THE HORROR.

[lliam]

THE HORROR in the Sudan raises the old, old question. What is wrong with Africa? Why, no matter how many billions we send or how much debt we write off, it is such a shambles? From the northern border of South Africa to the Mediterranean there is no sign of progress and not a single fair, free and functioning democracy. Why?
:confused:

<small>[ 08-02-2004, 10:43 AM: Message edited by: lliam ]</small>

[Selma in Sandy Eggo]

Ahem. I'd like to point out that I don't think lliam should extract a paragraph out of a post on another subject, use it to start up a different topic. Quoting out of context is rarely accurate in spirit and almost never acceptable to me. I'd appreciate my words being left where I put 'em.

Re Africa: I dunno. Except to note in passing that the simple application of cash does not always solve problems.

[RC]

Ahem, from some other thread:

Haggis
3rd Chair


posted 03-25-2004 12:05 PM
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I thought this was interesting and confess I was only peripherally familiar with the name Norman Borlaug I’m curious what others think.

If I’m a liberal about anything it is this; I believe all humans have the right to live peacefully, free, and without the threat of hunger. Another one of those “significant emotional events” for me was Somalia. There I saw the evil that some men are capable of: starving men, women and children in the name of power and political gain. In case you didn’t realize, Somalia grew plenty of food, I saw thousands of acres of corn, wheat and fruit rotting because the violence and deliberate calculations of a few people prevented the harvesting and plunged most of the country into starvation.

In this article it seems some of us are struggling with two “moral” stands,

1. Should we let them stave to death to preserve the continent from chemical farming methods?

2. Or, should we let them starve to death to preserve Malthusian theory?

Pretty stark choices

Malthusian theory is fascinating and worth a study.

[haggis]

"Malthusian theory is fascinating and worth a study."

No, its not and, no, its not. The theory was disproved as crap as early as the middle of the last century.

There is absolutely no reason for anyone in the Africa, or indeed the world, to go hungry. We (mankind in general and the U.S. in particular) have (and have had for decades) the power to feed the world. Full stop.

That we are not allowed to do so, mainly by European Union and especially French edicts to countries in Africa is so despicable and foul that hell must exist if for no other reason than to accommodate those people.

[RC]

If you hadn't studied the Malthusian theory, you wouldn't be able to say it was crap.

What's interesting about Malthus ideas is what his motives were in writing his paper...very suspect, and the reason his theories are equated as crap by many.

I also find Hilter's propoganda tactics worth a study and intensely interesting. Having taken a long look, I recognize it when I see it now.

[dai bread]

You let them starve to death because if you don't the warlord will. That's not a good choice either, but it's what happened in Somalia and I believe it's happened elsewhere. The warlord simply sends in his thugs and takes the Aid agency's supplies.

As for Africa, a recent immigrant from South Africa (White) told me that "Africa's f****d". In so many words. BTW, not all migrants from SA are White. The men who installed my new hot water cylinders were Coloured.

Europeans went thru the warlord stage centuries ago. I have no idea why they came out of it and Africans didn't.

<small>[ 07-30-2004, 05:17 PM: Message edited by: dai bread ]</small>

[rwcrooks]

Haggis,

Three points:
First, Malthus disproved as crap. Hilarious, since he predicted that a city the size of NY wouldn't be able to clear away all of the horse crap if growth continues.

Second, when I was in college The Club of Rome issued a paper called "The Limits to Growth" which may make some pretty funny reading 40+ years later.

Third, my old college professor, Buckmister Fuller, in his design science classes and seminars continually said that we can feed, clothe and shelter everyone on Earth if we only wanted to. We used to play and all weekend game called The World Game (as I recall) that proved this point. By the way the USPS is issuing a Bucky stamp!

[rwcrooks]

Lliam,

Look at the areas where the population still strongly identify with a tribal or small ethnic group (Africa, the Middle East and to some extent the Balkans) and those areas where society has gone past tribal identification (Germany and the rest of Europe, North and South America) and you might find an answer to your question.

[RC]

RichC,

Good point. What makes them cling to tribal or small ethnic group mentality?

Haggis,

I have faith in anyone to come to a reasonable conclusion on their own without my help if they are given the opportunity.

Had I not specifically brought Malthus to the fore front of the conversation, a lot of people would have skimmed your post and missed that reference.

