And I disagree with you. The solutions themselves are trivial. What's difficult is, as you said, getting the "rich" countries to support it. But these immigration issues don't exist in a vacuum. Why do you think Africans are fleeing Africa? What do you do if all you have is a farm and it dries up? Do you just sit there and die? Do you try to travel to Europe?
I'm very bearish on immigration. I think immigration policies in both the United States and Europe have been so negligent that they might be considered criminal, but I don't think it gets any better or easier if we leave people in Africa to starve or die from war while we keep pumping the atmosphere with CO2.
My point is that it's in our best long-term interest to create stable societies in Africa.
But here we are, and today even the anti-colonial ideologys exclaiming "help to help themselve" sound exausted. Europe has the most interest to stabilize africa, but good ideas on the how to are rare.
I know, colonialism- the excuse for everything- but other countrys where colonized several times over and are back on theire feet or ruling the world by now. And africa is diverse enought to show that colonialism is not just it.
My personal believe is that africa pays the price for bad circumstances (in part due to beeing the craddle of humanity/ bad distribution of croppable plants/ diseases) and living the facists and racists dream: "Constant warfare of one ethnicity against another. Mighty, messianically worshipped leaders, with no bigger aim then keeping the lion pack that brought them to power with corruption from tearing them apart."
My assumption is that if you have this mix, a spiral sets in which optimization is geared towards "surviving and propsering within the cycle of constant strife". The effect is partially visible in other country not on the african continent. To break the cycle, one would have to understand the human adaptions to crisis and strife - and combat the reactions. Create small oasis of prosperty- who can defend against african anti-capitalistic traditions, like leeching of the wealth of wealthy relatives (like public officials- who need constantly bigger bribes to pay this family mafia) and begin the same journey like south korea and south america did.
I guess saying that makes me a racist. And for racists im worser, calling theire gut feelings to "walk in cirles" dangerous. I just think it would be great if africans where the first to build a beanstalk for humanity.
Do you have anything to support this? I am not a global warming/climate change denier, but from what I have read, much of the farming problems is due to population growth and increased strain on existing irrigation sources. I have a hard time making a connection between a bad crop and political instability.
The economics profession has studied these problems for a very long time. If it were simple to do what you suggest then we would have done it. Literally everything has been tried in Development Economics.
> I know that part of the stable government solution involves taking down dictators and other military action
Again, based on what evidence are you making these claims? The story that you can military overthrow dictators and put in a stable government has utterly failed in most cases.
> but this has to also include education, food, medicine, and teaching people how to build things.
Do you have evidence for any of this? Development economics has long ago concluded that 'teaching things' has no long run impact.
Have you ever actually looked at the evidence and history of all these policy's?
Could you point me towards some overview of the issues?
I don't know a book specifically focusing on that issue, but any book on the history of economic development should have some discussion on this problem. There are good books both those that are more populist and the more academic ones. There is also the question do you want to focus on Development Economics specifically or general growth theory. One is more about how you can help somebody grow the other is more fundamentally about why growth happens.
I suggest you start view something more broad then just looking into education. A mooc like this: http://www.mruniversity.com/courses/development-economics-0
The list of books are very long. Something like "The Elusive Quest for Growth: Economists' Adventures and Misadventures in the Tropics" might be a starter. Once you get into the topic you can go in different direction. I am confident that I will also conclude that education by itself will not lead to sustained development.
I'm not sure how to overcome this and I have to admit that at one point or the other I thought that the EU should simply stop providing any help to Africa and just make sure the problems don't swap over here, cause Europe will be blamed anyway - and being blamed for not helping is far cheaper than being blamed for helping. Most of the time, I just hope there's still a solution which doesn't end in a complete disaster.
Never heard of that once. Where did you get it from?
It seems that pretty much all of Africa was affected by colonialism; even "litte" colonial involvment would have dramatic effects. Just upsetting an established government can lead to extreme instability down the road, and redrawing country borders can pit cultures into unresolvable conflicts forever.
A country not affected by colonialism would be Japan which did quite well throughout the years.
Almost all of Africa was in some way effected, but that leaves you with the same problem. Why is Botswana doing fantastically well when Zimbabwe is going down the drain. Why is Tunis doing better then Libya?
We also have to account for the fact that all of these countries were pretty poor before the Europeans arrived as well. So you can really only blame Europeans for them to continue to not do very well.
Colonization is still a very important topic, but more in the context of how it shaped the institutions in those countries. The question we are trying to explain is why are all these countries unable to make sustainable institutional changes NOW.
> A country not affected by colonialism would be Japan which did quite well throughout the years.
