Why Africa’s Future Will Determine The Rest Of The World’s
How Africa’s population evolves, and how the continent’s economies develop, will affect nearly everything people near and far assume about their lives today.
How Africa’s population evolves, and how the continent’s economies develop, will affect nearly everything people near and far assume about their lives today.
Authoritarianism – from Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe, who died last week, to the Philippines’ Ferdinand Marcos – always goes wrong. The list of failures is long, including China’s Mao Zedong, Cuba’s Fidel Castro and Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez. George Orwell’s prescient warnings in Animal Farm are confirmed again and again. The intriguing question is why so many both inside and outside a country suspend their thinking capacity and collude in the despot’s narrative.
The Ogaden War (1977–1978) between Somalia and Ethiopia upended the Cold War geostrategic balance in the Horn of Africa, and bore tragic consequences for the region that linger today. While many observers associate the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan on Christmas Eve of 1979 with the end of détente, historians now recognize that it was the Soviet intervention in the Ogaden conflict that precipitated the end of this era.
For decades, the United States was better than any other nation in putting forth value propositions that made other countries want to broaden and deepen their ties and associations with it. These were so effective that even when other governments wished to keep America at arm’s length, their people continued to feel an irresistible attraction. That is changing with dizzying speed now.
What happens when long-running autocratic leaders are finally ousted? This is the dilemma currently facing Algeria and Sudan, where protests recently led to the removal of Presidents Abdelaziz Bouteflika and Omar al-Bashir respectively. It is a conundrum that has had to be confronted in the last few years in Zimbabwe and Burkina Faso as well as in the likes of Egypt, Tunisia and Libya before them.
It makes sense that a continent home to 54 countries and 1.2 billion people would also house a mass of contradictory developments. Africa features several of the world’s fastest-growing economies and a burgeoning middle class. But much of the continent remains mired in debt, ravaged by conflict, disease or terrorism, and plagued by elites clinging to power.
Throughout the continent of Africa—like throughout the rest of the world—extremism in all its forms has been on the rise. Unemployment, poverty, deprivation, marginalization can be contributing factors as well as catalysts to an individual’s pathway to extremism, though it is important to note that, based on numerous social science research reports, the journey to extremism is individualized and personal.
Africa must industrialise to diversify away from natural resources and create jobs for its fast-growing young population. And by boosting intra-continental trade, consumption, and investment, regional integration can be a strong vector for improving productivity, building manufacturing powerhouses, and developing credible African brands.
Albeit from the limited perspective of South Africa’s bi-annual Africa Aerospace and Defense (AAD) exhibition, from September 19–23, it is apparent that most African states are ready to enthusiastically support China’s ambitions for militarising its growing influence on that continent, heralded by the first June 26 to July 11 China Africa Defense and Security Forum (CADSF).
Read Here – The National Interest
Also Read – Why The Billions China Is Pouring Into Africa Might Not Be Smart Money
It is indeed true that China is ever more involved in Africa. And that involvement now includes a somewhat extensive security presence. Much has been said about the new Chinese military base in Djibouti. There has been finger-pointing and apparently laser-pointing too.
