Garvey's Ghost: Black Talk

Go To People on Africa: Black Conservatives

With the rise of the Bushocracy, Black conservatives have found themselves as the go-to people on Africa. Never mind that the vast majority of these people have long records of doing and saying anything to separate themselves from "those" Africans Going so far as to write entire articles to expain why they are in fact "Negroes" and "not black" (Crouch and McWhorter respectively).

So now we have two more wanna be's who want to tell us what is wrong with Africa. One Walter "Willy" Williams who has stated that he wishes to be "treated as a white man" begins our journey into the weird world of Negro Wonder Land.

In Capitalism Magazine entitled Freedom not Foreign Aid, For Africa Willy proposes that Africa needs:

elimination of dictators and socialist regimes, establishment of political and economic freedom, rule of law and respect for individual rights. Until that happens, despite billions of dollars of foreign aid, Africa will remain a basket case.

Of course Africa needs to be rid of dictators. We wont argue with that at all. But what's with the socialist regimes comment? Does not the great Willy know that China, a Socialist political establishment (well actually Communist, but I doubt Willy knows the difference), is quite the econommic powerhouse. We'll not get into the problems that China does have, but this situation only goes to prove that one need not have a "democratic" government in order to have economic properity.

Let us examine one of Willy's more specious arguments. He states:

Let's examine the "vicious cycle of poverty" myth and whether foreign aid is a necessary ingredient for economic development. The U.S., Britain, France, Canada and most other countries were once poor. Andrew Bernstein of the Ayn Rand Institute wrote in an article titled "Capitalism Is the Cure for Africa's Problems" that pre-industrial Europe was vastly poorer than contemporary Africa.

A relatively well-off country, like France, experienced several famines between the 15th and 18th centuries as well as plagues and diseases that sometimes killed hundreds of thousands. In France, life expectancy was 20 years, in Ireland it was 19 years, and in early 18th-century London, more than 74 percent of the children died before reaching age 5.

Beginning in the late 18th century, there was a dramatic economic turnabout in Europe. How in the world did these once poor and backward countries break the "vicious cycle of poverty" and become wealthy, without what today's development experts say is absolutely necessary for economic growth -- foreign aid handouts, World Bank and International Monetary Fund loans, and billions of dollars of debt forgiveness?

The answer is simple: Capitalism started taking root in Europe.

Capitalism is an economic system where there's peaceable, voluntary exchange. Government protects private property rights held in goods and services. There's rule of law and minimal government regulation and control of the economy.

Check out the Washington, D.C.-based Heritage Foundation's "Index of Economic Freedom." Heading its list of countries with the freest economic systems are: Hong Kong, Singapore, Luxembourg, Estonia, Ireland and New Zealand. Bringing up the rear as the countries with little or no economic liberty are: North Korea, Zimbabwe, Angola, Burundi and the Congo.

It's not rocket science to conclude that economic liberty and the wealth of a nation and its peoples go together, not to mention greater human rights guarantees.

Willy Williams wants us to believe a big lie: Capitalism started taking root in Europe.

Capitalism is an economic system where there's peaceable, voluntary exchange. Government protects private property rights held in goods and services. There's rule of law and minimal government regulation and control of the economy.

See what Willy Williams seems to have forgotten is that during this era, there was no such thing as "peacable" exchange with Africa. During this time Africa was under the brutal dictatorships of those capitalist countries that Williams is so fond of. In fact those "peacable" capitalists were busy extracting profits from slave labour in the Caribbean and the Congo. They were trading freely in the cotton and tobacco of the American south. Indeed many scholars in the matter, including historians Eric Williams and Hugh Thomas make it pretty clear that much of the economic rise of Europe and America was based on the exploitation of Africans.
Indeed it was the Capitalists non-adherance to the idea of "private property" and the "rule of law" and "minimal governmental regulation" when it came to Africa that is at the heart of the deep ditch that Africans find themselves in. And this is not to excuse in the least bit the participation of those Africans in the trade.

