Bulletins from a War Zone
A revival in politically conscious reggae is finding a global audience, says Adeola Johnson.
Musical mythology has it that there has been no conscious Jamaican reggae since the early 1980s. Radical prime minister Norman Manley's economic reform programme had been brought to a halt by the International Monetary Fund and the CIA. Bob Marley intervened in the 1980 election to quell the violent gang rivalries of Manley and his opposition challenger Edward Seaga, and for a moment it seemed that reggae could succeed where politicians failed.