>I always wonder why politicians/dictators from developing countries who can also observe these differences ever wonder that the average people in a developed c

>I always wonder why politicians/dictators from developing countries who can also observe these differences ever wonder that the average people in a developed country are living a good life so why not just copy what the developed country is doing and apply the similar policies back home to improve the lives of their own citizens. They very much do, but they almost always do it in a cargo-cult fashion, imitating the appearance of western progress while remaining ignorant of or uninterested in the underlying mechanics. Take for instance Julius Nyerere, well-intentioned as he was, driving his country into the ditch not once but twice by uncritically accepting foreign ideologies of communist collectivisation first and then unchecked capitalism second, apparently thinking either was some kind of white magic incantation that would bring about prosperity, completely ignoring the systemic factors at work with ordinary Tanzanians.