Identity Politics,” Boston Review, summer 1999. On the economically advanced Ewe in Togo and Chagga in Tanzania, see Horowitz, Ethnic Groups in Conflict, pp. 37, 46, 149, 152, 154, 159. On the Baganda in Uganda, see Horowitz, Ethnic Groups in Conflict, pp. 163–64; Mahmood Mamdani, Politics and Class Formation in Uganda (New York and London: Monthly Review Press, 1976), pp. 29–34, 41–44, 120–22; and Bill Berkeley, “An African Success Story?” (Uganda), The Atlantic, September 1994, p. 22. The Susu in Guinea are discussed in the country reports compiled by Freedomhouse (http://www.freedomhouse.org) and the University of Minnesota Human Rights Library (http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/africa/guinea.htm).

 

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