Exploitation of Africa free essay sample

Exploitation of Africa Throughout the history of man, Africa has played an important part in the development of the world, through political, economic and social means. Recently, Africa and its people have been used more as a tool for other parts of the world for the development of their industries and economies. The recent trajectory of events has begun a period of Neocolonialism in Africa, in which the outside world has been scrutinized by Africans as exploiters of their land, resources and human rights. To access whether the outside world is truly at fault for exploiting Africa during this time, by unethical treatment of the people of Africa, research into specific case studies and outlying factors need be reviewed. To mention first, the idea that the outside world has never been able to exploit Africa at any point in history cannot be defended. During the age of Imperialism, European states began to colonize Africa, in the â€Å"scramble for Africa†. All of Africa was subjected to colonization with exception of Ethiopia and Liberia. Africa was divided into colonies during the Congress of Vienna in 1819, between the major European powers. The decision of the European states went against the Peace of Westphalia which declared that no state could not invade or conquer another sovereign nation without legitimate reasoning1. What was reasoning for the European states during this time? The reasoning was that of racism and the belief that the white man was superior to the any other race. This reasoning allowed the Europeans to justify their colonization in Africa and the rest of the world. After the Second World War, movements throughout Africa for independence began to explode. Following the war, these movements occurred in every country and the first African country to be liberated was Libya on December 24, 1951. Independence movements around the continent still continue today with South Sudan becoming acknowledged by the international community as a sovereign country. However, the argument is being made that Africa is truly not free from its shackles from the former Imperial powers and Robert Young states that â€Å"although the formerly colonized territories gradually had their political sovereignty returned to them, they nevertheless remained subject o the effective control of the major world powers, which constituted the same group as the former imperial powers (Young 45). The term â€Å"neocolonialism† was coined by the first Ghanaian president and pan-Africanist, Kwame Nkrumah2. Neocolonialism is defined as the use of capitalism, globalization and cultural forces used by the former Imperial powers to gain economic and political control of spe cifically Africa but as well as other parts of the world2. Kwame Nkrumah argues â€Å"the essence of neocolonialism is that the State which is subject to it is, in theory, independent and has all the outward trappings of international sovereignty. In reality its economic system and thus political policy is directed from outside† (Young 46). This argument is shared by fellow experts of neocolonialism, and that Africa has still is being subjected to interference of the outside world. The United States in addition, is considered as one of the newest members of this group of outsiders that is exploiting Africa for its resources. Kwame Nkrumah gained popularity following the Second World War, due to his philosophy and work for African independence. He was a major vocal leader in the movement for Ghanaian independence and became the first President of Ghana after its liberation. In addition, to arguing for African independence, Nkrumah wanted to create a united African coalition, similar to the European Union predecessor, the European Coal and Steel Community2. However the plan failed due to different allegiances to the two sides of the Cold War. There has been a lot of talk of the Neocolonialist and what they have done, but there has been little to no mention on who actually were these forces. As mentioned before the majority of the states that were involved in Neocolonialism were former Imperialist powers, such as France, Germany and the United Kingdom. In addition, the United States became one of the most important forces during this time. In addition to the inclusion of the United States, there main rivals during the Cold War also began to influence trade a policies in Africa2. These rivals were of course the former Soviet Union and China. The groups were divided into the First World (the United States and their allies) and the Second World (the Soviet Union and its satellites). One of the reasons why many believe that Africa is still being taken advantage due to a variety of reasons, first of which is that lack of industry and structure left by the former Imperial powers. Africa as continent today still lacks representation on the world economic stage. In 2002 none of the 56 countries in Africa ranked in the top 40 of the world’s most competitive economies3. A majority of African countries today, remain dependent on the exportation of their raw materials and the importation of manufactured goods from outside of the continent. This thought to be due to the lack of industry within the African states. Due to the lack of industry in some states, precious resource hotspots were sold to Western businessman at considerably low prices. In Liberia, the rubber industry has been completely