Anugwom, E: Development in Nigeria Promise on Hold?

"Academic critique of Nigeria's anemic political and economic development has been its own cottage industry since the 1980s. Given Nigeria's large population and substantial natural resources, the incontrovertible assumption has always been that the country should be much better developed. In this volume, Anugwom lays out all of the most common explanations for Nigeria's perennial underdevelopment, dedicating chapters to corruption, ethnic nationalism, religious conflict, oil dependency, and problems with Nigeria's federal structure, among other topics. The book is mostly a synthesis of the various discourses on these subjects in political and social sciences and their application to Nigeria's circumstances of development. As such, there is little in here that will not already be familiar to anyone with a background in Nigerian political economy. However, the elaboration of the themes is cogent, concise, and comprehensive, making it an excellent introductory text for non-specialists and a valuable reference work that brings together many different approaches to Nigerian development in a single volume. A journey through this book leaves the reader with a stronger understanding of the complexity of Nigeria's development dilemma, for which there is no simple panacea." --M. M. Heaton, Virginia Tech