question: In this fine-grained study, Bannister demonstrates how the unintended consequences of public health interventions were the result of both the excessive autonomy of the colonial expert and the structural biases of a state committed to imbalanced development. The remarkable density of the empirical record of employees' complaints and workers’ asserted centrality to the national project sheds new light on how Nkrumahism was debated from below, and also demonstrates that in some contexts historians of postcolonial Africa need not be constrained by pessimism about the viability of the governmental archive. In tracing the evolution of radio's developmental purpose from geographical integration to community building, the article challenges assumptions about the relationship between democratization and media liberalization, as well as those between states, non-governmental organizations, and local populations in sustaining the viability of development projects in Africa.