I can understand if you could name a country “XXX” and now they are a 1st world nation in the same ranks of the EU, then you have a case. Most nations do not start off as “poor” nations they have a long history of change. The countries than can change are the fastest one to improve the lot for their people.

Its one thing to have a person on welfare for a set time period where they can improve their job skills and re-enter the market. I mean really re-enter the market with credible skills. Once they are up to speed they can be a productive member of the community and with their tax money help others. The point is a set “time period” with “set goals” if there isn’t any option for the said country to get the skills to get out of poverty or worse they are unable to get a job (market their services to the world) then they would be stuck in the same place.

What nations in Africa have the same living standards as a EU country and did that said country do it on aid or in investment?

thanks.

But the this the question Dambisa fails to answer: If the problem with aid is that it makes governments less accountable to their citizens, and ending aid will “automatically” bring about this accountability. If there are no elections, how are the people supposed to register their displeasure with a non performing government. If this “benevolent dictator” cannot be held accountable by way of elections, then how do we hold them accountable?

Now let me say that the “copy and paste” attitude Africans adopt to elections is clearly unhelpful and it is what leads to the situation we are experiencing now everywhere. Africa clearly needs its own uniquely crafted democratic institutions instead of the current practice of just adopting what we see from the west. However even with this perspective, there is no credible argument for placing the destinies of even a few million people in the hands of one “benevolent dictator”. What if your “benevolent dictator” is misinformed or plain incompetent? By what process will he come to power, or will we just await the coming of this messiah whilst encouraging as many army men as possible to try out for the role? How will we know he is benevolent?

If Moyo is trying to make a point about the need for democratic reform, that is a different matter. But she goes on all out to endorse a benevolent dictator. That is asking a question, that is stating and opinion and the central question is this:

Does it make sense for Dambisa to slam democracy in a book that urges more accountability for governments will be achieved by cutting aid?

It seems to me an argument that is clinging to straws–any straws….it undermines her central point and it makes her work even less logically coherent or credible.

The same would be the case in Rwanda had it attempted forced Democracy.
All time would be spent in empty politicking where the themes are all personal and ideologically bankrupt

Democracy in Africa should be postponed untill we are able to create the middleclass society that can support it.
At the moment all we need is benovelent authoritarian .Leader ship to push threw reforms and policies for the good of Society.

From where i come from in Rwanda,citizens have to be “forced” to wear shoes,”forced” to wear Helmets and sit belts,”forced” to pay Health Insuarance. Employers are forced to avail protective gears for their employees.Citizens are “forced” to not throw litter in the streets.

Citizens are “forced” not to drink local brew in the morning working hours while others are now being forced to use contraceptives.
It has taken a decade to explain to no avail until coercive methods were intrroduced and the benefits are there for all to see.
Like a sick Child who is forced to take medication,his gratitude comes when he is recovered from the ailements that he suffered from.
Uganda, thanks to elections and abused Democracy and Human rights is one mess of a Country gone to the Dogs while Kenya cant conduct an election without secterian Violence.
This is where Moyo Ndabisa comes in. What if democracy is a liability itself, she asks?

To hold Leaders accountable through democratic means in Africa has totally failed. The whole continent is a recycle of Politicians who change Parties now and then and depend on tribal loyalities to win the votes.
No different ideological difference is their characteristic and secterianism is their commonality.

The A.N.C in South Africa is one manifestation of that. Corrupt and failure in gringing the goodies to the masses the impoverished majority masses of Africans continue to vote for it as long as Mandela says so and Zuma sings for them his favourate “Bring my Machine Gun” Classic.

Even if this what Moyo meant, she greatly undermines her point when she says in her book that we need a “benevolent dictator”. So how will we hold leaders accountable without a democratic process except ofcourse you are talking about more wars……

You should go read the whole book and then proffer a sensible opinion on it not just prescribe the death of millions when you are not involved in that struggle.

1. You, for some weird reason, think that Africa is able to dictate the terms of aid which is fantastical. The donors will always set the terms. Investment is different because it’s always negotiated, at least more so than aid. If I decided to send money to my aged grandmother, I set the terms, however altruistic my action would be. i’ll simply call my gran and tell her hos much I am sending her and how. If I was investing in my cousin’s business we’d have to discuss it. The notion that Africa can demand aid as a way to balance off Africa’s exploitation is nonsense.