If they read it and it didn't ring any bells, I thought it important for them to refresh their memories (or learn it for the first time) to get the emphasis of your post.

The first time you posted this, in March, no one mentioned Malthus again. I figured they missed it.

I hate it when people tell me something is crap, I like to find out on my own whats crap and whats not. I just figured everyone else did too!

[haggis]

As I posted on Nicole's side of the board:

"

I do take some things very personally, and Africa and the world’s attitude towards Africa is one of them.

I’ve been in Africa more times than I want to recall and every time it was on a U.S. military humanitarian mission to feed, to rescue, to help.

Europe abandoned Africa in the last century largely because Europe doesn’t want to admit that several centuries of shameful exploitation and colonization had left the continent in religious, racial, ethnic, political and economic ruin. Mainly caused by Britain and France, but Portugal, Spain, Italy and Belgium have their share of the blame as well.

No one country other than the U.S. has ever pledged ANY assistance or help to Africa and all of a sudden we’re the villains because we have certain expectations of how that aid is to be used? If those expectations so outrage the sensibilities of some should we then withdraw?

RC,

I find you logic re: Malthus somewhat tortured but I'll let that pass.

Europe (France) has told several Africa countries that if the buy GM foods from the U.S. then they will drop what piteous little aid they give them, scaring those countries away from the cheap food they need to feed their people; politics as its nastiest.

Pres. Bush is the only president to ever actually GIVE aid to Africa. Several previous presidents promised but never followed up.

The U.S. is in a position to, with relatively little outlay (comparatively speaking) to save a continent. I find it dismaying that no one in the African American community has championed that aid and that effort.

[The Great Carouser]

Originally posted by Haggis:
Pres. Bush is the only president to ever actually GIVE aid to Africa. Several previous presidents promised but never followed up.

Haggis, I'm with you vis a vis Africa but can't allow the quote to pass without comment. Here's a link from a conservative source about Clinton administration aid to Africa and I can follow it up with many more. WorldNetDaily.com

<small>[ 07-31-2004, 03:19 AM: Message edited by: The Great Carouser ]</small>

[haggis]

GC,
That's why I emphasized the word "give."

It was my understanding that Clinton, and by extension the U.S., failed to make good on most of those pledges mainly because congress wouldn't cough up the money.

I'll see if I can find any of the money in the following year's appropriations.

If I find that we did give the money, I'll change the post.

[RC]

How gracious
(bowing humbley)

I find your conclusion jumping ironic given you're an "investigator"...but I'll let that pass.

A simple "ooops" would have sufficed.

<small>[ 07-31-2004, 06:46 PM: Message edited by: RC ]</small>

[RC]

Asked about United States President George Bush´s proposal for increased aid to developing countries, he said he was pleased at his statement and commitment. That had been a long-awaited and dramatic statement, but it should be put in perspective. However, the effective date would be in fiscal year 2004, while the needs were urgent now.

Also, part of President Bush's statement concerned the need to meet certain criteria before that aid became available to a particular country. It was important to be "generous and not just demanding", he added.

Just 10 days ago, he said, he had visited the only clinic in the Central African Republic, where 267 people were suffering from advanced AIDS, most of them women with small children. There was "zero medicine, zero treatment, zero programmes" for AIDS prevention. The women had just come for a morsel of food to tide them and their babies over for the next day.

He said that 90 per cent of the beds in the local hospital in the capital city of the Central African Republic were filled with AIDS victims. Now, if that country could not receive aid until it proved it was efficient, it would never get the help it needed. "We can´t expect a country to fulfil criteria in advance that might be beyond its reach", Mr. Carter said.

A correspondent said that, notwithstanding President Bush's promise of $5 billion, it seemed that the dominant United States position was that trade was better than aid, and an unseen, but all-seeing, hand of the market would cure all ills. What did he think about that?

Mr. Carter replied that the developed rich nations had imposed trade restrictions on the poorest nations that far exceeded any total aid that they gave. For instance, in agricultural protection alone, "we cost the developing world three times as much as all the overseas development assistance that they received from all sources".

He added that when anyone talked about increased trade as a substitute for supplementing aid, they should look at how those countries were prevented from trading. So, in addition to giving foreign aid, the trade barriers that prevented countries from marketing their only attractive natural resources or produced goods should be reduced.

