Kenya

(PD) Image: Central Intelligence Agency

The Republic of Kenya is a country in Eastern Africa. It shares borders with Ethiopia, Somalia, Tanzania, Uganda and Sudan. Its coastline borders the Indian Ocean.

Government

Kenya is a Presidential Representative Republic, where the President acts both as head of State and head of Government. Executive power is wielded by the Government. Legislative power is shared between the government and the National Assembly. The Judiciary acts independently of both legislative and executive organs of government.

Kenya has had a relatively stable political history since independence (omitting recent political unrest and rioting). It escaped much of the internal tribal warfare and civil war which crippled neighbouring nations such as Ethiopia, Uganda and Somalia. It held elections in December 2002 which were deemed free and fair by international observers. Kenya has until recently been used as an example of a recovering African nation free of many of the domestic problems which beset many of her neighbouring states. The 2002 election heralded a peaceful transfer of power from the Kenya African Union to the National Rainbow Coalition.

The disputed 2007 elections led to wide civil strife with around 180,000 people being displaced and an estimated 350 lost lives.

Geography & natural history

Kenya elevates from low lying coastal lands along the Indian Ocean to the Highlands in the center of the country. The Kenyan highlands are one of the most productive agricultural regions in Africa. The highlands have one of the highest points in Kenya, Mount Kenya and is also home to a rare specimen to Africa - Glaciers. Mount Kilimanjaro, the highest mountain in Africa lies along the Kenya/Tanzania border.

Kenya enjoys a rich variety of flaura and fauna within its borders; Several safari parks operate under its jurisdiction and it provides a healthy income in tourism for the nation.

Economy

Immediately following independence Kenya enjoyed a period of economic growth, mainly due to public investment and high levels of foreign investment. From the mid 1970's to 1993, her economic performance declined as a direct result in the downturn in the international agriculture market, poor credit and higher oil prices. In the mid 1990's, Kenya began a economic liberalisation effort in tandem with the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. This allowed a sharp increase in economic fortunes despite setbacks in the early 21st century. However, the IMF suspended Kenya's Enhanced Structural Adjustment Program due to the government's failure to maintain reforms and curb corruption. Over the following few years efforts at reform were top priority in order to get the IMF back on board. Recent efforts at the highest level has been to combat corruption in government which is believed to be widespread from the local level to the very highest level of government.

Demographics

Kenya's ethnic groups comprise the following; Kikuyu 22%, Luhya 14%, Luo 13%, Kalenjin 12%, Kamba 11%, Kisii 6%, Meru 6%, other African 15% and non-African (Asian, European, and Arab) 1%. Recent elections has seen these groups generally vote along ethnic and tribal lines, but with exceptions. In the cities, such as Nairobi, old ethnic divisions are less stark than in the more traditional countryside.

Kenya's religious groups comprise the following; Protestant 45%, Roman Catholic 33%, Muslim 10%, indigenous beliefs 10% and other 2%

History

The interior is a history of migrations, and the activities of most of the major tribes are not well known before the 19th century. On the coast, trading settlements were established by 150 AD. By 1000 AD Persian and Arab traders were well established. A Swahili culture developed in the towns, notably Pate, Malindi, and Mombasa. The Portuguese arrival in 1498, with a powerful navy. After decades of small-scale conflict the result was loose control by Oman. Under Seyyid Said, the Omani sultan who moved his capital to Zanzibar in the early 19th century, created long-distance trade routes into the interior. The dry reaches of the north were lightly inhabited by seminomadic pastoralists. In the south, pastoralists and cultivators bartered goods and competed for land as long-distance caravan routes linked them to the Kenya coast on the east and the kingdoms of Uganda on the west. Arab, Shirazi, and coastal African cultures produced an Islamic Swahili people trading in a variety of up-country commodities, including slaves.

1850-1920

By 1850 European explorers had begun mapping the interior. British interest in the area developed later in the century, stimulated by German competition, and in 1887 the Imperial British East Africa Company, a private concern, leased from Seyyid Said his mainland holdings, a 10-mile (16-km)-wide strip of land along the coast. In 1895 the British government took over the company's interests and claimed the interior as far west as Lake Naivasha; it set up the East Africa Protectorate. The border was extended to Uganda in 1902, and in 1920 the enlarged protectorate, except for the original coastal strip, which remained a protectorate, became a crown colony.

Railways

The British government decided, primarily for strategic reasons, to build a railway linking Mombasa with the British protectorate of Uganda. A major feat of engineering, the railway was completed in 1903 and was a decisive event in Kenya's modern history. Large numbers of workers were imported from British India to do the manual labor. Many Indians stayed, as did the many Indian traders who had seen a commercial opportunity in the opening up of the interior of Kenya. Rapid economic development was seen as necessary to make the railroad pay, and since the African population was accustomed to subsistence rather than export agriculture, the government decided to encourage European settlement in the fertile highlands. The railway opened up the interior, not only to the European farmer, missionary, and administrator, but also to relief measures against slavery, sickness, and famine. By the time the railroad was built, military resistance by the African population to the original British takeover was virtually at an end, but new grievances were being generated by the process of European settlement. To make way for the Europeans (largely Britons and whites from South Africans), the Masai were restricted to the southern Loieta plains in 1913. The Kikuyu claimed some of the land reserved for Europeans and continued to feel that they had been deprived of their inheritance.

