Section One
One of the hallmarks of a powerful country in decline is the emergence of a widespread belief among, both, the populace and the rulers that their country is the world, not just even the center of it. And symptomatic of this belief is the absolute lack of knowledge of the rest of the world. Whether the U.S. is in decline or not is a moot question, however there is no doubt that a state of deep and widespread ignorance concerning other countries and other cultures pervades both the elites and the masses in the U.S. In light of this fact, the following is a brief overview of Africa and three issues of central concern to it: colonialism; imperialism and underdevelopment.

Africa is the second largest continent following Asia and has a landmass three times that of the U.S. (about 11,677,240 sq. miles). Some 180 million years ago Africa was at the core of the ancient super continent of Pangaea which also included India, Antarctica, and South America. Given its huge size Africa has climatic zone variation that is nearly representative of the global variation. Hence permanent snow and ice is found in the upper reaches of Mount Kilimanjaro situated near the equator, and a Mediterranean type of climate can be found at the northern and southern extremities. While the dominant climatic type is that of tropical savanna, desert and rain forest, it also has patches of temperate zone climate.

It is widely believed by scientists that Africa was the birth place of human beings as we know them to day. About 10,000 years ago changes in climate began to transform the Sahara grassland into the Sahara desert forcing its inhabitants to move into the fertile Nile river region, and there later (by around 3000 BC) they gave rise to one of the worlds greatest early civilizations--the Egyptian civilization. Around seventh century AD Islam was introduced to North Africa and thereafter it slowly spread throughout West African savanna via the agency of North African traders trading with wealthy West African kingdoms and civilizations that had emerged around the Middle Ages. These kingdoms were so prosperous that they engaged, via intermediaries like the North African traders, in long distance trade that spanned the length and breadth of the Indo-European and Oriental land mass.

Beginning in the fifteenth century and going on for the next three hundred years, Africa slowly began to be colonized by various European powers (see addendum B below on colonization.) The legacy of this colonization would be the transfer of huge populations of Blacks to the Americas, the introduction of Christianity to parts of Africa, the artificial formation of independent African countries incapable of uniting, and an economic transformation that would leave Africa dependent upon Western economies via the agency of World/Minority transnationals. (With reference to the last point see addendum A on underdevelopment and addendum C on imperialism.)

Via a complex process of climatically influenced evolution; breeding; and immigration Africa to day has races, languages, and religions representative of almost the entire earth. Hence Blacks, Whites, Browns and Yellows are all represented in Africa; however Blacks are dominant.

At the close of the twentieth century, Africa as a politically and economically fragmented and disunited continent with still unresolved pre-colonial issues of ethnic rivalry presents a grim future--one incapable of exploiting the rich resource potential it has to develop itself and become an economic superpower in its own right (see addendum A). This colonially determined predicament, coupled with the inherent racist proclivities (stemming from the early activities of European explorers and Christian missionaries among World/Majority peoples throughout the world) found among Westerners has led to the international marginalization of Africa.
 

The problem of underdevelopment in Africa (as in most other World/ Majority countries) is a complex one. However, after the failure of more than two decades of so called 'development assistance' to Africa that has left the majority of the continent's people (the peasantry and the workers) in a far worse situation then they were over two decades ago, it is becoming a little clearer as to what the obstacles have been in achieving meaningful development for the majority of the African peoples. It appears that the failure of African development in general and economic development in particular rests on three major sets of dialectically interrelated factors. These sets of factors are: (1) that inherited from the colonial period (centuries of colonial institutions and practice cannot simply be wiped out in two or three decades no matter how strong the political will, which itself in many instances is lacking as the new ruling elites have come to enjoy the same privileges that the colonial elites enjoyed); (2) that which has emerged in the post-independence period; and (3) that which is intrinsic to participation within the modern, western industrialized nations (WINs) dominated, international economic system.

The colonially inherited set of factors include: a mono-culture export-dependent economy which facilitates a hand-to-mouth economic predicament where investible surpluses are almost nonexistent for purposes of economic diversification--a situation that has now caught up with many of the oil exporters too--which is so absolutely essential for long-term economic health and stability; lack of an indigenous capitalist class sufficiently developed to stem the hemorrhage of surplus and resources taking place via activities of foreign multinational corporations; and fragmentation of the African continent into small countries with radically different ideological affiliations, making it almost impossible to develop a single, large, economic and political entity, without which for any one country in isolation comprehensive and organically integrated but diversified economic development is impossible, because of limitations imposed by economies of scale problems, as well as lack of balanced natural resources. (To further clarify the last point: the assertion here is that the present economic difficulties of individual African countries, for example, would be of a considerably lower magnitude and impact if these countries were simply provinces or States belonging to a single country called, perhaps, the U.S.A. --the U.S. of Africa. For a seminal contribution on this aspect see Green and Seidman, 1968.)

