MAKING OF THE CONTEMPORARY WORLD

One of the central pieces of reading for this week was the Economist article “A Hopeful Continent,” which attempted to offer a different view of Africa than is typically depicted in Western Media – which is to say, something other than an entire continent in constant crisis. The article opens by describing the general situation in Africa as undergoing improvement, stating that “many goods and services that used to be scarce… are now widely available.” It also says that the situation has improved because “a booming economy has made a big difference.”

It is difficult to say how accurate a picture this paints of the actual situation on the continent. The Economist clearly attempts to paint a picture that an neoliberal economy can eventually be built in Africa that will produce prosperity the way it has in Europe and North America, and to a somewhat lesser extent China and East Asia.

Weather or not this is possible, however, is certainly questionable. The Western World is capable of extreme material prosperity is large part because it is able to benefit from exploitation of African resources. Indeed, this exploitation is ongoing, and now with Chinese interests becoming prevalent in much of Africa (something unmentioned in the article) it seems unlikely that African economies will free themselves from this type of exploitation, especially under a profits-focused neoliberal model (after all, for a few members of the population, the exploitation of their countrymen is quite profitable.)

The apparent alternative to this would be some type of advocacy for a leftist economic model where private ownership of resources is either eliminated or sharply curtailed. It may be worth asking, however, how this system could be established now when in the past commercial interests always thwarted it in some way. And furthermore, it is worth asking if such a system would solve the problem of widespread poverty – after all, the original problems facing African states (arbitrary borders, lack of basic infrastructure) would remain. Would these problems by themselves be enough to destabilize a state that attempted to divy up resource profits to the general population? It certainly is not impossible.

All this consideration comes down to a simple and unsatisfying statement about African economies: there is no sure way to fix problems with them. What is certain is that while the Economist’s attempt to dispel with Western fictions about Africa is admirable, but seems to be somewhat lazy in contemplating the actual economic challenges facing Africa.

The first thing that comes to mind when you hear the word Africa isn’t prosperity but rather failure. An article called A Hopeful Continent, from the news source, The Economist explains that in most cases this is far from the truth. In fact some places in Europe could be considered worse off than those in Africa.  This quote from the article sums up the impact of African media coverage of Moldova,  “They inspire pity and disbelief, just as tales of disease and disorder in Africa have long done in the rich world” (The Economist Pg 1). This is the kind of reaction that you would think people from the western world would give when hearing about Africa. But when one hears about the continent it seems that all there is to talk about is the bad. Most media especially the news thrives off of sad and depressing stories more often than good ones. Can you blame a person for thinking that Africa is a backwater continent is that’s all the media represents it as? I believe that as time goes on this representation will change, as the article stated things are getting better, not everywhere is perfect but it is also far from terrible. As Africa’s economy grows as a whole more money will flow into the continent and will continuously progress until this backwards representation of the continent changes.

Imperialism created the Africa we see today. For example, in British colonies, “colonial policy also depended on constructions of racial differences” (Pierre 18) and in the French colonies as “’Blacks’ (or ‘Africans’) [were racialized] through both its political and juridical practices” (18). These racial divisions created racial distress between Africans. The north, seen as white, and south, seen as black, was created by Europeans. At the same time, Ancient Egyptian culture was decided to be a European history and written as a white society, practically stealing it from African culture and dividing Africans in classes they did not construct themselves. Europeans saw black Africans as unable to create such culture meaning that ancient Egyptians must have been white. Simultaneously, this division by European imperialistic powers created a Pan-African identity as Africans began to construct an identity based around the anti-imperialism efforts that is still seen today.

During the depression, white settlers in Africa “used local political power and influence to deny Africans access to land effectively ‘proletarianizing’ them” and using them as an inexpensive labor pool. (Bayley 89-90) After the depression and World War II, a push towards African independence occurred as European countries were more tired, had less money, and no longer wanted to put the work into maintain their colonies. This led to a tumultuous decolonization process as these African colonies were not prepared to rule themselves. They were not industrialized nor educated how to nor did they have easily available resources as Europeans had taken them. As new African countries scrambled to create an economy, ethnic division rose as European powers created come countries that divided cultural groups, and some that forced together hated people. As African groups fought each other, power voids were created as Europeans fled the continent. This is seen in Guinea-Bissau as “no president has served a full term since independence from Portugal in 1974.” (The Economist)

In our lectures concerning the colonization of the African continent, we briefly discussed a topic that I believe still cripples it to this day. When Europe decided to colonize, they needed to find a sort of justification for seizing power. In many, if not most cases this justification hinged on the so-called “white man’s burden”. The concept that white men in their “biological superiority” had not only the right but the obligation to bring civilization to the inferior men of Africa. This sense of superiority was likely developed over centuries of African enslavement. In any event, this idea that was perpetuated by colonial governments still lies under the surface of global politics today. Pierre writes “Indeed without its ‘colonial conditions of possibility,’ the epistemological and political project that is Africa ‘would hardly exist in its current form.'”(pg 23). The view of Africa and of Africans that was established in the colonial era have made it exceedingly difficult for African nations to act on the world stage due to the truckload of misinformation in current media representation of the continent. In at least my personal experience the media has portrayed Africa as a place of abject poverty and mass starvation. Media is fond of covering the wars and the spread of diseases. This crime would be fewer egregious were they to provide the accurate context of how these nations came to be in these situations . for that matter the representation of Africa in the teaching of history also appears to be wholly inadequate in dispelling the inherent racism that still remains from the old colonial rulers. Pierre also points out that this effect is exaggerated by the “denial of agency of so-called Africans to define themselves.” ( pg 23) Africans must be given that opportunity, but until then the context of history must be shared both by history classes and the media.

