This book explores the instability of the African postcolonial state and demonstrates that such a fundamental crisis can be solved only through discourses and practices that are designed beyond the Westphalian model of the modern state and out of the neo-patrimonialistic system of African governance. The challenge of instability will not be overcome by rebuilding the African nation-state undermined by social contradictions and complex emergencies; rather stability will be achieved by opening a public space of agonistic democracy that is supported mainly by an overlapping consensus on justice....