Libmonster ID: KE-1274

Keywords: West Africa, Benin, Togo, Ghana, African business, African cultures, professional education, development management

"History teaches" only when its revelations take on the form of lessons, parallels between today and days gone by. And it teaches only those who find in it not so much the matter for satisfying research curiosity, but rather the energy for constructive reflection of their own position in the world. However, strengthening the ability of people to realize and design their own path involves the involvement of the efforts of representatives of many, many professions, owners of a wide variety of competencies.

This realization has led to the union of specialists in seemingly so far apart fields as African studies and business, in particular, business education. Moreover, this alliance turned out to be so intellectually mutually enriching that it led to the conclusion of a cooperation agreement between the Institute of Africa of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the DiBiEi-Concept research and consulting group. Thanks to their joint efforts, an expedition of 13 managers from Russia, Belarus, Lithuania and Ukraine to three West African countries - Benin 1, Togo and Ghana-took place from October 30 to November 13, 2012.

It can be said that for the first time immersion in the cultural world of Africa was necessary for business to understand itself. Based on this, the concept of the expedition, its route, and approaches to the analysis of what was seen and felt during its course were built up.

THE IDEA AND BACKGROUND OF THE EXPEDITION

The approach of businessmen to the meeting with Africa was slow and gradual. The idea of educational and research expeditions of managers engaged in serious professional education at the MBA* level originated and first materialized in 2007. Then, under the guidance of one of the authors of the article (prof. Andrey Teslinov) held the first immersion of the leaders of Russian companies in the cultural worlds of Cambodia and Vietnam, which are outlandish for the European consciousness.

With this trip, the history of the "Living Parallel" began - on the one hand, a research project, and on the other - the organizational form and technology of adult education and self-education through living in a different reality in a special place.-


MBA (English Master of Business Administration) - a qualification degree in management, implying the ability of its holder to perform the work of a mid-level and senior manager.

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a well-organized comparison. We are talking about comparing the philosophical, and therefore extremely pragmatic research that takes place along the route of the expedition. The essence of this educational comparative study is to use examples of a new reality for participants to be able to draw those parallels between familiar and unfamiliar phenomena that would allow them to overcome their randomness and come to patterns.

Later, expeditions to Peru, Bolivia, Guatemala, India, Mexico, Belize and other countries took place. Intellectual work on the development of "existing as identical in different" (in the words of the ancient philosopher Plotinus) took place both on the monuments of civilizations of the past (Khmer, Siamese, Maya, Aztec, Inca and others), and in the midst of carriers of living ethnic cultures (among the Indian tribes of the Amazon, in the villages of Vietnam, slums of Brazil, etc.).

So the approach to Africa gradually took place, which promised the luxury of a rare cultural immersion. The first meeting of the "Living Parallel" with her took place (also thanks to the support of the Africa Institute) in 2011 in Tanzania and Rwanda. This expedition helped prepare for a deeper dive into the fragile world of African cultures next year, entering it with the "heart temperature" at which many doors open.

EXPEDITION TO AFRICA AS A TECHNOLOGY OF MODERN EDUCATION

It should be noted that the expeditions in question are a creative response to objective trends in high professional education of managers. And the expedition to Benin, Togo and Ghana was also conceived as one of the versions of the answer to the modern challenges thrown at it, the requirements imposed on it today. Thus, the rhetoric about MBA-level education is increasingly recognizing that classroom learning is exhausting, that case analysis in the form of texts helps only "prescription" learning, whereas in an era of change, something completely different is needed; that in conditions of diversity, understanding reality can only occur through changing contexts, etc.

Behind all this is the maturation of the educational paradigm, which comes after the" Great Didactics "of the" father of pedagogy " Jan Amos Comenius with its class-based system, developed by him in the XVII century.

A contemporary of the great rationalist philosophers and natural scientists, Ya. A. Comenius (1592-1670) created a system of education designed in the spirit of the so - called "Newtonian worldview", which was formed at that time and dominated until recent decades the view of the world as rigidly deterministic, developing due to unavoidable and beyond the control of man "natural laws". The educational model based on the system of Y. A. Komensky prepares a person for life in such a world.

