Systematic destruction of the Ottoman empire throughout Mediterranean Europe (e.g. "classical" Greece) and Africa (e.g. all of "North Africa") describes concisely the impetus of "shared history"

Being repeatedly at war with each other doesn't mean countries do not share a common history, culture and even economy: European kingdoms have been at war for centuries. By the way, the Ottoman empire was seen as a European state until its end: during the XIXth century, it was nicknamed "the sick man of Europe". Political and military alliances were made with it (by France and the Republic of Venice, for example) and there was a huge volume of trade with it throughout its history.

"Ce qui vient au monde pour ne rien troubler ne mérite ni égards ni patience." René Char

Five hundred flawed or flat out wrong explanations for why the bulk of the population of sub-Saharan Africa today have greater cultural affinity for each other than for North Africans does not disprove the cultural affinity.

Pan-Africanism has always solicited and accepted support in North Africa, on the basis of the hope for strength in numbers if nothing else ... and because there are indeed borderland affinities in countries like Mali and Chad, and of course it elides the Sudan problem ...

... but the base of Pan-Africanism is sub-Saharan Africa.

For instance, if UEFA invited in the North African nations, it seems likely they'd leave CAF in a heartbeat. In sub-Saharan Africa, it would be a fraught and heavily politicized issue, with money dueling against heart.


I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.

I didn't intend to characterize "normally closer relationships" between "black" nations at any point in history.

Another way of saying the point is, why in the hell not?

If talking about whether the idea of sub-Saharan Africa is a "real" thing in the here and now, or just a conceptual artefact of Europeans inspired by false theories of "race" ...

... wouldn't the first thing to look for be whether there is a cultural affinity among the peoples of sub-Saharan Africa?

When their nation does not make the World Cup, or if their nation makes the World Cup and then gets eliminated ... if there is a team remaining from Sub-Saharan Africa, people from all over Sub-Saharan Africa cheer for that team.

Of course, its not to say that history does not matter. As my wife says of the people of the Maghreb, they are the people who captured the sister of her grand mother into slavery, and somewhere in the world there are cousins that they know nothing about.

Were the Arab slave traders working on a slave raid somewhere near the bend in the River Congo necessarily from the Maghreb? Were they perhaps from a country like Yemen in the Arabian heartland rather than a country like Morocco in the Maghreb?

For the question at hand, what matters is more that the Maghreb tends to be viewed in Sub-Saharan Africa as a collection of Arab countries that happen to lie on the African continent.


I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.