America's Economic Strangulation of Africa

by Dain Fitzgerald

When talking with Thompson Ayodele – head of the Institute for Public Policy Analysis in Nigeria – it’s obvious he is convinced of something: Politicians and government bureaucrats are the same everywhere. Their very function is to impede and impose. They impede the basic freedom of exchange and production crucial to the generation of wealth. They impose on the stifled population restrictions on speech and the freedom of association, all the while maneuvering  themselves through the very halls of power created at the expense of the “citizens” (rather than fully autonomous beings with a free will) they supposedly represent. Politics is a shell game, and you don’t have to be a jaded, television-saturated American to know it.  

Africa ’s lifeblood – the minds and capabilities of the millions of people inside it – is being quarantined by a powerhouse with its own selfish agenda. Of course I’m talking about the United States . U.S. protectionist policies in agriculture are not only expensive for anyone who pays taxes or buys food (all of us), but are destroying the livelihoods of farmers in places like Mali. Lying just below Algeria , Mali is a large producer of cotton. Cotton is currently being subsidized in the U.S. – that is, cotton farmers are being compensated for the loss that would accrue under real market competition – to the tune of $3.9 billion! Not only are they being “protected” from a legitimate alternate source for the same product, the farmers of Mali are having their poverty sustained by preventing the free exchange of their product on the world market. Don’t let fears of an inferior and dangerous product, much propagated by the likes of the Food and Drug Administration, convince you that you are in mortal danger. Africa has an advantage in the production of foodstuffs; most African entrepreneurs are in the agriculture industry, whereas in America under 5% of the business activity is in this area.  

In the 1970s, the World Bank, under the leadership of Robert McNamara, gave Tanzania ’s dictator Julius Nyerere millions of dollars in “aid,” and was a hearty supporter of Nyerere’s “villigization” scheme, forcing the relocation of the population into high density clusters. (Urban growth boundaries, anyone?) This plan was encouraged by the Untied Nations in its fear of a sprawling, overpopulated planet that needed to be forced into smaller and more “sustainable” living conditions. Mr. Ayodele has recently challenged the well established myth of “overpopulation” being the cause of economic misery in his country. Propagating the perverse idea that a head of cattle is a boon to the economy while another human being is a burden, Nigeria ’s “leaders” have launched an effort to dissuade large families. Foreign interference by the U.S. , often under the guise of international collaboration, has been at the forefront of the continued chaos and poverty in Africa . To this day, Africa is suffering from this condescending handout to its illegitimate overseers. Bush’s promised billions in aid – under the name of the Millennium Challenge Act – is simply more of the same.  

Malaria. It’s a disease that is killing over a million people every year. It’s most effective treatment is DDT, the chemical used by Americans years ago in mosquito-infested places like Louisiana to eradicate malaria. When was the last time anyone heard of a case of malaria in the States? DDT is supposedly an environmental disaster, thinning bird eggshells to the detriment of a living earth philosophy. To the millions in Africa suffering from malaria – more than five times the number dying from AIDS – the argument that bird eggs come before people is obscene. Supposed alternatives like insecticide-treated bed nets won’t do much good to anyone traveling a dirt road or playing a game of football. While we complain about the West Nile virus bogeyman, people are dying or becoming permanently injured by an imminently curable condition.  

America ’s continued financial support and approval of despised governments in places like Nigeria help drag out the life span of an inefficient state schooling apparatus. Just as in subsidies to farmers, redirection of stolen money to overseas regimes only serves to encroach on an otherwise wide-open and discretionary market for goods. In this case, it’s the “good” of education. James Tooley, a British professor of education policy, is a long-time proponent of the idea of education without the state. Echoing figures like Albert Jay Nock – though with universal aspirations – he is helping to reinforce the largely private provision of education in most of the world, believing in the virtues of an anti-state education that allows for true intellectual flourishing. He has found that unlike in the U.S. , where 90% of children are schooled in compulsory government facilities, the large majority of students in Africa are taught in informal private settings. There is not yet an equivalent to the National Education Association and American Federation of Teachers, who together have managed to unionize the majority of public school teachers.  To keep it this way, America needs to get out of the money-stealing-then-lending practice.  

The United States, while pretending to think of itself as the epitome of the free market in action, is acting more like a cult, promising to provide the world with all its needs – money and otherwise – if it will only bend to our will. Whether it’s giving aid to Turkey in exchange for support of war in Iraq, or imposing restrictions on the use of DDT as a prerequisite for obtaining aid money (as in the case of U.S.A.I.D. in Bolivia), the U.S. is deciding just how the game will be played. In the case of Africa , the effects of years of wasted, ineffective aid money has led to an entrenched political class that is going to take even more years to undo. Thompson Ayodele is seeing all of this first-hand. He points out that while the government has allies, the free market has none. This is sad, and in no small part is due to U.S. commitment to subsidies and tariffs that confirm to the rest of the world that this is how it should be. The motto by those who are not allies of the government is “Trade, not aid.” The World Trade Organization – the agenda of which is set by the G-8 countries--therefore including you know who--functions as a belligerent meeting ground for the special interests in various countries to see what one will give up in return for the privilege of trading. “You end your tariffs, I’ll end mine.” “No? Then forget it!” This works against the interests of consumers everywhere. America should end its nationalistic chest-thumping via protection, its condescending and destructive handouts via foreign aid, and allow individuals across phony borders to interact without fraud and force.