The colonially inherited impediments have, however, been compounded by such post-independence factors as: planning and implementation of development projects aimed to benefit the minority urban elites rather than the rural masses; economic mismanagement on the part of governments of Africa via misuse of whatever little investible surplus that has been available in order to sustain economically parasitic middle-class standards of living enjoyed by their elites who model their lifestyles on those of the elites of the WINs; outright economic corruption by elites where financial resources have simply been siphoned out of the country to build financial egg-nests abroad--usually in the West; political instability as rival elite factions have sought to gain control of political power upon which their very status as the elite has come to depend, given the lack of alternative viable modes of large-scale acquisition of wealth, such as ownership of the major means of production; and political corruption--often aided and abetted by Western transnationals and governments, as in the case of Zaire--of which endemic military coups and dictatorships are simply but one manifestation, thus preventing the development of democratic institutions that can help to eradicate these politically induced economic ills. For more information regarding these problems see Gould (1980), Harsch (1988), Panter-Brick (1978), Stohl and Lopez (1986) and Williams (1987).

The third set of factors include the unequal terms of trade between the WINs and Africa, made possible in part by the mono-culturally induced hand-to-mouth economic position of Africa, as well as the extremely low demand-elasticity of many of their exports--clearly demonstrating the irrelevance of the theory of comparative advantage when applied to trading partners of unequal economic strength; usurious lending rates of foreign financial institutions; massive transfers of investible surpluses out of Africa via 'legal' as well as such illegal activities of transnationals as false pricing and invoicing; concentration of investments by transnationals in those branches of World/Majority economic sectors that provide maximum returns to investments in the shortest possible time and with minimal capital and technological outlay--usually the light, elite oriented, consumer industry or the resource extraction sector; bad planning advice and assistance from international organizations such as the International Monetary Fund, and the World Bank, of which the strategy of pursuing import-dependent import-substitution industrialization advocated in the sixties, or the human-capital strategy, or the trickle-down (crumbs from the table) theory, are excellent examples. (See Frank, 1981; Hayter, 1985 ; Lawrence, 1986; and Seidman, 1985)

Compounding these factors have been a number fallacies inherent in the 'ideology of World/Majority development' espoused by western and other international development experts--such as those who work at the U.S. Agency for International Development, and the World Bank. Of these fallacies two are particularly worthy of mention. One, is the belief that lack of progress and development in Africa is a consequence of weaknesses on the part of Africans arising from ignorance of 'correct and logical' methods/knowledge to resolve development obstacles and problems. Yet, in reality the problems of national development have less to do with subjective constraints than objective ones in that resolution of the one (subjective constraints) does not translate into resolution of the other. It is not individuals by themselves who are always responsible for backwardness and lack of progress, but rather forces external to individuals and beyond their control as individuals may also be involved.

One such critical force is, of course, the operation of the international economic system as it is presently constituted where, for example, independent of the volition of both those who own the multi-national corporations, and African leaders, investment in capital starved Africa has tended to be in the extractive (or resource depletion) sector. And even where investment has gone into industrial sectors, as in some countries of Asia, it has tended to be in the low productivity import-dependent sectors. The transnationals are not in the philanthropy business, their first and foremost reason for existence is and must be profit-seeking and maximization, and not development aid. It is simply more profitable to locate basic first-level production phase (raw-material acquisition) in World/Majority countries (FWCs), and leave the complex highly skilled phases of production (including research and development) in home countries where such facilities already exist by virtue of history. Yet the end result of this, of course, is the uncoordinated, parasitic and dependent 'development' that characterizes much of the World/Majority, thereby locking them into their colonially bequeathed monocultural economies. (For more information on the long term negative impact of transnationals, see the internationally comprehensive and empirical study by Bornschier and Chase-Dunn, 1985, as well as the work of Franke and Chasin, 1980.)

It follows from this that no amount of 'proper,' scientifically informed and altruistically infused development planning for Africa by highly knowledgeable 'experts' will, in itself, alter the structures of international economic system that have economically peripheralized Africa, with the resultant economic malformations that characterize most of them to day--of which phenomenon such as the rural youth exodus, lagging agricultural development, three-digit inflation rates, massive unemployment, etc., are but symptoms. It is only in a context when organizations such as the World Bank begin to actively champion radical, but positive, changes in the international economic system, can such development planning take on provide a meaningful basis for the long-term economic future of Africa. In the absence of this context, much, if not all, boils down to an exercise in mirrors and smoke--even if that is not the intention.

