These are but a few examples of what has become the most fashionable approach to rid oneself of guilt over the plight of those less fortunate than ourselves. The rich and famous, rich and not so famous, have discovered Africa, a discovery that warrant applause as well as critical evaluation.
Africa is a continent which for long has been labeled the “dark” continent. Since Dr. Levingston put a foot there in search of the source of the Nile, the world has looked upon Africa as some place out there one visits either to take home a “trophy” animal or mineral or to boost of being the first to claim a territory for “God and Country”. The scramble for African territory which began at the end of the 19th century gave European powers virtually the entire continent. All that remained was the division of spoils. At meetings in Berlin, Paris and London, European statesmen bargained over spheres of influences and traded lands and peoples to secure the desired outcome. “When marking out the boundaries of their new territories, European negotiators frequently resorted to drawing straight lines on the map, taking little or no account of the myriad of traditional monarchies, chiefdoms and other African societies that existed on the ground” (Martin Meredith, 2005, p.1). Africans for the most part were spectators. Those who opposed or resisted colonial rule died in battle, executed or shipped out to fight in European battles. No territory in Africa except Ethiopia escaped colonial rule. Africa emerged from the 19th century scramble, a continent divided with its people segmented according to the powers that have been there. There was British Africa, French Africa, Dutch Africa, Belgian Africa, Portuguese Africa, Italian Africa, as well as Arabian Africa. The haggling in Europe was over African territory with little attention to people – their ethnic identity, history or religion. Land and people were little more than pieces on a chess board.
As the world awoken to embrace through benevolent or violent acts the liberal order, people even in the Dark Continent were entitled to “life, liberty and pursuit of happiness”. Africa in the 21st century became theater for social experiments. Some would say it has become a playground for the rich and famous, the rich and not so famous. Africa also has become a theater for war among African themselves, poor and rich, between governments and those they govern.
Several scholarly books and hundreds of articles in scholarly journals have been written about Africa. A devastating assessment of the “goings on” in Africa since independence is given in two volumes: “A continent for the taking: The tragedy and hope of Africa” by Edward French (Alfred A. Knopt, 2004), and “The fate of Africa: From the hopes of freedom to the heart of despair” by Martin Meredith (Public Affairs, 2005).
The scramble for Africa in this century mimics the scramble for Africa at the end of the nineteenth century. Back then, European powers staked claims to Africa resources human and physical, in this twenty first century the scramble for Africa is not for men and gems (although that is true too) but for prestige and publicity. As Mandela’s wife, activist Graça Machel, the former first lady of Mozambique, has put it “what is uniformly true about celebrities is that they get attention for themselves, to some extent, but also for the issues they choose to highlight” (quotation from The Christian Science Monitor, August 22, 2007, p.11).
As the title of this piece suggests, there are several approaches to aid Africa. Scholars like Deepak and Raja Patirana examined the contribution of aid to Africa (it is the largest for any region, averaging 6.3 percent of GDP for all Africa, excluding South Africa and Nigeria, compared to 1 percent to South Asia and 0.3 percent to Latin America and the Caribbean). In their article “The Triumph of Hope Over Experience: A Marshall Plan for Sub-Saharan Africa?” (American Enterprise Institute, August 2007), Deepak and Raja Patirana discussed whether such a program, proposed by British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, is a viable alternative to current aid policies. Although most of the discussion is devoted to a comparison between the preexisting conditions in Europe and the current conditions in Sub-Saharan Africa, a prerequisite for assessment of such a program, the conclusion that emerges is that “European Marshall Plan and post-independence aid to Africa were responses to entirely different situations, so drawing parallels between the two is not justified” (p.3).
Africa statesmen (East African heads of state) offer an alternative to aid “a common market and a single currency for East Africa by 2012”*, again fashioned along the successful European experience.
A departure from aid and trade is “self help” or “a zero hand out approach in Africa” (The Christian Science Monitor, September 5, 2007). The idea behind this approach is capacity building and local control. A US based charity “Care for Life” reports success in promoting self reliant as a development strategy. All to the good, but one data point does not make a statistic.
Let me now focus on the “glamorous” approach to African development. A question that needed to be asked was put forth by a Tanzanian columnist, Ayah Rioba, a day after Bill Clinton visit to Africa: “is this really how to save Africa?” (quoted in the The Christian Science Monitor, August 23, 2007). Good question.
There are as many schools of thoughts about how to help Africa as there are clients and/or reformers. Leaving the academic debate aside for now, a subject for a later piece, the celebrities’ approach to development is a novel one that deserves the economists’ attention (at least this economist). Unlike academicians (except perhaps in the case of Jeffrey Sachs and the staff of the Agency for International Development), celebrities peddle glamour, beauty, riches to a captivated audience.
To gauge effectiveness of celebrities’ actions, let us first look at how celebrities have “carved” Africa among themselves. The Christian Science Monitor has devoted several issues (in August) tracking celebrities path into Africa: Bill Clinton: South Africa, Malawi, Zambia and Tanzania; Mia Farrow: Rwanda, Chad and Darfur; Madonna: Malawi; Oprah Winfrey: South Africa; and, of course, Angelina Jolie everywhere there are refugees as the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Spokeswoman. Unlike the European scramble for Africa in the 19th century, the celebrities scramble is far from complete. Why not say Burkina Faso, The Gambia, Guinea Bissau, Mali, Congo or Cameroon to list a few. One wonders how do African in these HIPCs Sub-Saharian countries feel about celebrities “neglect”**. There are 33 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa classified as HIPCs with per capita income of less than $2 per day. South Africa which has attracted celebrities’ attention is not one of them. One also ponders celebrities’ choice.
Pondering these questions is par for the course for an economist. In economics 101, one lays out the landscape of choice – examine the options available and the constraints faced in order to evaluate the choice outcome. The market is the place where such information is gained. Unfortunately, there is no market parallel for examining and/or evaluating celebrities choice, and their aid to Africa. Although one may speculate as to why South Africa was chosen and not the Gambia, it may perhaps be more useful in this instance to reverse the process – from the outcome back to the choice. Oprah Winfrey built a “Leadership School” in South Africa; The Counsel of Elders was initiated to address conflict resolution; the Clinton-Hunter development initiative aimed to expand access to water, sanitation, health care and agricultural markets in Malawi and Rwanda; the Clinton foundation works in 69 developing countries on initiatives ranging from expanding access to HIV/AIDS medication to reducing big cities greenhouse-gas emissions. These are but fragments about outcomes gained from newspapers accounts. From this information one could say that the choice of the country reflects the donor’s own perspective on Africa or on a particular cause he/she likes to advance. These outcomes notwithstanding what is missing is a true accounting of aid effectiveness – what is used to be called the “bang for the buck”. This accounting may hopefully be forthcoming soon. Bruce Sievers, a visiting scholar at Stanford University, is writing a book about the development of philanthropy. He is quoted as saying that for celebrities the bang of the buck is high in Africa (The Christian Science Monitor, August 22, 2007, p.11). But hopefully he can show that this is true as well for Africans.
* Bill Gates, Bono and economist Jeffrey Sachs share Brown in calling for a Marshal Plan for Africa and for a vast increase in aid. An analysis of the Marshall Plan and the common market proposals will be taken up in follow-up pieces.
**See August 2, 2007, blog for HIPCs definition.
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