Authority 9

I speak on behalf of the millions of human beings (..) who are reduced to only glimpsing in life a reflection of the lives of the affluent. I speak on behalf of women the world over, who suffer from a male-imposed system of exploitation. … Women who struggle and who proclaim with us that the slave who is not able to take charge of his own revolt deserves no pity for his lot. This harbours illusions in the dubious generosity of a master pretending to set him free. Freedom can be won only through struggle, and we call on all our sisters of all races to go on the offensive to conquer their rights.

Thomas Sankara (1949-1987) was a revolutionary, pan-Africanist and internationalist. He became President of Burkina Faso in 1983 in a coup, and was assassinated in 1987 in a Western (CIA) backed plot. His successor, Blaise Compaoré, was likely involved in the murder, and was ousted in 2014 after 27 years in office. In 2021, Compaoré was tried in his absence before a military court on suspicion of involvement in the assassination of Sankara.

During the anti-colonial independence movement, the former colonies demanded the democratisation of the world, e.g. the UN. Sankara addressed issues such as gender, environment, radical political reforms and democracy as well as colonial domination. From the 1990s, the TINA doctrine (There is No Alternative, see Thatcher) spread and, given the circumstances, neoliberal market democracy was sold as the only possible system. The discourse then changed, moving away demands for the democratisation of global structures to a focus on "good governance" and democratisation within states – all this while global injustice persisted. In contrast to many neoliberal governments in the West in the 1980s, alternatives were still conceivable in some countries of theso-called Third World. Sankara's government contained more women than that of any other African country, and his bodyguards were women on motorcycles. He forbade circumcision and polygamy and promoted contraception. During his rule, state luxury cars were sold and replaced with cheap state vehicles, while education and health care were improved, land reform carried out, reforestation promoted and international development aid rejected because, in his words: "He who feeds you controls you" (see Shuffield 2006).

*Robin Shuffield (2006): Thomas Sankara. The Upright Man. *David Scott (2017): From the right to trade to Good Governance. *Anthony Anghie (2004): Imperialism, Souvereinity and the Making of International Law. New York: Cambridge University Press.

1984