Well, first I would argue that Japan culture has been far more effected by the West then the culture of Nigeria or Botswana. Why the Japan is a pretty special and unique case is a separate debate.
The same pattern does not hold for south east Asia for example. The countries not colonized are not doing better then those who have.
Turns out that even under perfect conditions developing a country that was held back just 40 years in its development is extremely difficult.
Africa was held back 1000x more, and in crucial moments in history (industrialization) at that. The situation of Japan is highly relevant as an example what can happen when you have continuity and a stable environment.
It just not as simple, its not linear and then colonialism comes along and is holding you back. The reality is that the institutions need to develop are complex, culture, foreign involvement, geography all play a role.
Africa is poor because colonialism story just does not hold up. Its a part of the story, but by itself it explains little.
Japan is not successful because they were not a colony. The are successful because they had a centralized state for a long time, that state was was able adopt new institutions. Even had the been a colony, once the imperialist leave Japan would probably have better growth is the avg. growth in Africa.
Africa's poverty is an African issue. In fact (and don't take this as a pro-colonization statement because I'm very anti-colonization) they were in many cases materially better off under foreign rule. Zimbabwe comes to mind.
EDIT: read that link and then explain how that is not a problem instead of downvoting:
"The ethnic groups of Africa number in the thousands,"
Wake up boys - it's all the same meat and bones.
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ethnic_groups_of_Afric...
Let me pose it this way.
You were born a Native American, your tribe is your family, and your history. For all intents, yhey are a nation that raised you.
Around you are strangers. They come from a different nation.
They butchered your ancestors to steal what they had.
Yet, as is the way of your tribe, you try to be peaceful and considerate.
In response, some are kind to you. But, their leaders steal your water.
Not just sustinence, something special to the stories of your people.
You protest peacefully.
They react with violence.
How do you feel?
Tribes aren't something to give up. They're a part of you. Your history. Do you tell an Irishman to forget his kilt? An Englishman his Coat of Arms? Do you tell someone who's grandfather was a slave that its okay to be poor, because he's equal now?
The tribe is family, history, and nation. When your neighbour tried to sell your grandfather out for diamonds, there will be problems.
If anything, Africa shows us problems we ignore... And that with time and effort, relations can be improved. Sometimes it doesn't work. Bill kills Joe, because Joe bragged that his Da used to eat your family.
But forgetting who you are, isn't going to help.
You mean, like overwriting my actual life experiences with some sort of "narrative" that becomes more synthetic the more it becomes generalized and massaged? That's exactly what tribalism and group think are to me. "fools in old-style hats and coats, / Who half the time were soppy-stern / And half at one another’s throats" come to mind.
> The tribe is family, history, and nation.
It's funny though how as babies we start out mostly alike, and happily adopt a lot or even all of wherever we're put. History is kind of irrelevant if you don't actually tell it, it's a story. Yes, knowing why one's parents behaved the way they did is useful, but anything before that isn't really different from stories about other people. Interesting for their content, but with no super special connection to me, giving me identity or anything remotely like that. In so far as they affected me, in so far as I am a result of that chain, I can more accurately examine those current traces in my current me, simply find out who I am, in the flesh, not in dead words and thoughts.
Now, don't get me started on "communities", beh. I know all of this sounds so anti-social, but it's not, I hate how the actual people let themselves be buried under essentially religious systems that will spew them out as quickly as they snatched them up.
We clearly have different thoughts on the matter, so I won't delve deeply here.
But I would say the message becoming more generalised isn't what I've seen. Though, the tribes I was immersed with had deep story-telling practices, such as weaving and repeated communal retellings. Resulting in near word-for-word retellings some hundreds of years apart. The moral isn't explained or given. Its just history.
> As man advances in civilisation, and small tribes are united into larger communities, the simplest reason would tell each individual that he ought to extend his social instincts and sympathies to all the members of the same nation, though personally unknown to him. This point being once reached, there is only an artificial barrier to prevent his sympathies extending to the men of all nations and races. If, indeed, such men are separated from him by great differences in appearance or habits, experience unfortunately shews us how long it is, before we look at them as our fellow-creatures. [...] This virtue, one of the noblest with which man is endowed, seems to arise incidentally from our sympathies becoming more tender and more widely diffused, until they are extended to all sentient beings. As soon as this virtue is honoured and practised by some few men, it spreads through instruction and example to the young, and eventually becomes incorporated in public opinion.
-- Charles Darwin, "The Descent of Man" (1871)
It's the in-between that drives me nuts, and the closing window of opportunity to achieve some kind of unity that isn't based on deformity and deception, if not outright force.
