This Bulletin issue is based on the premise that policy discussions about the current 'crisis' in African agriculture will not prove useful unless they take into account the political and organisational factors which shape the capacity of states to define and deliver policies. We wish to investigate the hypothesis that many of Africa's economic failures have political foundations, and that the economic crisis is fed by and feeds a political crisis in the developmental role of African states. We focus on agriculture because the human problems it poses are the most urgent and since it lies at the roots of both crises.