However, in the twentieth century, thanks to the discoveries of Niels Bohr and Albert Einstein, the socio-political catastrophes of two World Wars, the world in the minds of people lost its unambiguity and definiteness (which is reflected in modern social studies-see the works of K. Barad, B. Latour, etc.2). From the point of view of the" post-Newtonian worldview", practically nothing is predetermined in the world, and therefore a person's life in it is, first of all, the realization of personal discourse, the path on which situations of choice constantly change, in which it is necessary to make independent decisions. In this regard, the ability of a person, especially a business executive, to act in the "world of unpredictability"is of particular value. The growing core of a fundamentally new education system is the synthesis of several environments in which education should take place, including adult education.

Africa is the most suitable continent for this, "offering" a huge variety of cultural and historical contexts, environments and cross - sections in their unique interweaving. That is why the leaders of successful companies from the countries of the former Soviet Union needed to immerse themselves in culture (more precisely, cultures). Africa with its past, present and future.

For any serious student of social regularities, Africa can also provide an extremely rich "material". But, as the sages say, "' may 'does not mean 'will' yet." In order for the expedition to achieve its goals, the culture of Africa had to be asked deep questions, the formulation of which would actually turn training into research, it was necessary to create a sound route, select competent guides and assistants. All this took place.

The training-research was based on the consideration of an amazing human phenomenon-culture. The point of view from which it was considered was reflected in the title of the training course that the expedition participants mastered during its course:"Culture as a resource for development". At the same time, development was understood as broadly as possible, as a universal principle of the world order. In the course of the classes, first of all, it was analyzed how the understanding of its mechanisms related to culture can be used by managers in order to successfully develop their companies.

The training process was based on the so-called observation with reflection, organized by the co-leaders of the expedition - the authors of this article on 10 prepared tricks. The reflection consisted in comparing examples from the expedition participants ' business practices with what they had seen in Africa in order to identify the common cultural principles and patterns of development behind such dissimilar phenomena. At the same time, the regularities understood and mastered served as the basis for deducing managerial consequences for the development of companies. As a result, the participants of the expedition were able to make sure that it is culture-accounting and the ability to use its features and properties, and not abstract designed business processes-that influence the success of activities, creating both powerful and effective solutions.-

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opportunities, as well as equally powerful barriers to success.

Here are just some of the most important questions put forward for the study: What are the signs of strong, viable crops? What exactly should be taken from cultures (and business companies were also considered as special cultures) in order to understand the circumstances and conditions of successful activity? What is the relationship between culture and development processes? What mechanisms ensure the rise or decline of culture, and in companies create the power of employees to move to success, or reduce all the efforts of managers to zero? How to transfer knowledge and experience across cultural borders? What can really be changed in cultures and how can you change cultures by developing them and yourself within them? What are the real limits of a person's and an organization's freedom due to their belonging to a particular culture?

All this was to be understood using the examples of the cultures of the peoples of the countries of West Africa-Benin, Togo and Ghana, drawing a "living parallel" between them and the cultures of the enterprises managed by the managers participating in the expedition. It was necessary to see and analyze the results of the development of autochthonous beliefs and their interaction with world religions, historical and modern evidence of the development of cultures of living ethnic groups and nationalities of past times. The idea was to use the parallels between the phenomena of different realities in West Africa to better understand the phenomenon of culture itself, the features of different cultures that are necessary today for an active business person at "cultural intersections", and the possibilities of developing the cultures of their own enterprises.

By the beginning of the expedition, all preparations were completed. Invaluable assistance was provided by a Beninese graduate of RUDN University, Candidate of Technical Sciences Jules Yamonchet, who became a full member of the expedition team.

The expedition passed through the southern regions of Benin (Litoral, Oueme, Zou, Atlantean, Mono departments), crossed from south to north, and then from north to south of Togo (from the capital of the country, Lome, through the Palime valley, the cities of Atakname, Sokode, Kara to the Tamberma Valley and back) Finally, I visited central and southern Ghana (Kumasi, Accra, Cape Coast and Kakum National Park).