monopolized by two American countries, Firestone and Goodrich5. The local bourgeoisie only produce 1% of the gross domestic output of rubber in the country as the two rubber giants’ profiteer off of African resources. The capital gained to the US due to these rubber plantations â€Å"has provided the main sphere of wage labor, source of foreign profits, and important export product to the United States† (Smith 68) while Liberia seeks alternate ways to export goods on the world market. The same exploitation occurs in Zambia with the copper production, and the United States limits the amount of Zambian copper into the marketplace by undercutting the prices of Zambian copper5. However, these cases did not propagate racial division and racism like the following case. South Africa has been long known for its problems with apartheid and racism, and when United States investors began to invest into the country, they only help propagate these issues. Though South Africa has currently ? of the continents gross national product and 2/5 industrial output, these benchmarks were only attained by questionably racist tactics used by neo-colonialists5. In 1947, to American mining groups were invited to purchase the largest South African mining group for a low-price of $2. 5 million (~$24 million today) 5. US businessman, Charles W. Engelhard controlled around 15% of gold and 20% of the uranium of production in South Africa through various inquisitions. These companies and persons were encouraged by â€Å"Washington’s aggressive postwar foreign policy and by British and South African monopolies to buy into and underwrite the colonial and racist system in southern Africa† (Smith 59). In addition, the flow of US capital towards South Africa only â€Å"predicated on the overall level of profits which is steadily high, as it is based on the double exploitation of an industrially developed capitalist country operating on the economics of apartheid† (Smith 61-62) After the purchase of hese businesses and the creation of monopolies, these companies maintained the racist status quote in South Africa. Segregation was practiced even within factories and mines and divided the workers by race. Over 380,000 African workers had to work in more hazardous lines of work compared to their 45,000 white and Eur opean counterparts who worked in safe and clean environments5. United States involvement in South African factories and mines did not create a new found racist system in South Africa, but it did help perpetuate the system which had been occurring for the past century when the Dutch and British initially colonized the country. In addition there are other ways the neocolonialist exploit Africa in the view of neocolonialist theorists. Other methods include technology and resource sharing, International Agency control (such as financial institutions such as the World Bank and the IMF), corruption and in some cases violence and foreign invasion2. Robert Young believes that the exploitation was allowed to work due to the fact that Africa was in a bad place economically, socially and politically following Imperialism. He believed that â€Å"foreign capital is used for the exploitation rather than for the development of the less developed parts of the world† (Young 47) and caused the gap between the rich and the poor was widened in African societies. This root of concern that was initiated partly because of the gap was that most African nations were underdeveloped. The underdevelopment of African countries can be tied the theory which the United States and its associates practiced, which was the development theory. This theory was used as justification by the neocolonialists to get involved in Africa. The idea was to â€Å"transform them [African countries] through a modernization that would break through the restraints of traditional institutions and social attitudes† (Young 49). Introducing modernized ideas of democracy and economics was supposed to make Africans more receptive to integration of Neocolonialists into African society2. In addition banks from industrialized and western states were instructed to give loans to aid in the development if these countries2. However the modernization and transformation did not occur for the better in countries in which the practice was put into place. The United States did a trial run before the plan could be instituted in Africa in Central and South America. Using the development theory the opposite goal occurred in these trial countries and the economies and societies broke down, causing civic unrest and led to the underdevelopment of the countries. As Nkrumah puts it, the development theory â€Å"kept the newly independent countries subservient to their more economically powerful former colonial masters† (Young 51). After the failure of the development theory, most of those nations turned to Marxism and the philosophies of Soviet Russia. Many African countries preemptively turned to Marxism, fearing the development theory and capitalism would lead to the underdevelopment and economic stagnation of their own country2. However the process did reach Africa and the development of the countries never occurred as it was intended. Loans from banks were not converted into successful civic and business projects as they were intended and the collapse of economic structure occurred in many African countries. However as Young quotes†¦ â€Å"‘Development’ of the non-industrialized