Africa
Stearns' readable account of the ongoing war in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is concerned with the perceptions, motivations, and actions of an eclectic mix of actors in the conflict -- from a Tutsi warlord who engaged in massive human rights violations to a Hutu activist turned refugee living in the camps and forests of eastern Congo.
Reading these three fine books on Zimbabwe under Robert Mugabe produces something of a Rashomon effect, so different are the elements they emphasize and the information they put forward.
The great merit of this history of Sudan since independence is Cockett's skill at integrating the crises in southern Sudan and Darfur with the politics of Khartoum.