The route was designed so that in a two-week period, you can "pass through" and comprehend what you saw in three so-called "traditional kingdoms" and at audiences with their rulers, among five nationalities, in seven museums, three forts, seven cities, eight settlements, and two protected natural territories. As well as hold a number of meetings with representatives of business, political and scientific circles. Of course, the schedule of movements and daily creative workshops (classes) it was dense and even, one might say, super-dense - the very research tension was created, under which serious results can appear.

AFRICAN LESSONS OF THE "LIVING PARALLEL"

About learning to read symbols

From the first steps in Benin, and then in Togo and Ghana, the participants of the expedition felt how clearly the symbolic beginning is expressed in the cultures of Africa, how rich they are in various symbols in content and form, which are, in fact, the language of culture, i.e. a means of preserving and transmitting cultural information, its multi-valued meanings. Even L. White (1900-1975), one of the "pillars" of anthropological science, showed that the symbol is the unit of all human behavior and civilization, that human behavior is, first of all, symbolic behavior, and the ability to think symbolically is a property of all living beings inherent only in man3. Although the group of participants of the expedition consisted of educated people, i.e. capable of intensive symbolization, the variety and ambiguity of unfamiliar symbols initially puzzled them. However, in the future, it was this phenomenon of living, talking symbolism that became the basis for the expedition participants to understand both Africa and themselves.

Here are just a few examples of how symbols actually work the same way in culture and business.

In the pre-colonial Kingdom of Dahomey (in what is now Benin), each new supreme ruler erected a new palace in the country's capital, Abomey, filled with new symbols and attributes of power, including the throne, which he ascended under a special motto created especially for him. All these subjects were inspired with the idea of a new era associated with the change of power, of the coming changes that promised them even greater prosperity.-

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the country - greatness; the special meaning of the rule of each monarch was established. Changing the scenery in the offices of managers in companies is just as important as in the offices of newly elected or appointed politicians. Only in modern culture is the meaning of symbolism and its replacement rarely expressed so clearly.

In the Museum of Slavery in the capital of Benin, Porto Novo, there are exhibits that tell what slaves exported from West Africa to the New World received, and their descendants inherited the names of their owners as a special sign of belonging to them. (It is no coincidence that one of the most prominent ideologists of the fight against racial segregation in the United States, Malcolm Little, called on African-Americans to from their surnames, as a symbol of the slave status of their ancestors, and he began to be called Malcolm X.) It is this symbolic work that is also fixed in modern branding as a technology for positioning and increasing the awareness of products for consumers (a unique brand, an umbrella brand, etc.).

A real fireworks display of symbolism could be observed in Kumasi (Ghana) during the Adae holiday, one of the main events for the Ashanti people - the creators of the famous Ashanti Confederation, which in the late XIX - early XX centuries withstood seven (!) wars with the British colonialists. This is the day when the living ruler re-strengthens the sacred connection with the spirits of his ancestors, which is considered absolutely necessary for maintaining the well-being of the entire people.

It is enough to look at the bundles of keys that the courtiers carry behind the king to immediately understand that all the doors of the kingdom are open to him and even wider-the worlds of people and the spirits of their ancestors. Modern business etiquette teaches exactly the same thing: a business person must have an expensive watch, briefcase, shoes and other attributes of well - being-all these are signs of prosperity and respectability. They serve both as a symbol of success already achieved and as a condition for future success, as they are designed to inspire confidence in the great professional capabilities of a businessman among partners and clients.

It was for the sake of observing and understanding such parallels that the expedition was conducted. After all, the success of modern companies also depends on the work of symbols - this is increasingly recognized in public rhetoric about organizational culture. Many managers of both business giants (Philips, OCS, Google, H. Stern, Land Rover, etc.) and regional companies (Forus, Miel, MTS, etc.) care about reasonable symbolic positioning of the business space. But in Africa, it became clear that in order to fully use it, it is necessary to specifically teach staff, customers and partners how to correctly read the symbols offered to them. Without this work, the rich possibilities of symbols remain unrealized, and they themselves turn into nothing more than decorations.

