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Equating capitalism with colonialism, Africa’s nationalist leaders rejected it and adopted socialism in the 1960s. Foreign companies were nationalized, a string of state-owned enterprises was established and a plethora of state controls on rent, prices, imports, and foreign exchange were imposed to capture the commanding heights of the economy. But nowhere in Africa was the socialist experiment successful.
It was a miserable fiasco in country after country including Angola (under dos Santos), Benin (under Kerekou), Ethiopia (under Mengistu), Ghana (under Nkrumah), Guinea (under Toure), Mali (under Keita), Mozambique (under Chissano), Tanzania (under Nyerere), and Zambia, among others.
In 1961, workers on Ghana state farms barely produce enough to feed themselves let alone the nation. In Tanzania, Ujamaa destroyed the country’s agriculture. Ethiopia’s misguided villagization program did the same.
Zimbabwe socialist experiment ended in disaster, transforming the country which used to be called the breadbasket of the region into a net food importer, with millions facing starvation.
Well the Post Independence African leaders wanted to eradicate important aspects of colonialism, and with it they saw that capitalism was a symbol of capitalism. So they adapted an extensive socialist program of eradicating capitalism. The results of this was a disaster in their economy and a majority of post African countries followed that path.
Actually South Africa which is the latest country to become free from White rule is in the path of socialism. With it now South Africa has major financial problems.
The must be another way for African countries to follow instead of the disasterous socialist policies which can benefit all their citizens, including the poorest of the poor there.
Defective economic ideology is only part of the problem. The other big part is Africa's understandable distrust of foreign investment, which there will need to be a ton of to substantially improve Africa's economic fortunes.
Equating capitalism with colonialism, Africa’s nationalist leaders rejected it and adopted socialism in the 1960s. Foreign companies were nationalized, a string of state-owned enterprises was established and a plethora of state controls on rent, prices, imports, and foreign exchange were imposed to capture the commanding heights of the economy. But nowhere in Africa was the socialist experiment successful.
I believe you have made an error in your analysis. I don't believe the African leaders adopted socialism, rather they adopted nationalism. They are different things.
The underlying concept in socialism as espoused by Marx is, 'from all according to ability, to all according to need'. This evolved into communism. The African model of nationalism was a form of capitalism, with the leader the head of the corporation rather than the colonialist master. Where they fell down was in the lack of ability, knowledge and skill, to run the corporation, unfortunately.
I believe you have made an error in your analysis. I don't believe the African leaders adopted socialism, rather they adopted nationalism. They are different things.
The underlying concept in socialism as espoused by Marx is, 'from all according to ability, to all according to need'. This evolved into communism. The African model of nationalism was a form of capitalism, with the leader the head of the corporation rather than the colonialist master. Where they fell down was in the lack of ability, knowledge and skill, to run the corporation, unfortunately.
Am not sure why this narrative about socialism comes from. But African nations have very mixed economically systems. All African nations aren't failing. Greed and control is what lead many nations in Africa to suffer in addition to having compromised leaders and or lack of vision for its success. Many African nations are growing and developing presently.
I can equally image a host of papers titled 'How Capitalism destroyed Africa'.
I'm not saying I'm for either one, but agendas can be proven with any slant anyone wants to make.
This.
The sad fact is that there are very few African success stories regardless of which economic system was adopted. I'm from Nigeria which has never adopted the socialist ideology. Complete crapshow. One of the United States most loyal friends in the war against communism in the 80s was Mobutu of Zaire (now called Congo). That country has rotted in misery throughout the "capitalist" phase of its history.
The simple facts is that for most African countries, whoever took over the leadership saw it as an opportunity to steal as much money as possible, and hand over resources to the leader's local tribesmen and allies. Even though those allies were completely incompetent and useless. This is why most African countries have failed to thrive. A civil service that is competent, and free of corruption would go a VERY long way to bringing prosperity back. Dont see that happening though.
The biggest issues is corruption half of which is due to ethnic nepotism. Some tribal conflict is also an issue as well. But on the other hand the ethno-states or near ethnostates are Swaziland, Lesotho, Seychelles, Cape Verde followed by Somalia, Rwanda, Burundi, Equatorial Guinea, Mauritius and Botswana. Swaziland and Lesotho which are the only true Ethnostates in the continent are wholly surrounded and indirectly controlled by other nations so even though they are ethnostates their policy is basically an extension of whatever South Africa is doing.
The issue when you get into it is that most states including many ethnostates on the continent and elsewhere are diverse in some other way in the first place. I do think Ethnicity is the main issue throughout Africa as far as conflict. Africa doesn't have a single coastal, racially homogenous, religiously homogenous ethnically homogenous, non "tiny island". Majority of Europe falls into that category, with religious diversity being the main exception but even then mostly being different sects of Christianity. Somalia is the closest country to what I described. Europe has a dozen of these countries. France, Germany, Italy Greece etc. Spain is about the only exception and should probably be a model for African countries in fostering a National Identity without attempting to completely erase the linguistic differences.
So ethnic wars have held most of the continent back and the places that aren't, held back by inherent Ethnic Conflict, like Lesotho and Swaziland are landlocked in a country that is dealing with racial as well as a bit of Ethnic conflict as well in South Africa.
Europe sorted out the ethnic conflicts a long time ago (not including Yugoslavia/USSR) and with some exceptions most ethnicity in Europe has a state. Now you don't need to be a monoethnic country to be successful but ethnicity which normally means language diversity is one of the most defining issues of our time and has led to virtually all of the bloodiest conflicts in the modern world, with the various wars in China being the main exceptions. Hell even the U.S Civil War was a pseudo-ethnic War of some sort. Currently the majority of African countries especially the largest ones both physically and population wise are all nations where the largest group of people are pluralities. Which when nation-building doesn't foster as much unity from the get-go. Only in the last decade have many countries truly gotten over a significant portion of their ethnic hold ups which has allowed themselves to prosper.
Before setting up any kind of economic system, Africa has to rid itself of polygamy, which still accounts for 20-50% of all marriages on the continent. Former South African leader Jacob Zuma had four wives. You can't have an open economy of any kind without the ability to interact openly with outsiders, which isn't going to happen when no one trusts anyone from outside their extended family.
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