Historical Dictionary of Western Sahara Third ... - Scarecrow Press
Historical Dictionary of Western Sahara Third ... - Scarecrow Press
Historical Dictionary of Western Sahara Third ... - Scarecrow Press
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Preface<br />
As was the case in the second edition <strong>of</strong> this dictionary, the time period<br />
leading to my authorship <strong>of</strong> this completely rewritten new edition has<br />
been highly eventful with respect to the attempts by the international<br />
community to resolve the <strong>Western</strong> <strong>Sahara</strong> dispute. Only an outcome<br />
universally perceived as evenhanded and just would both foreclose the<br />
possibility <strong>of</strong> renewed war and fully satisfy an African continent sensitized<br />
(by virtue <strong>of</strong> its own experiences if nothing else) to issues <strong>of</strong> decolonization<br />
and self-determination. In spite <strong>of</strong> the fact that this is an<br />
entirely new presentation, I still feel (and readers <strong>of</strong> this volume should<br />
also feel) a considerable intellectual debt to Tony Hodges, who almost<br />
alone among English-speakers pioneered the study <strong>of</strong> <strong>Western</strong> <strong>Sahara</strong>’s<br />
history during his exhaustive researches beginning in the late 1970s. It<br />
is my hope, therefore, that this edition will be judged to have been faithful<br />
to the firm foundation that Tony Hodges constructed over two<br />
decades ago, although neither he nor anyone else besides myself should<br />
be held responsible for any errors <strong>of</strong> fact or omission contained in these<br />
pages.<br />
As far as specifics are concerned, the user will find several important<br />
differences in this book as opposed to the two earlier editions. Aside<br />
from the customary deletions from the main body <strong>of</strong> the dictionary<br />
made necessary by the passage <strong>of</strong> time and by the emergence <strong>of</strong> new issues<br />
and personages (and not all the omissions here are from the colonial<br />
or precolonial period), most existing entries have been thoroughly<br />
updated with new information, and there are nearly three dozen entirely<br />
new entries covering a wide sweep <strong>of</strong> the history and politics <strong>of</strong> <strong>Western</strong><br />
<strong>Sahara</strong>. The decade plus since the publication <strong>of</strong> the second edition<br />
has also brought the emergence <strong>of</strong> scores <strong>of</strong> new source materials devoted<br />
in one way or another to <strong>Western</strong> <strong>Sahara</strong> and the dispute surrounding<br />
it. As a result, I have totally reorganized the bibliography,<br />
xiii