Diversity of African Politics: Trends and Approaches -- Independent Africa: Trends and Patterns -- Approaches to the Study of African Politics -- Political Interaction Framework -- Structures of Politics -- State Institutions and the Organization of the Public Arena -- Concept of the State in Africa -- Structural Foundations of African States: The Colonial Legacy -- Constructions of the Public Arena Since Independence -- States and State Variety in Africa: Some Implications -- Social Groupings -- Social Groups and Social Process -- Organization of Social Life -- Social-Networks and Social Trends -- Ethnicity, Class, and the State -- Ethnicity and Ethnic Group -- Ethnic Intermediary's Critical Role -- African Class Cleavages and Social Conflicts -- Class and Ethnicity as Situational Variables -- Political Process and Political Change -- Regimes in Independent Africa -- Regime Evolution in Postcolonial Africa -- Regime Types and Their Variations -- Regime Types and Political Process -- High Politics: The Procedures and Practices of Government -- Politics of the Center: Decisionmaking and the Rules of the Political Game -- Politics of Social Relations -- Center Consolidation and Maintenance: Some Trends -- Deep Politics: Political Response, Protest, and Conflict -- Elite Conflicts -- Factional Conflicts -- Communal Conflicts -- Mass Conflicts -- Popular Conflicts -- Interplay of Political Conflicts -- Political Transitions and Patterns of Change -- Modes of Political Change -- Patterns of Political Interaction -- Political Economy -- Political Economy: Policy Choices in a Constraining Environment -- African Economies in Historical Perspective -- Sectoral Policies in the Postindependence Period -- Popular Strategies for Economic Survival. Conclusion: An Overextended State? -- Africa and the World Economy.