Editing History of Africa (section)

==Contemporary Africa (1935-present)==
{{Main|Postcolonial Africa}}
{{Further|History of North Africa#Post-colonial period|History of West Africa#Post-colonial period|History of Central Africa#Post-colonial period|History of East Africa#Post-colonial period|History of Southern Africa#Post-colonial period}}
{{See also|Decolonisation of Africa|Neocolonialism|CFA franc|Status of forces agreement|Historical African place names}}

[[File:African nations order of independence 1950-1993.gif|upright=1.25|thumb|Order of independence of African nations, 1950–2011|alt=An animated map showing the order of independence of African nations, 1950–2011]]

[[Imperialism]] ruled until after World War II when forces of [[African nationalism]] grew stronger. In the 1950s and 1960s the colonial holdings became independent states. The process was usually peaceful but there were several long bitter bloody civil wars, as in Algeria,<ref>Alistair Horne, ''A savage war of peace: Algeria 1954–1962'' (1977).</ref> Kenya,<ref>David Anderson, ''Histories of the hanged: The dirty war in Kenya and the end of empire'' (2005).</ref> and elsewhere. Across Africa the powerful new force of [[nationalism]] drew upon the [[modern warfare|advanced militaristic skills]] that natives learned during the world wars serving in the British, French, and other armies. It led to organizations that were not controlled by or endorsed by either the colonial powers nor the [[List of current non-sovereign African monarchs|traditional local power structures]] who were viewed as collaborators. Nationalistic organizations began to challenge both the traditional and the new colonial structures, and finally displaced them. Leaders of nationalist movements took control when the European authorities evacuated; many ruled for decades or until they died. In recent decades, many African countries have undergone the triumph and defeat of nationalistic fervour, changing in the process the loci of the centralizing state power and patrimonial state.<ref>Gabriel Almond and James S. Coleman, ''The Politics of the Developing Areas'' (1971)</ref><ref>Festus Ugboaja Ohaegbulam, ''Nationalism in colonial and post-colonial Africa'' (University Press of America, 1977).</ref><ref>Thomas Hodgkin, ''Nationalism in Colonial Africa'' (1956)</ref>

The wave of [[decolonization of Africa]] started with [[Libya]] in 1951, although [[Liberia]], [[South Africa]], [[Egypt]] and [[Ethiopia]] were already independent. Many countries followed in the 1950s and 1960s, with a peak in 1960 with the [[Year of Africa]], which saw 17 African nations declare independence, including a large part of [[French West Africa]]. Most of the remaining countries gained independence throughout the 1960s, although some colonizers (Portugal in particular) were reluctant to relinquish sovereignty, resulting in bitter wars of independence which lasted for a decade or more.

The last African countries to gain formal independence were [[Guinea-Bissau]] (1974), [[Mozambique]] (1975) and [[Angola]] (1975) from Portugal; [[Djibouti]] from France in 1977; Zimbabwe from the United Kingdom in 1980; and [[Namibia]] from South Africa in 1990. Eritrea later split off from Ethiopia in 1993.<ref>Henry S. Wilson, ''African decolonization'' (E. Arnold, 1994).</ref> The nascent countries, despite some prior talk of redrawing borders, decided to keep their colonial borders in the [[Organisation of African Unity]] (OAU) conference of 1964 due to fears of civil wars and regional instability, and placed emphasis on [[Pan-Africanism]], with the OAU later developing into the [[African Union]].<ref>{{cite journal|last=Touval|first=Saadia|title=The Organization of African Unity and African Borders|journal=International Organization|volume=21|issue=1|pages=102–127|date=1967|doi=10.1017/S0020818300013151|jstor=2705705|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2705705}}</ref> During the 1990s and early 2000s there were the [[First Congo War|First]] and [[Second Congo War|Second]] Congo Wars, often termed the African World Wars.{{sfnp|Prunier|2009|p=72}}<ref>{{cite book|last=Prunier|first=Gerard|url=https://archive.org/details/africasworldwarc0000prun|title=Africa's World War: Congo, the Rwandan Genocide, and the Making of a Continental Catastrophe|publisher=Barnes & Noble|year=2014|isbn=9780195374209|access-date=20 October 2014|url-access=registration}}</ref>