Another fallacy has to do with the view that all States are at best beneficial, and at worst simply benign. Thus there is the notion that the State exists on behalf of society as a whole, and consequently as a representative of common interests of society, it exists to protect all individuals in society from injustice and exploitation. While this view of the State may or may not approximate reality among the WINs, with respect to the circumstances of most of Africa the ridiculousness of this notion is self-evident from even a cursory examination of what is going on among African independent countries: the use of the State by elites to facilitate rampant political and economic corruption, commonly involving wholesale violations of basic human rights of the masses and gross misuse of public funds, accompanied by often outright robbery of the public treasury at such levels of magnitude as to almost permanently debilitate all national development effort. In other words the State in many Africa exists primarily to benefit those from amongst whom it is constituted: the elite.

This situation, it should be stressed, has less to do with the absence of public ethics or morality or democratic values or even notions of 'civilized' conduct--however that word is understood--but more with the historical origins of the elite and the State in Africa. Both the modern elite and the State in Africa is for the most part the progeny of colonialism. Consequently it is political power (via the monopolistic control of the State), rather than direct economic power that ensues from the ownership of the major means of production that provides the basis for the constitution of the elite as an elite. Under these circumstances it is not surprising that most major activities of the State that pertain to the distribution of political and economic resources are geared toward the benefit of the elite. This is achieved via both constitutionally legal means (such as investment of public funds in 'development' projects that benefit mainly the elite) as well as extralegal means in the form of political and economic corruption--which can sometimes reach such levels as to reduce 'governments' to gangs of armed thugs presiding over political and economic systems of naked and brutal exploitation of their people--often with the assistance of externally derived help from the WINs, as in the case of some African and Latin American countries. (See for example Gould 1980, Frank, 1981, Herman, 1980, Sandbrook and Barker, 1985; Stohl and Lopez, 1984.)

It should also be noted that it is this particular form of genesis of most African elites that also accounts for their failure to adequately resist the inequities that the international economic system foists on their countries. Why should it matter to many of these elites if workers in their countries are underpaid and exploited by transnationals, so long as the presence of these foreign investors guarantees for the elites themselves (via such mechanisms as managerial employment, receiving bribes, entrepreneurial partnerships, government 'consultancy' work--meaning quite often assistance with the location of appropriate government bureaucrats to bribe), lifestyles and standards of living commensurate with those of the elites among the WINs. (For an example of the retrogressive impact of such behavior on development, see Fuenzilada, 1982.)
 

The subjugation of a people through use of force by an alien people from another country--who are usually characterized by different economic, political, social and cultural systems and who usually belong to a different race and/or ethnic group is what Colonialism implies. The subjugation entails, on one hand, imposition of alien rule and culture by the colonizers against the wishes of the colonized, and on the other, development of a dependent economy based on an alien economic system (e.g. capitalism) aimed at exploiting the resources within the colonized territory (ranging from people through land to mineral and other raw materials) for the benefit of the colonizers. The relationship between the colonized and the colonizer, therefore, is always one of antagonism, inequality, exploitation, and repression.

Colonialism is a specific form of imperialism (see below). The post-colonial imperialist relationship between the colony and its former colonizer is often referred to as neo-Colonialism. The colonization of the World/Majority by Europeans that would follow the so called 'Voyages of Discovery' that began in the 15th century was a result of a fortuitous combination of factors that had evolved in Western Europe over many centuries, which in the end would seal the fate of the World/Majority peoples because they lacked these factors. They included:

(i) Economic factor: the development of the capitalist economic system that would create a demand for overseas investment and exchange markets and at the same time sources for cheap raw materials and labor power (in the form of slaves as well as low-wage workers). The World/Majority peoples did not have capitalist economic systems which could have interacted with the European capitalist economies productively. The prevalent economic systems in the World/Majority ranged from 'hunting and gathering' through 'subsistence shifting-cultivation' to semi-feudal (as in some parts of Asia). Under such systems even the notion that human beings could individually 'own' land in perpetuity was considered highly alien. It is no wonder that European settlers in many parts of the world would claim that they found land with no owners.

