Page 485 - Volume 2_CHANGES_merged_with links

Changes!

Commentary

not added to, the USA ‘fear’ of communism taking root anywhere . And anywhere included

Africa.

African communitarianism is not communism. But communitarianism isn’t the

commodification that so symbolises corporate USA. And in this modern world corporate

USA so dominates the USA and its interaction with the wider world.

Why does this matter? Well, when independent African governments turned to

Moscow and its allies in the decades following independence, they were not running
towards communism. In many ways, they were running away from what they saw as a

domineering and restrictive USA. If anything, they were running towards someone

seemingly more co-operative.

(It’s only fair to say that communist Moscow and its satellites can reasonably be described as running
towards Africa. In their superpower contest with the USA, they were only too willing to provide the
economic ‘trinkets’ that could tie African governments to them).

I am not sure Americans understand this negative reaction towards their country. (It might
be slightly more accurate to say “their government £rather than “their country”.) Americans see

themselves as ‘helping’ Africa. Africans can see things differently.

You can see something like this in China’s Outward Direct Investment (ODI) in Africa.
The USA, the UK and others have reacted, and perhaps over-reacted about this. m’zungu

donor nations are entirely right to worry about the ‘debt’ aspect of China’s ODI. But what

they don’t seem to get is that African governments are not running towards China. They
are running away from the restrictions that m’zungu nations and their institutions (BWI)

impose on Africa.

In my 5 years living in Africa, before writing this trilogy, I never met a single African

who spoke well of China, who welcomed China as an investor in Africa. No matter the

country I was in, no matter the type of African I talked to, each and all saw China as ‘out for
its own interest’, only investing in projects that China saw as being valuable to China’s self-

interest.

This does have some importance for the next few decades of African development.

Americans should ask themselves why Africa turns away from the USA. And why they run
towards another ‘power’.