During a Voodoo ritual in the Beninese city of Ouida, the expedition members were able to observe how the priests were engaged in learning to read symbols, fixing their "correct" meanings in the minds of believers. It was a ritual performed on the local New Year, connected with the comprehension of the universal struggle between good and evil - good and evil spirits, in which good wins without fail, but not completely: evil spirits are expelled and are deprived of the opportunity to harm people, but they can return, and therefore the rite of their expulsion must be repeated from year to year.

It is noteworthy that everyone from young to old takes part in the ceremony, which lasts more than an hour. This eliminates the possibility of the emergence of subcultures that blur the cultural homogeneity of the ethnic group. Of course, this reduces the transformational potential of the culture, since it violates the principle of "minimal diversity". But this also achieves its vitality, which, as it were, freezes the meanings necessary for life in symbols. Children who participated in the ritual and clung to the expedition participants in fear will never forget that good overcomes evil, but it is necessary to constantly be on the lookout, because evil can return.

About the work of values in us

As the outstanding psychologist L. S. Vygotsky (1896-1934) argued, personality is only about values.4 The color of a person's eyes, skin, temperament, height, weight, and many other differences do not determine their personality in any way. It is rooted only in the structure of human values and manifests itself in the work that values do in us. In this regard, the value approach to culture is extremely interesting. According to him, human behavior is a behavior determined by values, and culture is a reality in which the movements of all objects are associated with values and contribute to the change of values.

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Traveling through Benin, Togo and Ghana allowed us to "open windows" into some layers of the culture understood in this way. For example, it became apparent that values could not be placed in a hierarchical order on any single scale, such as the power of progress scale, as European scientists and philosophers have so often tried to do since the Enlightenment. The members of the expedition, on the other hand, were convinced that in Africa (and indeed nowhere else) the value of progress that might have been induced by European intervention did not become dominant, did not turn into a value in itself, suppressing all others. Rather, on the contrary, this value only outwardly colored the way of African life, which continues in its own direction. In this direction, most likely, the achievements that separate a civilization from "barbarism"are not created independently. But the scale of barbarism that civilization creates by following its values is not generated either.

Each value, or class of values, refers to certain problems that arise in the course of the historical development of culture. For example, the values of modern artistic scarification (scarring) of African faces are a legacy and transformation of the need for people to recognize each other's ancestral identity. The need to survive and escape from the warlike Dahomey people in the specific conditions of savanna-covered Northern Togo was the impetus for the emergence in the XVII century of the entire value way of life of the Tamberma people (otherwise called Batammariba or batammaliba) - the population of the Tamberma Valley. Their fortress dwellings still resemble the trunks of baobabs, in which, according to legend, their ancestors were buried.

And the solution of the same problem at the same time, but in completely different conditions - on Lake Nokue in Benin - led to the fact that the way of life of the Tofinu people living in those parts turned out to be completely different. Tofina built settlements from houses on stilts right on the water. The largest of them - Ganvier-in travel guides and advertising booklets for travelers is called nothing less than"African Venice".

It turns out that the problem - value relationship is a tool for purposeful development of cultures in organizations. At the same time, the need to solve the same problem, even if it actualizes the same values, depending on the specific situation, can give rise to different forms of manifestation of these values and lead to different, and equally effective, solutions to the problem.

Each value has its own story. As a rule, it contains "intersperses" of other, more ancient values, the formation of which was once a response to the challenges of other problems. For example, such a historical amalgam is undoubtedly formed by the values that determine the preservation of traditional monarchies to this day within all three modern republican states visited by the expedition. You can try to reconstruct the history of each value in order not only to rely on it in your current activities, but also to consciously direct its further transformation. We are talking about the explanatory possibility of value research of culture, which, in turn, allows us to rely on the understanding of culture with its values in practical activities of any kind, including in business.

At the same time, values are often in a complex - at the same time contradictory and complementary - relationship with each other. Thus, the participants of the expedition were not only very pleased, but also surprised to meet at the University of Abomey-Kalawi, the main university of Benin, with teachers who were trained in the USSR and Russia. What was surprising was that even though they are completely identical to the context of modern African life, they conduct department meetings in Russian, preserving and reviving the value of belonging to the cohort of Soviet-Russian graduates.