(ii) Political factor: The development of nationalism and nation-states in Europe from around 18th to 19th centuries. This had the effect of generating internal rivalries among the various Western European powers for global economic advantage via acquisition of colonies which in turn improved their military and administrative capabilities to acquire more colonies. Most of the World/Majority peoples had not yet reached a similar level of political development. Consequently, not only did they not have a sense of belonging to a particular geographical territory with a unitary government that they could call a nation-state, but they were unable to organize among themselves (as well as unite with neighboring peoples) to meet the colonial threat that the European appearance on their doorstep heralded. In fact, on the contrary, the colonizers were able to play one ethnic group against another by exploiting existing rivalries to thereby, eventually, conquer and colonize all.

(iii) Ideological factor: By the time the 'Voyages of Discovery' had begun Western Europeans had acquired a religion, Christianity, that saw all those who were not Christians as savages in need of being 'saved.' The Crusades would help to harden this view. Consequently the Europeans arrived in the World/Majority with preconceived racist tendencies. The task of undertaking rapine projects would be made that much easier on their consciences. World/Majority peoples on their part lacked these tendencies with the result that not only were they unable to unite with each other against a common foreign enemy when the need arose, but on the contrary, often received the strangers without animosity and extended to them their hospitality. This permitted the Europeans to establish 'beachheads' from which they could mount their colonization projects. The paradox, of course, was that while many World/Majority peoples were riven by ethnic rivalries among themselves they did not expand their 'ethnicism' to the level of racist hostilities against the most obvious outsiders, the Europeans. In fact to this day this paradox continues: it is not uncommon to find that in a black and white encounter, whites will almost always unite in a common racist bond against blacks, but blacks on their part will fail to achieve a similar common racist bond against the whites. Hence, for example, at no time have blacks in S.A. ever called for a black racist state; rather they have always worked toward a non-racial state. One of the first words uttered by a freed Nelson Mandela, even after more than two decades of imprisonment by the European racists was to the effect that he was opposed to black domination just as much as he was opposed to white domination, and that if need be he would give his life in working toward a democratic society in which all (black and white) lived in harmony.

(iv) Technological factor: Although the Chinese invented the gunpowder it was the Europeans who found a way to put it to destructive use by inventing the gun. (Invented by the Italians, probably in the early 14th century.) World/Majority peoples did not have guns when the Europeans arrived with theirs. The predatory tendencies of capitalism, justified by the ideology of Christian racism, was consummated via the barrel of the gun. In the inherently unequal encounter between swords and spears on one hand, and bullets on the other, the fate of the World/Majority peoples was sealed forever; their history would be permanently hijacked and transformed into an appendage of Western European history.
 

>(a) It is not a coincidence that possibly the only World/Majority country in the world to escape Colonialism, Japan, would retrace the same steps as those taken by Western colonial powers including becoming a colonial power itself in Asia and later an industrial power. The reason why Japan escaped colonization was a result of both good fortune and internally generated changes that permitted it to develop a defense capability when the threat of colonization by a Western power seemed a possibility.

(b) For a very informative account of the colonization of the World/Majority people by some of the World/Minority nations see Braudel, 1982 (1979).
 

Imperialism is defined for the purposes of this article as follows: The pattern of economic relations historically determined between an advanced (usually industrial) country and a less advanced (usually agricultural or low level industrial) country in which, via the superior economic power of the advanced country, the economy, culture and even politics of the less advanced country is dominated by the advanced country. This domination takes the form of extraction of resources and profits by the advanced country from the less advanced country via the agency of transnational corporations, coupled with its dependence on the advanced country for whatever major economic growth it may experience. The imperialist relationship is similar to a colonial relationship except for the fact that there is no desire for political control of the less advanced country by the advanced country.

The principal mechanism for maintaining an imperialist relationship, therefore, is not governmental instruments--such as the colonial administration set up by the colonizer--but an economic instrument in the form of the multinational corporation originating from the advanced country. The imperialist relationship, like the colonial relationship, is inherently an unequal economic relationship in which direct plunder of the resources of the less advanced country that characterizes the colonial relationship is replaced by an indirect plunder via the operation of the international capitalist system of investment, trade and profit maximization. While colonial relationships always entail use of direct military force, imperialist relationships are maintained through indirect military force in the form of either the threat of its use or its actual episodic use in support of those within the less developed country who benefit the most from imperialism (who, therefore, are most willing to maintain the imperialist relationship) to achieve or retain political power. Therefore, unlike in a colonial relationship, no imperialist relationship is possible without a significant degree of cooperation from those who control political power within the less advanced country. It is for this reason that often such countries tend to have dictatorial and oppressive, rather than democratic, governments.