3 ms·

Africans are very creative and resourceful people. Children are building their own toys, mechanics can repair any car or engine. If they are missing some eleme

Africans are very creative and resourceful people. Children are building their own toys, mechanics can repair any car or engine. If they are missing some elements, they will be built. With so much ingenuity, it's hard to believe they need aid. I really think the author has a good point, aid for Africa has always been to tell them how to do instead of letting them do it their own way. Colonialism (and its newer version, aid) has had a bad impact in a sense that they've been taught to imitate the occidental world. The culture and the people are different, the solutions must be different.

johnnybgoode 17y ago
Although colonialism and aid might appear to be similar on the surface, there are big differences between the two. The motives were not at all the same, and they had very different results.
- samueladam 17y ago
  Of course, they are completely different. Some of the guilt of colonialism has been transformed into aid. I was referring to the influence both have on not considering Africans as people who can handle themselves. It will take time, trial and error, but those can't be avoided.
  - johnnybgoode 17y ago
    I agree. They certainly can handle themselves.
    - eru 17y ago
      Yes. I guess corruption, not material needs, is the big and hard to tackle problem for most of Africa. We like to complain about our civil servants and politicians in the rich world, but we have more than a head start in this regard. (Perhaps someone should export honest and competent civil servants and politicians. Perhaps the Swiss can be coaxed to spare some? Italy would certainly benefit from an influx, too.)
      - sho 17y ago
        "Perhaps someone should export honest and competent civil servants and politicians." They'd probably just be imprisoned/killed by the corrupt incumbents. You'd have to replace the whole power structure at once, and back it with force of arms - which kind of brings us back to colonialism.
      - vidarh 17y ago
        Actually, the UN does have a program for "exporting" competent and honest civil servants and politicians, or rather of paying to repatriating well qualified expats that could otherwise not afford to move back. A recent example was one of Nigeria's previous ministers of finance who was paid by the UN to move back from the US. Nigerian ministers were at the time paid only ca $6000/year - no wonder corruption is high in many of these countries when these same people often could make hundreds of thousands, or millions, in the private sector. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ngozi_Okonjo-Iweala http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ngozi_Okonjo-Iweala In her case it didn't go down to well with the other ministers, and that's likely a problem. A solution might be to set up a fund to provide better salaries in return for the government agreeing to regular independent audits of ministers finances and publishing the findings (... we saw how much fun that could be even in a country like the UK). Of course many governments would decline, but some at least seem to want to clean house. It's a lot easier to clean house if the financial situation doesn't provide ridiculous levels of temptation on a daily basis.
        eru 17y ago
        Interesting. Thanks. I remember I even watched some TED talks by Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala earlier.
- anamax 17y ago
  > The motives were not at all the same, and they had very different results. Yes, the results of colonialism were significantly better for the colonized. However, to be fair to the folks who think that intent matters even when the result is a horrorshow time and time again, the colonial-era missionary work was significantly more effective than post-colonial non-religious aid. Then again, the post-colonial missionary work has been more effective than post-colonial non-religious aid. That's not to say that missionary work has always been a great thing. On the other hand, beating the record of non-religious aid isn't all that hard.
mahmud 17y ago
Africans are very creative and resourceful people. Hey, thanks! You non-Africans seem that way to us as well. Maybe it's just something we all humans have in common? Children are building their own toys, mechanics can repair any car or engine. If they are missing some elements, they will be built. I have noticed the same thing in the Chinese, South Asians, Latin Americans, South East Asians, East Europeans and ex Soviets! Actually, I might be on to something here. All poor people are just good at fixing things, usually bicycles, and recycling. It's like, necessity taught them or something. I have also noticed that people in the developed world are just as good at "fixin" things, albeit non-physical things. I greatly admire your ability to "startup" and advance your lives in anyway possible. Sometimes I wonder if our ancestral village elder traveled to your lands and tutored you in the ways of survival. Amazing you are!
- samueladam 17y ago
  You missed my point. Those sentences were to introduce the fact that they don't need help they're not asking for. Why do you feel the need to take them as offending? Those are things i admire in Africa, like the fact that you are considered as a human being rather than a consumer. Yes, because of the lack of wealth as we know it in occidental countries, but wealth can take many forms.
  - mahmud 17y ago
    I am not offended, just confused by your afro-centrism ;-) It's very typical to mystify and revere Africa (or the non-occidental Other, in general) as something noble, rich in tradition, hospitable, etc. but even these kind words alienate the people spoken of (as opposed to the people spoken to) Admiring "resourcefulness", a universal human trait, in just the Africans means one of two things to me: 1) Inability to see the same quality in non-Africans (which is afro-centrism) or 2) Patronizing Africans for their ability to, well, "use what they've got" :-P If you want to see sheer human ingenuity and resourcefulness all you have to do is look at prison tools and weapons. Any 1st world citizen will be reduced into an "African" once thrown in jail and stripped of all property; they end up collecting small items and fashioning them to works of art. It's nothing special. You can see traces of this "patronizing" of the other going as far back as Rouseu and his noble savage. The modern day, American, equivalent is a funny series of commercials ran by GEICO, and American insurance company. A caveman is portrayed having a very normal life; he plays tennis, has an on again off again relationship, goes out with friends, yet he is treated as different everywhere he goes. To himself, he is just "like us" :-)
TrevorJ 17y ago
I once traveled to Africa with a documentary film crew. One of our battery packs broke and a local was able to whip out a soldering iron and take the whole thing apart. He quickly identified the fuse as the offending part. Rather than asking if we happened to have a spare, he simply heated the fuse, teased the metal end caps off it and used a bit of similar-gauged wire to rebuild the fuse itself. This all happened in under ten minutes in a dark hallway while he was sitting on the floor. Sure, lots of people in lots of places are handy with various things but here in the states we rarely HAVE to fix things with no possibility of acquiring replacement parts, so I think sometimes it doesn't even occur to us to try.