A similar effect can be recognized in a phenomenon that has a completely different history - in

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the ubiquitous juxtaposition of symbols of Christianity and autochthonous beliefs, which has become valuable for residents of African cities and villages and reflects the breadth of the phenomena of bireligiosity and religious syncretism among them.

A striking example of the same phenomenon is the combination in the "king" of the city of Anejo (in the Togolese Republic; during the slave trade under the name of Petit Popo - this city was known as one of its centers) of a traditional ruler, a symbol of the socio-cultural identity of his people and a completely modern person in terms of outlook and interests, a successful businessman. It turns out that in these cases, with different history of occurrence and different manifestations, the values behind the mentioned facts, or rather, groups of values, express the same characteristic features of the worldview inherent in modern Africans. In order to understand the possibilities of behavior of an organization (including a business company) in a certain situation, each value should be considered as a point of coincidence, condensation and accumulation of many of its components of a common plan for this class of values.

Values appear only when the context changes. An interesting experience of exposing valuables took place in the village of tamberma. Upon arrival in the village, we were advised to first meet the chief, who, according to custom, should allow communication with the inhabitants. So it was done. The chief received us with dignity and generously let us go for a walk around the village. He had that confidence that distinguishes a caring host and patron of a small, but lively and beautiful people in their own way. But all this instantly disappeared as soon as his "subjects" began trying to sell their crafts to guests from Europe.

The chief actively intervened and explicitly demanded that the villagers immediately stop trading: only he could decide what to sell and at what price. The lesson for the expedition managers in this case was that context change is a powerful management technique that distinguishes a wise leader from others.

This and many other examples confirmed that it is only when the context changes that the original motive of behavior "hides" in the depths of the human soul, what values are behind it.

Thus, during the expedition, its participants could repeatedly see that a value-based approach to culture creates rich opportunities for its understanding and use in management. In particular, the relativity of cultural values has become obvious to them. When a person does not go beyond the limits of his own culture, its values and norms seem natural to him, and therefore the only correct one. Looking into the mirrors of other cultures allowed us to better understand both the world of their values and our own culture, and to better know ourselves.

Playing, play

For a modern person who finds himself in the African outback for the first time, the truly shocking thing is, of course, not the color of his skin or the multiplicity of languages of its inhabitants-he is already used to living in a world of "different colors" and "different voices". I am surprised, first of all, by the unfamiliar rules that the world obeys in this region. And since "surprise is the beginning of thinking", it is from this moment that the understanding comes that culture is a game. As the outstanding cultural historian Johan Huizinga (1872-1945) famously put it, "culture does not come out of the game like a living fetus that separates from its mother's body - it develops in the game and as a game. All cultural creativity is a game. " 5

Slow, up to three-hour cooking sessions in a restaurant, for example, in Porto Novo, is a game that was invented here, where in ordinary life a meal is not a restaurant, but a purely domestic activity. And as soon as it became clear that these were the rules of this game, the worries and expectations of the expedition participants disappeared, and the return games began - there were no conflicts.

Carnivals with masks covering the faces of members of the Egungun secret society, in Abomei, in honor of the new ruler and the new government is a game with deep meaning. So through the game, an innovation is mastered, which brings with it a new chapter in the history of the people of the background. Similarly, genuinely and festively wise CEOs should "play innovation" in their companies. In order for the necessary changes to take place in the company, they are said to "take place twice": once in the area of designed business processes, and then in the minds of employees. And the best tool for managing organizational change can be a game.

A surprisingly vivid example of games as regulators of the social world order was the various initiation rites that exist among various African peoples to this day. Here, initiation-play acts as a public right to start a new life in the form of either a marriage license, or inclusion in the council of elders, or some other change in a person's social status that is visible to all and recognized by all.

