Imperialism or realism: United States and West Africa, 1988

The purpose of the thesis is to utilize the realist-neorealist paradigm to analyze the United States policy objectives in West Africa, comparably to other African regions. The basic premise of the realist paradigm purports that states are unitary actors and they act to protect their national interest. Through a critical analysis of secondary data, my findings clearly point to the fact that the former colonial powers, Britain and France are the major actors in West Africa not the United States. The United States policy strategy centers solely on the crisis areas of other regions, the Horn, Central Africa and Southern Africa. This is because of the power struggle between the super powers and because these areas are endowed with vast mineral resources. The Nigerian oil and Chadian conflict with Libya are the only two areas of U.S. interest in West Africa