When speaking of "not rocket science to conclude that economic liberty and the wealth of a nation and its peoples go together, not to mention greater human rights guarantees." Willy Williams would have us forget how the former colonisers left many countries including a country he listed, The Congo, without any, ANY, educated or trained individuals capable of taking over the infastructure of that country. Why were there no native educated and trained individuals ready to take over the DRC when the Belgians left? It is because the government and private sectors were established and maintained for the benefits of the whites in that country and the mother country. A little inconvenient fact that apparently escapes Mr. Williams.

But Williams is not done insulting us. He continues with this:

Some economic development "experts" attribute Africa's troubles to its history of colonialism. That's nonsense, because some of the world's richest countries are former colonies, such as the U.S., Canada, Hong Kong and Australia. In fact, many of Africa's sub-Saharan countries are poorer now than when they were colonies, and their people suffer greater human rights degradations, such as the mass genocide the continent has witnessed.

Is Williams seriously suggesting that the situation of the 13 colonies was in any way, shape or form the same as those in post Berlin Conference Africa? Same as Canada? Is he kidding? Or Hong Kong, a British Colony until recently taken over by the Chinese powerhouse? Who does Willy Williams think he is kidding, besides the editors of Capitalism Magazine?

Indeed some countries are poorer now than when they were colonised. We already discussed the DRC. It's no wonder it is poorer now. In addition to what occured under Belgian rule, let us remember that the US and Belgium colaborated to kill the Democratically elected Patrice Lumumba and replaced him with Mobutu, a dictator whome various European countries were more than happy to give money to and sell him various properties while he took the country to hell. Yes our good friend Mobutu, a guest of a few US Presidents left his country with the equivalent of $20,000 when he finally was ousted. Thanks a lot CIA.

Meanwhile over at The Townhall Thomas Sowell gives it a go in his article entitled The Tragedy of Africa where he states:

Years ago, a courageous economist in India pointed out that, however helpful it was to receive food from abroad during India's famines, the long-run policy of continually giving wheat to India was just reducing the ability of Indian farmers to grow wheat and sell it for a price that would cover their costs.

Eventually the policy of continually dumping wheat into India was stopped and today India produces so much wheat that it has been able to send some to Africa to deal with African famines.

Promoting dependency and irresponsible borrowing is not the way to help the poor internationally any more than these are ways of helping the poor at home. Such policies benefit the bureaucracies that administer foreign aid and enable vain people to see themselves as saviors, even when they are doing more harm than good.

I'll need to agree with this. I have made similar comments about US intervention in the past. However, as usual, Sowell then goes off into right field with:

Ideologues love to think of African poverty as caused by "exploitation" on the part of Western countries. But, with a few notable exceptions, Africa has had little to be exploited. Even at the height of European imperialism, there was far less foreign trade or foreign investment in the whole vast continent of Africa than in a little country like Belgium or Switzerland.

As pointed out previously, Africa was never meant to be a point of arrival for European assets. That there was little foreign investment in Africa is understood by historians. The purpose of Africa is and has been the exploitation of its raw materials. In order to exploit a population or resource you must invest as little as is possible. So while the Debeers gets Diamonds out for cheap, they get many many times the cost of extraction at sale. Similarly with rubber that Firestone got from Liberia or the Palm Oil that lubricated Europes Industrial Revolution. We wont even get into the Slave Trade and its attendant free labour afforded various human resource intensive industries such as sugar. So no, We didn't see investment or trade with Africa because Africa was not meant to be traded with, it was meant to be taken from.

Sowell then goes on to discuss Cote D'Ivoir which he held up as the Model African nation Where as Ghana under Nkrumah and Tanzania under Nyerere were held up as models of how to ruin your country. Indeed the problems of Nyerere and Nkrumah were due in large part to thier willingness to deal with the Soviet Union, the blood enemy of the US, and their determination not to allow theri countries to be exploited by their prior colonizers. We all know what happens when black folks dare to be independent.

I tell you a few more years of black "expertise" like this and the whole history of Africa will change completely.

Links:
http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?ID=4310
http://www.townhall.com/columnists/thomassowell/ts20050712.shtml