The publicity of these games removes any possibility of doubt about the legitimacy of the change and detachment from its consequences. The lesson is that in management, you should play the right games and play with inspiration. Then it becomes both a way to influence and a way to create spaces of personal comfort for managers. In addition, it is known that management is about decisions. Management is made up of decisions, and only by decisions does it realize itself.

The vast majority of decision-making theories focus on the logical basis for choosing the best alternative from a variety of alternatives. However, each manager eventually begins to understand that, in addition to logical action, decisions are volitional acts. It can be argued that in the modern business world, even a good logician is inferior in success to someone who is able to make decisions by will. And it turns out that one of the most effective ways to teach this crucial competence is to play.

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To do this, it releases the necessary energy in the "player", teaches behavior in constraints, sets the order of behavior that the act of making decisions makes immutable.

An equally valuable lesson for managers was learning about the diverse forms of marriage that exist in Africa. In particular, the members of the expedition communicated with people who are in both polygamous and monogamous marriages. And here, too, we can talk about a game, but "invented" by the culture itself, and with one goal-to ensure the greatest survivability of its carrier (people) in the specific conditions of its existence.

This circumstance underlines the main message of the expedition-culture as a resource for development. For a company to succeed, it is necessary to create exactly those games that can increase its vital energy in the specific context of its activities. Some games are needed to survive in conditions of total state control over doing business, others - with market freedom, and still others - with the emergence of a strong ambitious company development strategy. Only in the artificial life of social groups, which is created in organizations, the situation is more complicated. When playing the "right" games, you need to monitor the roles that managers find themselves in with their companies.

And, of course, it was impossible not to pay attention to the "recipe games" that voodoo priests play with their followers. In this sense, perhaps the strongest impression on the participants of the expedition was made by the "fetish department" of the Dantokpa market in Benin's largest city of Cotonou - one of the largest markets in Africa. The picture of a brisk trade in monkey skulls, the remains of small rodents and other "preparations" for sacrificial offerings on altars, a rare way of collecting herbs and other unthinkable paraphernalia necessary for magically ensuring a prosperous life, cannot but evoke an emotionally colored and at the same time simple thought: playing, play for real! And only then will a miracle take place-the luck that is so necessary for the success of any business will come.

RESULTS AND PLANS

For some of the managers who participated in the expedition, it ended only two months after they returned home, when they completed a written analysis of the state and prospects for the development of the organizational culture of their companies through the prism of what they saw and understood in West Africa. After that, they were expected to defend their MBA diploma. And all the participants of the expedition left a long intellectual "aftertaste"from it. What's in it?

Understanding the unity of principles ("living parallel") of the existence and development of cultures of various kinds and scales-from a business company to the state. Understanding that it is possible to manage the development of organizations through the development of organizational culture, and, moreover, this is the most powerful way to transform them.

The idea of leadership deployed on the flags of Western management, devoid of cultural and historical meaning, is pernicious: leadership should not be a desire to get ahead of others, but a desire to lead them. Observation of living samples of historical, socio-cultural experience is a prerequisite for the development of managers - without this, the formation of their competencies is like incomplete laboratory experiments; "salon" training of "business masters" in a changing world should be perceived as flawed. The variety of forms of training in modern management should be heavily colored in the colors of cultural and historical comparative studies; Africa is the most fertile "workshop" for this, and "Living Parallel" is a promising, modern, in fact, educational technology.

There has not yet been a serious demand for anthropology, history, and cultural studies on the part of business in general and business education in particular in Russia and other post-Soviet states - it is only maturing, but it is already clear that deriving recipes for the success of the business world from the chaotic experiments of precocious "system builders" and many other apologists of postmodernism is a false path in management. It is necessary to focus not on abstract supposedly universal schemes, but on culturally colored, and therefore obviously in each case specific models of business development, i.e. an anthropologized, "humanized" understanding of business is required, which can ensure its union with the humanities in the field of business education.

* * *

We are convinced that two expeditions of managers to Africa within the framework of the Living Parallel research and education project have played an important role in strengthening ties between science and business in the post-Soviet countries. However, their co-organizers are not going to stop there: young employees of the Institute of Africa have already developed two new routes: Ethiopia - Djibouti and Senegal-Gambia. These are new "roads that we choose", paths that will search for answers to questions that are important not only for business success, but also for a person's awareness of their place in the cultural universe.