Replying to a question about whether the United States should pledge to give 0.7 per cent of its GNP to official development assistance (ODA), he said, yes, but that was an unlikely prospect now. Yet, the Europeans had pledged 0.39 per cent of their GNP compared to the United States' one tenth of 1 per cent.
from http://www.un.org/ffd/pressconf/19l.htm

I wonder lately, if we are sufficiently evolved to handle capitalism and democracy. Charity and conscience are very personal. I wonder if you can really thrive without them. Do they need to be mandated?

One of the things that got me on the Bush band wagon when we went after Afghanistan was the emphasis on personal involvment and contribution. I was foolish enough to think it was worth something. Then I saw a local TV broadcast of a donation drive collecting K-Mart clothing and coloring books...?

How disconnected are we?

I know many people who tithe and never give charity another thought.

Haggis is right, our government has done far less than one might think. I think this is like tithing. You pay your taxes and assume all is well.

I'm looking at a possible move to The Gambia, (for the second time). Ironically, it's become a tourist destination...whatever. Thats like going to Mexico, staying in a giant resort and thinking how quaint is the boy selling "Chick-e-lets".

Saw a movie the other night called "The City of God". Great movie about the slums of Rio De Janeiro. It's everywhere!

If you want to feed the world, you have to spread compassion like disease.

I'm trying to think of how many people I know who would be willing to give up their boat to feed a starving family.

Feeling guilty? If your name isn't Mother Teresa or Muhatma Gahndi, I guess you probably do...like me.

<small>[ 07-31-2004, 10:24 PM: Message edited by: RC ]</small>

[lliam]

What I can't understand is, when we’re shown the starving people on the TV the women holding their starving babies, their shrunken breasts that hold no milk for the baby. We're shown the babies that have died. Those same women will produce more babies that will also starve to death. Surely it would be better to stop population growth until the food crisis is sorted out. What do you think?

[Serenity]

End welfare for nations!

http://www.lp.org/issues/foreign-policy.html

[dai bread]

Some thoughts on foreign aid:

It encourages people to move off the land and stop subsistence farming. This is good (see J.K.Galbraith in particular), but nothing is put in place for these people to do. When Europeans were moved off the land there were factories eager to take them. The conditions of employment were dire, but that changed in time. People in the refugee camps have nothing.

Aid is siphoned off all the way along the line. Occasionally some aid worker who's had enough writes an article for our newspaper and says so.

Aid, particularly (as far as NZ is concerned, food aid) is often inappropriate. Some examples have been given in the articles linked to this thread. Another one concerns NZ directly. Once upon a time, whenever there was a disaster in some third-world country, the first thing we would do was to send over a shipment of milk powder. The was considered a Good Thing, and went on for years, until a nurse who had had enough came home & wrote a newpaper aticle. In it, she told us what happened to the milk powder. As anyone in contact with his brain could have foreseen, the locals mixed the powder with water to make milk. They had no refrigeration and no clean water. Result, sickness adding to already substantial problems. Shipments of milk powder stopped almost immediately.

Trade not aid is the story. It's a message we (among others) have been trying to get across for years. Our efforts have been masked by the fact that we're not a 3rd-world country, so people think we're just trying to sell things, but there's more to it than that. Now that the South Americans are exercising some muscle, in conjuction with quite a number of other agricultural exporters, something might be done. Apparently a preliminary agreement has been reached at the WTO conference in Geneva.

The agricultural subsidies of the U.S. and the E.U. are disastrous for developing countries, a big handicap for countries like NZ & Australia, and I think they're probably not very good for the U.S. & E.U. either.

We used to have farm subsidies here too, and there was much wailing & gnashing of teeth when they were abolished more-or-less overnight. But farmers changed what they did & how they did it, and wouldn't return to subsidies if you paid them. Deer farming started at this time, for instance. The end result is that NZ farming is now stronger than ever, particularly dairying.

BTW, we do import agricultural produce from the U.S. & the E.U. Danish blue cheese, for instance, and fruit in our off-season. All nicely subsidised by others.

[barfle]

I posted elsewhere about how the United States could lead the world by example, instead of by force. Many people who could thrive if they practiced practical free trade are turned off by the idea of doing business with the US because we tend to put so many strings on our commerce (What's it take to win the "most favored nation" status?).