I don't understand why half the world is still crying, man
And the other half of the world is still crying too, man
But if we forget our past, we risk repeating it.
Remember the bad, and where you came from, and remember the good, so that you have a chance at ensuring the future doesn't look like your nightmares.
Maybe this might be an example of a tribe serving a better purpose:
The elders acknowledged the problems of the next generation. So they built a school, and brought in outside knowledge to run it. The school was too far inland to run from, and a long way from anywhere else. They learned maths, alongside the story of the elder who decided to make peace with the other tribes.
The school is their pride. They rejoice in the girl learning to be a doctor, and the guy who is now a national athlete.
They didn't forget who they were, but they saw who they weren't and are actively trying to add to it. Enhance themselves, by using their past as a guide.
You should have started off with that. There's no point in arguing with you if this is the case. You're too invested in them.
This is fine. You're probably more correct that I am anyway, since you've experience on the ground. I'm just armchair quarterbacking.
"Yes, knowing why one's parents behaved the way they did is useful"
and
", but anything before that isn't really different from stories about other people"
are contradictory. How could you know why your parents behaved the way they did if you don't know about their parents?
The person you are is a function of where you grow up, that is, your community. To deny that is to deny what humans are: social primates programmed to absorb a culture.
I only need to know their experiences with them and other people. Anything before stuff that shaped them is a bonus. Otherwise: how can you know your grandparents without knowing your grand grandparents? And so on? At which point does "knowing" become clogging up your mind with fuzzy distant blobs, then?
> The person you are is a function of where you grow up, that is, your community. To deny that
Would be contradictory with "in so far as I am a result of that chain, I can more accurately examine those current traces in my current me".
Though come to think of it, I'm denying it the way you phrase it. Communities and societies are even more importantly functions of the individuals in them. They have no meaning and no existence on their own, outside of a mutual agreement of actual people. We get shaped by our relationships and experiences with other people, and you can sum that up as "my community", but that's just a shorthand for my own actual experiences with the actual people I interacted with, and their experiences with me.
And who would you "absorb" culture from, if that was all there's to it? From others who just absorbed it? There needs to be a source at some point, why not be such a source, at least partially.
Ordered by number of conflicts, in decreasing amount:
Tribes > Nation-states > Unions.
There will be more wars when the European Union breaks up. Or when the US does.
Conversely, Africa will greatly benefit from becoming more united in the same way the West has. This is now being reverted (see Trump, Brexit), so you just wait and see where that takes us.
It isn't as simple as you say, because a tribe is more than you seem to think it is. I can change my country, I cannot change my tribe.
Having many tribes does not mean unity is impossible.
You're missing my point. There are no tribes in Australia, for practical purposes. Australia has moved past the concept of tribes. In Australia, people are born into Australia.
In Africa, in 2017, people are born into a tribe.
That is utter, utter crap.
The Tiwi don't associate with the Kimberly kids. Their islands are closed to outsiders. You are given your totem at age of 12 in a smoking ceremony that outsiders are not permitted to witness. You are not born Australian. You cannot marry one. You are Tiwi.
Tribalism and the "killing each other" thing is not unique to Africa. On the latter, Europeans have Africa beat. If you're an America, I'll suggest you make a study of your ancestors history.
War seems to have stopped in (Western) Europe though. That is until the Russians take advantage of the current power vacuum to start one, or a spark ignites between ethnic groups that haven't been around in large enough numbers until very recently.
On the other hand, Africa is at war today. See: article being discussed and [0].
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_conflicts_in_Africa#21...
But yes, wars stopped because after WW II, they decided the madness had to stop. That led to the formation of the EU. Countries that belong to the same economic group seldom go to war. ECOWAS serves the same purpose in West Africa.
Assuming you're an American, you should be blaming your govt. rather than Russia for the what's happening around that region. I know you won't believe it, but that doesn't change the facts.
There might be differen reasons than giving up on tribes. Afaik the biggest wars we had were totally not tribe related, but rather "Nation" and than "Race".
And the original tribes in central europe are loong gone, replaced by feudalism and christianity over 1000 years ago.
My point is that progress in Africa is hampered by unnecessary divisions between people. It's obviously not the only problem, but it's not helping, either.
What bothers me is that there is a ,largely, simple solution here: stop global warming and build educational, medical, and governmental structures to support the people in Africa. We need to bring them along with us in our prosperity, and, find a way for them to enjoy stable government. I know that part of the stable government solution involves taking down dictators and other military action, but this has to also include education, food, medicine, and teaching people how to build things.