2. I’d have expected you to understand the point about the US. The point was not to hold the US up as a paragon, but to illustrate that receiving FDI does not make a country a “slave” as you so ridiculously claimed. If a powerful country developed and retains its power through FDI, it’s quite clear that your claim was puerile.

3. Aid can not be reparations. Reparations are reparations. If you broke my windscreen and sent me a cheque of $200 to fix it, that’d be reparations. If you saw my broken windscreen and you sent me a cheque for $200 then that’d be aid. But the dynamics in the real world is even more different. The reparations Jews got for Nazi crimes is theirs to invest as they please. The aid Malawi receives, most of it doesn’t even get to Malawi. A lot of it goes to paying donor country workers. But whatever is the case, that can’t be a reason to keep a bankrupt and fundamentally flawed aid model. Whether Africa deserves reparations or not, it certainly does not deserve aid with all it’s negative effects, and its inability to deliver development.

4. Debt Relief is not aid. It might be classified as such but is not aid. But if that’s what you’re claiming for the aid side. I’ll give you that one. But debt relief is a one-off, and can’t be an approach to development. Aid unfortunately has become a misguided approach to development. But debt relief was a big boost. What wasn’t a big boost wasn’t buying retroviral drugs from US companies to give free to Rwandans. That did not contribute to growth directly.

5. Taxes: The Canadian government does not leave you the choice to pay your taxes. It comes and collects it. To consider it naive that African countries have to do the same is amazing. Taxes are the cost of having an orderly society. And it has many economic advantages. And I only laugh that you dismiss any other ways to recruit resources for African development. it’s a telling sign, that you think Africa should not try to develop but should just lie postrate, wait for aid money to come, and fool itself that this will lead to development. This is a very important point. Aid will never be enough. FDI will never be enough. Africa has to tap into its own resources because 99% of what Africa does have was created by African resources. It has to find ways to tap more into those resources and deepen them. There is no excuse for not collecting taxes that are due. No excuse whatsoever.

So I will respond by first debunking certain insinuations (incorrect of course) you have made about my position on this issue and then moving on to engage your viewpoints as I always have.

1. I do not support aid as it is now. As I have repeatedly stated, I have posited views in my previous comments about how I believe aid should be reformed to make Africans stakeholders in the development project rather than the present case of beggars without choice. Thus I am not as you say, “comfortable with Paris, London or Washington dictating to Africa what it’s problems are, how it must solve them and in which order of priorities”. That is the system that organizations like ONE and Africans need to work together to change.

2. Ironically you are the one who has refused to engage my points especially on the level of facts and clear logic. You make sweeping assumptions and do not care to look at the fine print or even provide facts and figures to back up your positions. Clearly, your idea of fact and logical arguments is majority opinion. Fortunately, the two are not always necessarily interchangeable. So it is possible that these many Development economists or “Jack and Kwame” are wrong. It is important for you to examine the merits of every argument on its own merits and not on the whimps on misguided academia or even worse”Jack and Kwame”.

3. On your point about “how much FDI the most powerful country on earth receives”, it will perhaps interest you to know that on many levels, it is this level of FDI that has wrought its present destruction. Its theatrically comical that you would use America’s failed model of development to push a point especially in these financial times. However, it is a good thing that you agree that FDI is hardly the only way to go. But I find your insistence on taxes rather naively thought out. Who will pay taxes in countries where there is no law and order? In Nigeria, there are countless examples of foreign multinational companies who evade taxes because they can bribe tax officials. More so, there is the salient issue of further impoverishing the poor and unemployed. The idea of taxes as a spur for economic development in Africa is one that is in fact dead on arrival. As for the other funding sources, I find them to be creative alternatives but I doubt their feasibility in the face of incompetent governance. It is necessary to consider why development aid (which I consider to be the most practical fulfillment of this concept of Development as Justice) is important not just for its low cost economic benefits but for the message it sends to a world that finds it a sport to take advantage of Africa.

4. In the course of my studies, it has become rather obvious to me that much of the resource transfers from Africa to the West have already occurred during and after the period of colonization. In fact there is a case to be made for this resource transfer still presently continuing. Thus, what we are witnessing as present day poverty in Africa is a manipulation of the free market system. We gave them resources, but we never got enough in return. The little we got, we were manipulated into giving even more for in the name of trade. Of course the reasons for this abound. Short sighted, illiterate leaders…etc. The idea of development aid is in my opinion to effect this balance of trade. There has to be that return transfer before we see concrete development in Africa. However, the last thing we want in this payback for resources is some sharing program where each person gets handed worthless paper. Therefore, the most concrete way for the west to do this is to invest in OUR infrastructure. This means we tell them where the shoe pinches and they fix it. That is how I believe it should work. Sending more resources to the west in the absence of this principal fix is operating in a market of inequilibrium. This is not how even the revered “free market” pretends to allocates resources. An extension of this thought is the idea that people have to return home. Human capital has to return to base for any significant development to take place.

