The Post-War Careers of Ex-Servicemen in Ghana and Uganda

This article argues that, relatively few individual exceptions, the primary effect of the large-scale recruitment of Africans into British forces during World War II was not the radical transformation of the serving men into modernised, politically active citizens with a national outlook. Instead, the service provided a concentrated exposure for 470,000 men to basically the same modernising influences which were already being felt in their home territories. This exposure increased the potential for popular interest and participation in politics; but, as the diverse post-war record shows, involvement in a specialised form of the modernisation process did not mean a change in established values and beliefs or in the direction of ex-servicemen's political support.