The Limits of Solidarity: A History of Israeli Cooperative Assistance in Zambia

The history of the establishment, expansion and demise of the Israeli schemes teaches us that socialist agendas were often only one part of a complex web of policies and priorities facing postcolonial leadership in Africa. In Zambia, Kenneth Kaunda had made the cooperative movement a cornerstone of his policies to achieve growth, but other political and ideological concerns that loomed larger throughout this era eventually overshadowed the domestic agenda. The following examination of Israeli cooperative assistance in Zambia between 1966-1973 can provide a close up view of how the socialist aspirations of leadership was sometimes doomed by broader geopolitical concerns that mandated the imposition of alternative policies.