Foreign Aid; Is Europe Obliged to Help the Third World?

[bombadillo]

Originally Posted by Mynydd

Actually, corruption is one factor. But not the main factor why aid is unsuccessful. The main factor is the people themselves. They have proved consistently hopeless to even help themselves.

They are helpless -- which is one big reason why they're in the predicament they are in. And partly why they are helpless is because of authoritarian government structures -- military rule, or civilian dictators (often masquerading as democracies), and a corrupt officialdom. So even if "humanitarian aid" does arrive (and it's usually just a drop in the bucket), it gets siphoned off by the dictator and his cronies and/or crooked officials. What little is that left for distribution usually goes to favored people (since governance is along patron-client lines).

But to clarify my position, people have to stand up and fight for themselves. Call it cultural Darwinism if you will. Even if we wanted to, we can't help those who aren't willing to stand up and fight for themselves.

[Almost a Christian]

I'm not interested in watching people die. But let's make one thing clear. All the strutting ego-driven concerts don't add up to a dime...

What can be done is to develop an international trade consensus to compel multinationals to behave ethically, remove their support for junta's and a system of tair trade should then regulate commerce. If people are actually dying at a catastrophic rate then aid should be rendered, otherwise hand-outs breed dependence although technical advisors are permissable...

If such measures are implemented (they won't be, the status quo is too profitable) then positive improvements will be seen in Africa within 50 years. Naturally that won't satisfy that whiney Corr woman but waving a magic wand was never realistic proposition was it..?

[Errigal]

That's right. Fair trade practises will do far more than yet another feel good concert for Africa.

[meadhbh]

What needs to be done is to help the people develope methods that will allow them to help themselves. An example is a lot of problems stem from the fact that parts of Africa are growing drier. So send experts on farming in an arid enviroment out there and teach people what they can do to produce more food. Not just go over there and give it tom them. That fixes thing so long as there is food being given but doesn't adress the long term isssues.

[Kalevi]

Originally Posted by Mynydd

I'm not sure if you are aware of the large number of young medical doctors, teachers, engineers and other volunteers from European countries helping out in Africa. It is not just free food. At least not with the Catholic Church aid agencies.

Yes, that's a totally different thing, of course. My comment was specifically about material aid.

One alternative to material aid would be to give them jobs instead. I mean a large scale practice of establishing factories in Africa, factories that would produce different kind of export items like genuine African handicraft for Western yuppies and hippies, would not compete with the local entrepreneurs and disturb local markets, and would not strive to make profit but just to keep people employed under a certain set of rules. This in order to teach the people the basics of modern society - going to work on time, having a good working moral, not stealing, etc. - that are preconditions of a developed society. Perhaps it would be hard not to disturb markets anyway, but at least the benefit (wages) would go directly to the people instead of the pockets of some spineless ruler or bureaucrate.

At least I'm running out of ideas what else to do ...except to build a high wall around the continent and not letting anyone or anything in or out.

Originally Posted by Mynydd

Which brings me again to the issue of what do Africans settled in developed countries do for their own people. Do they gain knowledge that allows them to go back to Africa and help their own?

I think they do send a lot of money to their families back home. Which is an indication of the tribal/family centered culture in Africa. "Their people" to them means a radically smaller unit than it means to us, which brings in the question if it's even possible or sensible trying to form European style nations in Africa.

[Kalevi]

Originally Posted by Gonzalvus

Sending money and food we are only combating the effects (famine, poverty). That doesn´t work, in my opinion. We should instead combat the causes (too many to list: usurocracy, capitalism, etc.) or just do nothing and let them die.

From the article I posted above: "If the [material] aid to Africa would be stopped, an ordinary African wouldn't even notice."

[bombadillo]

Originally Posted by Almost a Christian

I'm not interested in watching people die. But let's make one thing clear. All the strutting ego-driven concerts don't add up to a dime...

What can be done is to develop an international trade consensus to compel multinationals to behave ethically, remove their support for junta's and a system of tair trade should then regulate commerce. If people are actually dying at a catastrophic rate then aid should be rendered, otherwise hand-outs breed dependence although technical advisors are permissable...

If such measures are implemented (they won't be, the status quo is too profitable) then positive improvements will be seen in Africa within 50 years. Naturally that won't satisfy that whiney Corr woman but waving a magic wand was never realistic proposition was it..?

As you say, the present arrangements are too convenient for Western financial and political elites -- which is the only thing that matters -- so nothing will change. The present world system has evolved gradually over the last few centuries and I believe it affords the best perspective with which to view conditions in any specific part of the world. This world system operates with structural inequality that is enforced militarily if need be, and most of the rest of the time by manifestly one-sided rules and regulations administered by bodies like the WTO and IMF.

But even before this system came into being, life in the Third World was no bed of roses. As Plethon has indicated, Africa has been in a state of low-intensity warfare for centuries. Are we our brother's keeper? How can we change human nature? If the way they have decided to live causes them problems, is that our responsibility? Western exploitation would be impossible, in fact, without local complicity, incompetence, apathy, corruption, and division. This is the gist of the matter. And our good intentions -- if we have them -- are powerless in the face of this. In light of this, the best we can probably do is try to live our lives and let them get on with theirs -- whatever it is.

Postscript: To drive home my point, an article in today's Guardian:

Zimbabwe runs out of bread | Special reports | Guardian Unlimited

Zimbabwe's bakeries have shut and supermarkets have warned there will be no bread for the foreseeable future as the government admitted that wheat production had collapsed following the seizure of white-owned farms.

The agricultural ministry announcement that the wheat harvest is only about a third of what is required, and that imports are held up by lack of hard currency, came as a deadline passed today for the last white farmers to leave their land or face prosecution for trespass.