1 For the Institute of Africa, this expedition was already the second in recent years experience of conducting research in this country-see: Bondarenko D. M., Banshchikova A. A., Kavykin O. I. Expedition of the Institute of Africa of the Russian Academy of Sciences in the Republic of Benin / / New Russian Humanitarian Studies. 2008, N 3 (http://www.nrgumis.ru/articles/article_tull.php?aid-84&binn_rubrik_pl_articles-209).

2 См., например: Barad K. Meeting the Universe Halfway: Quantum Physics and the Entanglement of Matter and Meaning. Durham; London: Duke University Press, 2007; Latour B. Reassembling the Social: An Introduction to Actor-Network Theory. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005.

White L. 3 Izbrannoe: Nauka o kul'tury [Selected Works: Science of Culture]. Moscow, ROSSPEN Publ., 2004. It was Leslie White who coined the term "cultural studies" in 1939 and singled it out as an independent discipline.

Vygotsky L. S. 4 History of the development of higher mental functions. Collected works in 6 volumes. Vol. 3. Moscow, Pedagogika. 1983. pp. 5-313.

Huizinga J. Homo Ludens. Man playing, Moscow, EKSMO-PRESS, 2001, p. 277.


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This article examines the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow maritime artery connecting the Persian Gulf with the Gulf of Oman, which holds critical importance for global energy supplies. Based on analysis of geographical characteristics, economic statistics, and current events from February-March 2026, the article reconstructs the comprehensive significance of the strait and the consequences of its blockade. Particular attention is devoted to the geopolitical context of the ongoing conflict between Iran and the US-Israel led coalition, as well as the potential impact on global oil, gas, and related product markets.
Catalog: География 
3 days ago · From Kenya Online
Foreign Leaders Whose Elimination Has Been Attributed to the United States
4 days ago · From Kenya Online
Which national leaders were killed by the United States?
4 days ago · From Kenya Online
This article examines the phenomenon of United States involvement in operations to eliminate foreign leaders, which has gained renewed attention in connection with the dramatic events of 2025–2026—the abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and the death of Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in a joint US-Israeli strike. Based on analysis of historical documents, expert assessments, and international legal norms, the evolution of US approaches to using coercive methods for regime change is reconstructed. Particular attention is devoted to the contradiction between the official ban on political assassinations and the persistent practice of their application under new legal justifications.
5 days ago · From Kenya Online
This article examines the phenomenon of the United States' involvement in operations aimed at eliminating foreign leaders, which has gained new resonance in connection with the high-profile events of 2025–2026—the abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and the death of Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei as a result of an American-Israeli strike. Based on analysis of historical documents, expert assessments, and international-law norms, the evolution of the United States' approaches to the use of force for regime change is reconstructed. Special attention is paid to the contradiction between the official prohibition on political assassinations and the continuing practice of their use under new legal justifications.
6 days ago · From Kenya Online
This article examines the critical strategic question of whether Russia possesses the capability to destroy the United States with a nuclear first strike while successfully precluding a devastating retaliatory response. Based on analysis of open-source intelligence, strategic force postures, official statements, and expert commentary, this study deconstructs the technical, operational, and doctrinal dimensions of this question. Particular attention is devoted to the structure of Russian strategic forces, the capabilities of the US nuclear triad and early warning systems, the role of automatic retaliatory systems like "Perimeter," and the fundamental strategic stability paradigm that has defined US-Russian relations for decades.
7 days ago · From Kenya Online
This article provides a comprehensive examination of the Tomahawk cruise missile, one of the most versatile and widely used precision-guided weapons in the modern military arsenal. Based on analysis of official defense sources, historical combat records, and technical specifications, the article reconstructs the evolution, design, and strategic role of this weapon system. Particular attention is devoted to its guidance technology, combat history, recent modernization into Block V variants, and the geopolitical implications of its potential transfer to Ukraine.
7 days ago · From Kenya Online

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