1. Independent Darfur : land, people, history -- The economy and the lie of the land -- Population : a complex ethnic mosaic -- The independent Darfur Sultanate -- Umm Kwakiyya, the time of the bandits -- Ali Dinar and Darfur's last independent years (1898-1916) -- 2. Darfur and Khartoum (1916-1985) : an unhappy relationship -- Colonial benign neglect : romanticism and underdevelopment -- On the margins of history : Darfur and Sudanese nationalism -- Reaching for the centre : the frustrations of democratic politics in Darfur -- The Chadian-Libyan factor : a fundamental element of destabilization -- From maladministration to famine : the 1984 catastrophe -- 3. From marginalization to revolt : manipulated "Arabism" and "racial" anarchy (1985-2003) -- Consequences of the 1984 famine -- Khartoum's "democratic" politics and the Chadian conflict -- Libya's "victory" in Chad, a new Darfur famine and the Daud Bolad insurrection -- Centre versus periphery : Darfur in a global Sudanese perspective -- 4. Fear at the centre : from counter-insurgency to quasi-genocide (2003-2005) -- Centre versus centre : the Islamists' internal quarrels and their spillover into Darfur -- Naivasha and the "feel good factor" -- Khartoum wakes up to the danger -- "Counter-insurgency on the cheap" -- Improvising a "final solution" -- Foreign intervention and death by attrition -- 5. The world and the Darfur crisis -- Media coverage : surfing on the horror charts -- Embattled humanitarianism -- "Shuffling papers while Africans die" : the international community and the Darfur crisis -- Was there a genocide in Darfur or not? -- 6. Darfur Agonistes -- Six months of unfulfilled hopes after the CPA -- The race between peace and growing anarchy -- The growing ethnic anarchy -- The Chadian civil war and its increasing impact -- A false solution: the Darfur Peace Agreement.