This is a presentation by Marcel Kitissou at a symposium organized by the Department of Africana Studies at the University at Albany on October 23, 2019 in commemoration of “400 Years of Inequity” and of the celebration of the Department’s 50th anniversary. The main argument of the presentation is that, without the West, Africa would be less westernized (or at least in its own terms) but certainly more modernized. In Africa south of the Sahara, unlike any other parts of the world, the colonizer “decolonized” but never left. Therefore, “westernization,” as can be observed today, is not a free choice. With the constant presence, and constant control by the West (Francophone Africa particularly), Africa is more westernized than modernized. Westernization, in its current form in Africa, is likely to perpetuate dependency and prevent Africa from being a global power player as was the case in the past. Read more at

Deconstructing the Westernization of Africa