African Socialist International
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The African Socialist International (also Confederation of African Socialist Parties or League of African Democratic Socialist Parties) is a union of social democratic political parties in the continent of Africa. It was set up to provide an international forum for moderate socialists in Africa, and proclaimed that "democratic socialism" was the only possible path to African development[1]. It is affiliated to, but not a regional component of, the Socialist International[2].
The decision to set it up was taken at the 1976 Geneva meeting of the Socialist International by a group of African social democrats led by Léopold Sédar Senghor of Senegal[3]. At the time vice-president of the SI, he was "entrusted" with the task of setting up a local organisation that would be free of accusations of any affiliation to Moscow.
The ASI held its inaugural meeting in Tunis on February 26-28, 1981. Eleven social-democratic parties from across the continent attended[4]. Senghor was unable to attract all the continent's socialists; prominent exceptions included Zimbabwe and Namibia. The Soviet press declared the union of "bourgeois" parties was dangerous and opportunistic, and that the ASI was "programmed in Western Europe and designed in Dakar and Tunis."[5]
In the early 21st century, the name of the organization was co-opted by an African internationalist group headed by Omali Yeshitela.
[edit] References
- ^ Doherty, James C. (ed.): "African Socialist International" in the Historical Dictionary of Socialism, Scarecrow Press, 1997.
- ^ Sibilev, Nikolaĭ Grigorievich. Socialist International, Progress Publishers, Moscow: 1984.
- ^ Kosukhin, Nikolai: Revolutionary Democracy in Africa: Its Ideology and Policy, Progress Publishers, 1985.
- ^ Gromyko, A.A. "Africa Today: Progress, Difficulties, Perspectives", Social Sciences Today, 1983.
- ^ Novosti Daily Review, 1 March, 1981.
