2025-1&2 African Independences and the Avatars of Coloniality
Guest Editors
Víctor Barros, Instituto de História Contemporânea, Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas da Universidade NOVA de Lisboa / IN2PAST – Laboratório Associado para a Investigação e Inovação em Património, Artes, Sustentabilidade e Território
Suzano Costa, Observatório Político, Instituto Superior de Ciências Sociais e Políticas da Universidade de Lisboa.
In 2025, four Lusophone African countries – Angola, Cabo Verde, Mozambique and São Tomé and Príncipe – will celebrate fifty years of independence. A commemorative cycle that began in 2023, with the celebration of the proclamation of the state of Guinea-Bissau on 24 September 1973, will thus come to a close, with the 50th anniversary of the independence of Angola, Cabo Verde, Mozambique and São Tomé and Príncipe.
Independence processes are political, economic and socio-cultural events with several ramifications that simultaneously interconnect histories of resistance and the construction of political subjectivity of individuals and peoples. For this reason, independence processes are neither gifts nor political artifices. They are a multifaceted phenomenon, made up of a multiplicity of dynamics, structures and processes that are constantly in movement. For the territories and peoples under colonial and imperial rule, these historical and material complexities are even more obvious. Firstly, because independence proposed to end the colonial situation; secondly, because it gave rise to new states that became part of the international political system as sovereign entities.
The global history of decolonization achieved on the basis of struggles against colonial rule is characterized by complex, at times conflicting dynamics, with implications transcending the actors and the geographical limits of the territories concerned. These dynamics are intertwined as concomitant processes, namely in the management of the legacies of colonialism – institutional (de)continuities, among others – and in the political construction of new nation-states as national independent entities. These dynamics led to an unfinished process today characterized by various avatars of coloniality: the post-colonial ramifications of global capitalism, cultural imperialism, relationship of dependency (at various levels) and the structural inequality inherited from the colonial situation fueled neo-colonialism in the post-independence period as a mode of relationship between the new African states and the former colonizing powers, etc.
Thus, it is crucial to reflect on African national independences, with a special focus on the territories that were under Portuguese colonial rule: Angola, Cabo Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique and São Tomé and Príncipe. There is a distinctive historicity which characterizes the dynamics of independences (some achieved through armed struggle, others not) and the process of building the post-colonial state in each of these territories. It is, therefore, the purpose of this special issue to call for articles that highlight specific aspects related to the construction of national independence and the state in these countries. We call for articles that not only scrutinize the theoretical, ideological and symbolic contours of the concept of national independence (through different discourses and narratives), but also examine the practices and repertoires of action carried out to materialize the nation-state in these newly independent countries.
We encourage the submission of innovative empirical or analytical proposals (anchored in unpublished data, sources and research) on various themes and fields of action – politics, culture, education, the arts, gender issues, popular mobilization, governance, the circulation of knowledge and repertoires of action, state-building, the management of colonial legacies, diplomacy and foreign relations, etc. We also encourage proposals that investigate:
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the influence of Cold War dynamics on the context of state-building and independence;
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the relationship with wider conflictuality in Southern Africa;
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the solidarity networks of revolutionary internationalism;
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the role of lesser-known figures of liberation, neglected or erased by dominant post-colonial narratives;
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the (re)interpretations of the concept of national independence within the field of memorial activism produced by new social actors, and several other topics related to the theme of this special issue.
Articles that mobilize different scales of analysis (local, regional, international or transnational) are welcome, as well as comparative research and case studies emphasizing nuances on topics, aspects, realities and practices related to independence processes.
Due to the interdisciplinary and trilingual scope of Lusotopie journal, contributions can be sent in French, English or Portuguese. Proposals, in the form of an abstract (500 words maximum), containing title, name and institutional affiliation of the author(s), should be sent to lusotopie[at]gmail.com by 31 January 2025.
Important deadlines
Notification on the acceptance of the abstract: 5 February 2025.
Submission of the first version of the article: 30 May 2025.
Submission of the final version after the review: 30 September 2025.
Publication: December 2025.