5.I believe the only reason aid has not succeeded is because it was used by the west as a tool of subversion and control. If Africans reclaim development aid as repatriation for the resource flight that took place a long time ago, the attitude the West has to aid will fundamentally change. They will have to realize that Africans have to direct the development aid agenda, not just because it is the only way to achieve real development but because we deserve to. Or have you ever seen a debtor dictate to the creditor the terms of payment? It is always the other way around. I believe that we ARE ENTITLED to aid as a reparation for the past (and present) resource flights from Africa to the west.

6. During the last decade in which you claim FDI has made the difference, there has also been the highest aid flows from Europe to Africa thanks to debt relief and other initiatives sponsored by ONE. I believe that these factors deserve as much credit as FDI in the decade of growth we have just registered. No doubt corruption has been an obstacle but still our resourceful people have made the best of the little that has trickled down to them.

In conclusion, I also want money to be invested in Africa and I think development aid presents that opportunity to us with the added advantage of time as well as reducing capital flight out of the country.

PS: The CIDA idea looks good and I think this is one way aid can be managed. But why should CIDA and not this individual determine where the “$100″ we would “put into another project next week” should go?
Replace CIDA with say Goldman Sachs and we can rightly assume the money would go to Ms Moyo’s bonus. Capitalism eh?

It’s not just that you’re randomly finding misleading articles and branding it research while asking me to “do more research” it’s more that you won’t engage my actual points. If some obscure Masters thesis (not directly about your subject) is what you’ll use to counter the established view of both academia and just any Jack or Kwame you ask, then I’ll have to wonder….

Your aid as reparations idea can be discussed on its merits. But even if Africa merited reparations, and there are strong arguments for that, reparations would flow to Africa as reparations, and would not be aid.

You complain about colonialism and supremacism but are unfortunately comfortable with Paris, London or Washington dictating to Africa what it’s problems are, how it must solve them and in which order of priorities. If you advocate that Africa should seek to develop through aid, you’re asking Africa to outsource actual governance because we know that what we’ll get is conditions and priorities set from outside. In that sense aid can actually be seen as subversive and a tool of control. Talk to people in the policy circles of aid donor countries and they talk, often earnestly about “influence”, how to make sure that they are able to influence results and happenings in recipient countries by their actions. From the donor’s viewpoint, that’s fundamental to aid effectiveness.

The notion that FDI makes a country a “slave” seems ridiculous given how much FDI the most powerful country on earth receives, and has received right from its inception.

While FDI is not cost free, it is a proven path to growth as we’ve seen in Africa in the last decade. On the other hand there is not one single developed country that became so through aid or any other kind of dependence.

About my stance on aid. I am not by any means arguing both sides. I am saying, Africa needs financial resources. So I am not opposed to countries which are willing to put capital into Africa. What I am certain of is that aid as it stands is not set up to succeed. free lunches can not cure hunger. Creating jobs, educating people and expanding productivity will. So I say don’t give the money away. Invest it.

I am saying to CIDA: If you are ready to give away $100 in Africa, then you should be ready to simply make sure that those $100 are put into a project that generates an economic return. That way you do 4 things. 1, you get $100 back to put into another project next week. 2, the recipient, if he is successful in giving CIDA a return of $100, would remain in business since he’d be generating more economic value through his activity than $100 which would much enhance the sustainability of that activity. 3, You’d actually boost how much the recipient’s government can collect in taxes. 4, you’d actually be putting your money where locals see both a need and an opportunity.

I do not think that FDI is the only way to go. In fact, I strongly believe that if African governments will simply collect taxes which their citizens owe they’d raise a whole lot more money than they can raise from aid AND FDI based on today’s levels. I also think that if the capital in the informal and black economies in Africa were mobilised you’d find a deep pool of resources for development. But Africa needs all the resources it can get. As I said before the problem with aid is not that it exists, it’s that it’s not and can’t be substantial, and it does not directly boost Africa’s economic potential.

All I want is for money to be invested in Africa as it has been invested everywhere else in the world.

I think you’re wrong, even misguided, but I wish you the best. Cheers!

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