The process of decolonization in Africa changed the course Africa was on forever. From a continent largely occupied by European powers to a continent of independent nations. One of the negative ramifications of the decolonization was the power vacuum created in many African nations and the potential for unruly governments and leaders to fill those voids. Political turmoil has been a constant in Africa since decolonization as the newly independent nations are trying to find their way. Many African nations have seen dictators, protests, uprisings, war much of what Europe went through in the 19^th and 20^th century. Much of this political turmoil and war can still be seen in recent years.

 

The Economist article, A Hopeful Continent, talks about the hope that Africa is turning a new leaf. A new leaf in terms of less political turmoil, wars and fighting, and improvement of governing. The Economist may not be the most unbiased news source, they still provide evidence for a shift in Africa, a shift for the better. Specifically, with war, the article highlights the point that “several big conflicts across the continent have died down” (4). It highlighted the end of wars in Ethiopia and Mozambique. The article also points at though that general violence is down across the country, that does not mean it is over. In general, the article is discussing the upward trend they see in Africa, while many might not see it yet, it is there. Not that it is completely changed and perfect, there are still much political turmoil and violence but it is improving.

The process of decolonization in Africa had many interesting, positive and negative ramifications for the continent and the entire world. Regardless of the questions of how, why, and in what way decolonization occurred, African independence had ripple effects in many branches of academia. It seems clear from the various readings and lectures from this class that imperialism was a major factor in pushing the racist platform of the imperialists forward. The ideas of social darwinism and the ‘white savior’ aided the agendas of imperialist leaders back home. The conquest of Africa helped alleviate political and class tensions, giving the people of imperialist Europe something to focus on. However, long after slavery was abolished in almost every corner of the world and colonization became a thing of the past, the idea of Africa as an inferior continent because of the people that inhabit it was shockingly persistent. Racism is, of course, still a major problem in both Africa and almost anywhere people of African descent might live. Even now, the idea of the ‘white savior’ has not fully disappeared.

The study of Africa as a continent stretches back hundreds of years. For much of its history, as explained by Jemima Pierre in Critical Terms for the Study of Africa, the field of African Studies was based on racist views held by Western people and scholars. The study of economic development, however, largely ignored Africa until the process of decolonization began. Instead, it focused on countries like the United States. It asked why the Great Depression was so damaging, how it could be avoided, and why the US economy was so successful in the years following the second World War. But as African nations were earning their independence, the field of economic development shifted its focus from the most developed economies in the world to the least. Development economists started asking how to bring Africa as a whole out of poverty and into prosperity.

Much of this early work was concurrent with African independence. The 1950s and ’60s were a time of significant development in the field of development. But as time passed, it became clear that no one macro-level strategy would cure poverty in all of Africa. Some strategies worked for some countries for some time, while others found only stagnation when they attempted to emulate their neighbors. There were complicating factors, as there always are, but the vision of Africa as a collection of many separate but alike nations was fundamentally flawed.

The discipline began to shift again. Perhaps, if there was no solution for the entire continent, it was better to look at the problem on a nation by nation basis. Determining policy and economic strategy to eradicate poverty in a single country is easier than for an entire continent consisting of dozens of independent governments. The idea that there was a single golden economic development story was no longer considered reasonable. This perspective is mirrored in the article from the Economist. The reporter focuses on Africa by region, pushing the narrative that Africa is a continent faced with challenges, but in a position to succeed.

The Economist is a fundamentally conservative institution, and this perspective of Africa, as the one before it, is declining in popularity. The field of economic development in many ways is examining even more specific entities, for instance, conducting studies on how to boost education or female decision making power on a local level. Both of these factors have been significantly linked to the development of a country’s economy, and this is the kind of thing development economists are beginning to focus on.

Even now, the idea of economic development in the United States focusing on Africa is perhaps disquieting. After all the years of racism and discrimination, is this form of aid anything better than the ‘white savior’ idea from the time of imperialism? Is economic development in the West condescending or humanitarian? If aid were to discontinue, would that be a sign of recognizing the implicit racism, or would it be turning a blind eye to those in need? It seems hard to believe that aid today is motivated directly by the ‘white savior’ idea, but perhaps the drive to lend such aid is derived from a lingering sentiments of a time when it would not have been so unbelievable.