Government

Although power remained concentrated in the governor's hands, legislative and executive councils made up of official appointees were created in 1906. The European settlers were allowed to elect representatives to the Legislative Council in 1920, when the colony was established. The settlers hoped to achieve responsible government, as did the settlers in Rhodesia in 1923, and they pressed for extensions of representative government for themselves while opposing similar demands by the far more numerous Indian community. In 1923 the Colonial Office, in a famous white paper, declared that the interests of the African population must be paramount. But although the settlers failed to achieve self-government, representation on the Legislative Council for Indians and Arabs, first introduced in 1924, remained disproportionately small. A European was nominated to represent African interests.

Bibliography

• Barsby, Jane. Kenya (Culture Smart!: a quick guide to customs and etiquette) (2007)
• Haugerud, Angelique. The Culture of Politics in Modern Kenya. Cambridge U. Press, 1995. 266 pp.
• Mwaura, Ndirangu. Kenya Today: Breaking the Yoke of Colonialism in Africa. Algora, 2005. 238 pp.
• Parkinson, Tom, and Matt Phillips. Lonely Planet Kenya (2006) except and text search
• Rough Guide To Kenya (8th ed. 2006)

History

• Anderson, David. Histories of the Hanged: The Dirty War in Kenya and the End of Empire. W. W. Norton, 2005. 406 pp.
• Berman, Bruce and Lonsdale, John. Unhappy Valley: Conflict in Kenya and Africa. 2 vol. Ohio U. Press, 1992. 504 pp.
• Bravman, Bill. Making Ethnic Ways: Communities and Their Transformations in Taita, Kenya, 1800-1950. James Currey, 1998. 283 pp.
• Collier, Paul and Lal, Deepak. Labour and Poverty in Kenya, 1900-1980. Oxford U. Press, 1986. 296 pp.
• Eliot, Charles. The East Africa Protectorate (1905) full text online
• Elkins, Caroline. Imperial Reckoning: The Untold Story of Britain's Gulag in Kenya. Holt, 2005. 496 pp.
• Gatheru, R. Mugo. Kenya: From Colonization to Independence, 1888-1970. McFarland, 2005. 236 pp.
• Harper, James C., II. Western Educated Elites in Kenya, 1900-1963. Routledge, 2006. 193 pp.
• Kanogo, Tabitha. African Womanhood in Colonial Kenya, 1900-50. Ohio U. Press, 2005. 268 pp.
• Kyle, Keith. The Politics of the Independence of Kenya St. Martin's, 1999. 258 pp.
• Lewis, Joanna. Empire State-Building: War and Welfare in Kenya, 1925-52. James Currey, 2000. 393 pp.
• Mackenzie, A. Fiona D. Land, Ecology and Resistance in Kenya, 1880-1952. Edinburgh U. Pr., 1998. 286 pp.
• Maloba, Wunyabari O. Mau Mau and Kenya: An Analysis of Peasant Revolt. Indiana U. Press, 1993. 288 pp.
• Maxon, Robert M. and Ofcansky, Thomas P. Historical Dictionary of Kenya. (2nd ed. Scarecrow, 2000). 449 pp.
• Maxon, Robert M. Going Their Separate Ways: Agrarian Transformation in Kenya, 1930-1950. Fairleigh Dickinson U. Pr., 2003. 353 pp
• Miller, Norman, and Rodger Yeager. Kenya: The Quest for Prosperity (2nd ed. 1984) online edition at Questia
• Ndege, George Oduor. Health, State, and Society in Kenya. U. of Rochester Press, 2001. 224 pp.
• Ochieng, William R., ed. Themes in Kenyan History. Ohio U. Press, 1991. 261 pp.
• Ochieng, William R., ed. A Modern History of Kenya: In Honour of Professor B. A. Ogot. Nairobi, Kenya: Evans Brothers, 1989. 259 pp.
• Odhiambo, E. S. Atieno and Lonsdale, John, eds. Mau Mau and Nationhood: Arms, Authority and Narration. Ohio U. Press 2003. 306 pp.
• Ogot, B. A. and Ochieng, W. R., eds. Decolonization and Independence in Kenya, 1940-93. Ohio U. Press, 1996. 270 pp.
• Percox, David A. Britain, Kenya and the Cold War: Imperial Defence, Colonial Security and Decolonisation. Tauris, 2004. 252 pp.
• Pinkney, Robert. The International Politics of East Africa. Manchester U. Pr., 2001. 242 pp. compares Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania.
• Press, Robert M. Peaceful Resistance: Advancing Human Rights and Democratic Freedoms. Ashgate, 2006. 227 pp.
• Sabar, Galia. Church, State, and Society in Kenya: From Mediation to Opposition, 1963-1993. F. Cass, 2002. 334 pp.
• Sandgren, David P. Christianity and the Kikuyu: Religious Divisions and Social Conflict. Peter Lang, 1989. 209 pp.
• Smith, David Lovatt. Kenya, the Kikuyu and Mau Mau. Mawenzi, 2005. 359 pp.
• Steinhart, Edward O. Black Poachers, White Hunters: A Social History of Hunting in Colonial Kenya. Oxford: James Currey, 2006. 248 pp.
• Tignor, Robert L. Capitalism and Nationalism at the End of Empire: State and Business in Decolonizing Egypt, Nigeria, and Kenya, 1945-1963. Princeton U. Press, 1998. 419 pp.

Primary sources

• Kareri, Charles Muhuro. The Life of Charles Muhoro Kareri. U. of Wisconsin-Madison, African Studies Program, 2003. 104 pp.
• Lewis, Joanna, ed. From Mau Mau to Harambee: Memoirs and Memoranda of Colonial Kenya, Tom Askwith. Cambridge U. Press, 1995. 221 pp.
• Maathai, Wangari Muta. Unbowed: A Memoir. Knopf, 2006. 314 pp.