Voices Of Decolonization Book Review

Decolonization was a period that followed the Second World War, and that lasted from 1945 to 1965. Many colonial empires were destroyed by European Powers, and in result the former colonies became independent. In the book Voices of Decolonization, written by Todd Shepard, many issues were examined in relation to the decolonization process. Issues such as race, the cold war, international institutions emerging, and national self-determination arguments were explained very clearly in this book. The issues of new international institutions and national self-determination were very important during this time frame because they continued to show themselves multiple times in the reading. These two issues are linked together and played hand and hand
(p. 14). The United Nations, one of the many developed institutions that were built upon the idea of self- determination, addressed the issues of non-self-governing territories. (p. 46). The United Nations Charter revealed self-determination’s importance in article 73 b, which identifies the trust that should be put into the United Nations by those who have yet to demand their independence. The Charter said, “to develop self-government, to take due account of the political aspirations of the peoples, and to assist them in progressive development of their free political institutions, according to the particular circumstances of each territory and its peoples and their varying stages of advancement.” (p. 48). This article was meant to influence those who had not adopted the self- government to think more about all that the United Nations had to offer in 1945. The goal of this organization was to inspire other countries to become independent so those countries could give their people more freedom. These countries could only do this if they believed that the United Nations had interests in peace and security of their countries. (p.
This article was published by the General Assembly and was known as, the “Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples”. (p. 143). The General Assembly mentioned a lot of things that they saw themselves as being when discussing international law. Some examples are, ‘Mindful’ of human rights, ‘Conscious’ of equal rights, and ‘Recognizing’ of the passion that the people had for independence. (p.143-144). There were many other adjectives used to describe the General Assembly but one that stuck out was ‘Convinced’. The Assembly said that they were, “Convinced that all peoples have an inalienable right to complete freedom, the exercise of their sovereignty and the integrity of their national territory.” (p. 144). The article by the United Nations General Assembly amplified the United Nations Charter of