| Summary/Abstract |
In 1941 and 1942, a committee of scholars, policy experts, and missionaries met in New York City to discuss the United States’ foreign policy toward Africa. This committee was convened by Anson Phelps Stokes, the founding director of the Phelps-Stokes Fund, a philanthropic organization focused on African American and African education.1 Stokes wanted the United States to play a major role in shaping the politics of the African continent once the Second World War ended. Further, he believed his fund—with its experience in missionary education, close ties to leaders of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), and connections to the State Department—was the ideal body to sway policymakers and “influenc[e] public opinion on wise lines” regarding an eventual postwar settlement in Africa.2 The group Stokes convened came to be called the Committee on Africa, the War, and Peace Aims (CAWPA).
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