It's possible to be wealthy and nice, too. It's a shame we ended up being world leaders by show of force, instead of by shining example.

I recall a book that was quite popular in the early 1960s titled The Ugly American, which dealt with how the United States is viewed overseas. We've made a few changes that make some of the examples in the book obsolete, but we're still pretty much the biggest bully in the neighborhood, instead of a nation that is respected for their moral fiber and their dedication to liberty.

[RC]

Europe abandoned Africa in the last century largely because Europe doesn’t want to admit that several centuries of shameful exploitation and colonization had left the continent in religious, racial, ethnic, political and economic ruin. Mainly caused by Britain and France, but Portugal, Spain, Italy and Belgium have their share of the blame as well.

Don't forget the US who fed the demand for slaves long after many european countries had banned slavery.

In 1787, it was the Brits who established Freetown in Sierra Leone from freed slaves. Freetown was one of the first British colonies in west Africa.

Not all foreign influence was ill willed. Sierra Leone was relatively peaceful and prosperous before gaining independence from the UK from the 1950-1960's.

It took just 10 years for things to fall apart.

I finished a book several months ago written by a a man who set up house in Sierra Leone to do missionary work (in the 1990's I believe).

He abandoned the missionary work in short order and spent the rest of his life just trying to stay one step ahead of the bloodshed and provide whatever assistance he could.

He talked of how disturbing it was that the natives wanted British rule back and actually thought that "blacks" were incapable of ruling there own country. Only white men had this special knowledge. This was coming from the natives themselves.

What disservice was done that that type of knowledge was miscommunicated.

I do remember that some of the men he befriended appeared on an American TV program several years ago (60 Minutes maybe?). They had received prosthetics free in the US because their arms had been hacked off by rebels (RUF). I DO remember how amazed they were at the civilization they witnessed and I DO remember hearing that sentiment from them about whites being granted some special gift for ruling.

I'm so sorry I don't have the title of the book and I've given it away.

Liberia, Sierra Leone's neighbor, was a product of Nation Building by the US. We sent former slaves back to Africa, set up a democracy, set up capitalistic trade, and watched it crumble over the next 150 years into disaray and bloodshed.

If they feel they are somehow inferior, it's going to take more than food handouts to fix the problem.

[Shapley]

RC,

I avoided talking about this becasue of the ease with which ones statements can be misconstrued. The simple fact is that Africa was much more stable and prosperous during colonial times. Not prosperous for everyone, but there was less starvation and poverty overall, even among the "savages", than is exhibited today.

That is not to say that black lack the power to rule themselves. The problem is that the loss of centralized colonial government left a void which was filled by violent men backed by armed groups of brigands. Instead of replacing the oppression of colonial governments with a planned government based on freedom and equality for all, they were replaced by warlords who sought to oppress other groups, generally with a ruthlessness unthought of by the governments they sought to rid themselves of.

I realize this paints all of the continent with a broad brush, and there have been spots of light in the texture of the dark continent, but generally, self government there has been a failure. If nation building can be successful, it needs to be done there. They do not need to return to colonial government, they need to learn the basics of stable self-rule, and implement them.

The nations of Africa are not poor in the strictest sense. There is a wealth of natural resourses that can be obtained there, and their production and sale on the open market would provide the revenue that is currently provided by foreign aid and charity. Few, if any, of the nations of that continent lack valuable resoursed that can provide the financial foundation that is needed. The problem is the political instability that drives the cost of developing those resources higher than the world market is willing to pay. South Africa enjoys the benefits of commerce because the diamond, chromium, and other resource mines were left relatively unmolested by the post-colonial government. Other nations have taken a socialist attitude towards the wealth embodied within their territories, to the end that such wealth will not be obtained till the situation becomes favorable to do so. When that will be is anyones guess, but the smart money lies in later, rather than sooner.

There are educated and capable men within the nations of that continent that have the capability to turn their nations around, but they do not have, nor desire, the military might to establish themselves in a position to do so. Those that employ the military might to obtain a position of leadership, find themselves beholden to the military powers that established them, to the end that they cannot implement the type of reforms that are needed, lest that power turn against them.

V/R
Shapley