nations was assisted by loans from banks or western states designed to generate growth. However, for many countries, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, when envisaged growth failed to take place, and inflation and devaluation of the currency followed, this strategy simply led to a debt to a crisis in which the debtor countries ended up repaying far more in interest than they ever borrowed (George 1998, 1993)† (Young 50) In the article â€Å"Africa Deal Seeks End to Misery†, the writer Charlayne Hunter-Gault, explains how large the deficit really is. The total GDP of Africa in 2002 was an estimated $424 billion, while its external debt was estimated around $276 billion (which is 65% of the continents GDP) 3. In addition, â€Å"it was incessantly argued that Western backs, acting as monopolists, cornered credit markets and callously extracted exorbitant interests charges from destitute, problem-plagued African countries that could ill afford to pay them† (Ayittey 234). The failure of the development theory can be tied to this inflation of external debt due to unreasonable bank loans, however careless spending and corruption may also be a factor, these issues will be discussed later. However there are some Africans that believe some foreign interactions would be beneficial to the continent. The former South African president during office believed that Africa faces problems that need assistance from the modern world. At a G8 summit in 2002, Mbeki stated, â€Å"where you dont have democracy, where youve got military governments, where youve got civil conflict, where youve got no observation of the rule of law, then all of these things need to be addressed as a basis for development (Hunter-Gault 2002). Other African leaders supported Mbeki’s cry for outside assistance and many â€Å"want support from the G8 summit of industrial nations for projects in health, education and water. In exchange, they are offering good governance† (Hunter-Gault 2002). However the term good governance is a word that may raise some eyebrows. Surely every African leader is working to raise the economic and social level of their respective countries during their time in politics. However the fact is that internal corruption has been a long-occurring problem within Africa and has affected almost every nation. Corruption has deeply affected the recent history of Africa and been used as means to take advantage of a situation which most countries had no way to respond. Both internal and external factors have been a cause of corruption. Externally, the Neocolonialist would constantly try to find ways into manipulating leaders or other high ranking African officials into carrying out their plans. From under the table deals to political maneuvering, western businesses, banks and governments have using various ways to coerce African leaders away from their people. The first example of this occurs in two West African countries, Angola and Benin and the dumping of radioactive materials in both of the countries. In Benin, France was able to dump radioactive material within Benin borders under the acceptance of the then President Ahmed Kerekou in an under-the-table deal4. The same situation occurred in Angola in 1989, as the Angolan government came to an agreement with a Swiss businessman to dump 5 million tons of toxic waste in a semi-desert region of the country4. However, this region was only 125 miles from the coastal town of Namibe, and could be a serious health risk for the people of the town4. The wellbeing of the people is not being taken to account when deals are done and are usually done for a quick buck instead of long forward to the long term and the startling aspect is that the governments sponsor these programs. The allowance to dump of those hazardous materials into their countries raises the question, were the leaders of these countries unaware of the lives they may affect or did the leaders no longer feel an obligation to protect the people they govern? The answer for many is that the ruling classes of most African nations no longer feels a connection with their people and are more interested in collecting and hoarding money for themselves. Most, if not all African leaders have been western educated elites, so the argument that they did not know what they were doing seems very farfetched. Smith also argues â€Å"it is unrealistic to argue that these government officials did not know of understand the load agreements they were signing† (Smith 234-235) and that the signatories signed because they were paid off before or after hand. In addition Smith states that peasants are not exploited directly by the Neocolonialists and monopolies but â€Å"the real exploiters and oppressors of the African peasants are often the African elites† (Smith 235). Former President of Zaire, Mobutu Sese Seko told his cabinet during his presidency, â€Å"If you steal, do not steal too much at a time. You may be arrested. Steal cleverly (yiba na mayele), little by little† (Ayittey 233). There are countless other examples of African elites taking advantage of the people in their own country but the first, there is the case study of Libya. Libya, located in Northern Africa has one of the largest oil fields in all of Africa. The oil produced in Libya was estimated at around $10 billion in 1990, and with a population at around 4 million people, Libya could have had one of the highest per capita incomes.