Zimbabwe: Thirty Years of Independent Life

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to provide elements in order to explain the economic and political developments —without being exhaustive— which have taken place in Zimbabwe’s first thirty years of independence (1980-2010), with the purpose of contributing to the understanding of both the crisis which has unfolded and the complexity which has been exposed in the search for solutions.

As a starting point, we are faced with the fact that often Zimbabwe’s history is not well known, which makes it difficult to understand the current crisis. The paper begins with an introduction that briefly presents the main features of the colonial period. The analysis of the years between 1980 and 2010 is divided in three periods and, with explanatory purposes, the economic and political developments in each of these periods are treated separately. The paper concludes with a general overview of the political arena between April 2010 and July 2012.