johnnybgoode 17y ago

Although colonialism and aid might appear to be similar on the surface, there are big differences between the two. The motives were not at all the same, and they had very different results.

samueladam 17y ago
Of course, they are completely different. Some of the guilt of colonialism has been transformed into aid. I was referring to the influence both have on not considering Africans as people who can handle themselves. It will take time, trial and error, but those can't be avoided.
- johnnybgoode 17y ago
  I agree. They certainly can handle themselves.
  - eru 17y ago
    Yes. I guess corruption, not material needs, is the big and hard to tackle problem for most of Africa. We like to complain about our civil servants and politicians in the rich world, but we have more than a head start in this regard. (Perhaps someone should export honest and competent civil servants and politicians. Perhaps the Swiss can be coaxed to spare some? Italy would certainly benefit from an influx, too.)
    - sho 17y ago
      "Perhaps someone should export honest and competent civil servants and politicians." They'd probably just be imprisoned/killed by the corrupt incumbents. You'd have to replace the whole power structure at once, and back it with force of arms - which kind of brings us back to colonialism.
    - vidarh 17y ago
      Actually, the UN does have a program for "exporting" competent and honest civil servants and politicians, or rather of paying to repatriating well qualified expats that could otherwise not afford to move back. A recent example was one of Nigeria's previous ministers of finance who was paid by the UN to move back from the US. Nigerian ministers were at the time paid only ca $6000/year - no wonder corruption is high in many of these countries when these same people often could make hundreds of thousands, or millions, in the private sector. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ngozi_Okonjo-Iweala http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ngozi_Okonjo-Iweala In her case it didn't go down to well with the other ministers, and that's likely a problem. A solution might be to set up a fund to provide better salaries in return for the government agreeing to regular independent audits of ministers finances and publishing the findings (... we saw how much fun that could be even in a country like the UK). Of course many governments would decline, but some at least seem to want to clean house. It's a lot easier to clean house if the financial situation doesn't provide ridiculous levels of temptation on a daily basis.
      - eru 17y ago
        Interesting. Thanks. I remember I even watched some TED talks by Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala earlier.
anamax 17y ago
> The motives were not at all the same, and they had very different results. Yes, the results of colonialism were significantly better for the colonized. However, to be fair to the folks who think that intent matters even when the result is a horrorshow time and time again, the colonial-era missionary work was significantly more effective than post-colonial non-religious aid. Then again, the post-colonial missionary work has been more effective than post-colonial non-religious aid. That's not to say that missionary work has always been a great thing. On the other hand, beating the record of non-religious aid isn't all that hard.

mahmud 17y ago

Africans are very creative and resourceful people. Hey, thanks! You non-Africans seem that way to us as well. Maybe it's just something we all humans have in common? Children are building their own toys, mechanics can repair any car or engine. If they are missing some elements, they will be built. I have noticed the same thing in the Chinese, South Asians, Latin Americans, South East Asians, East Europeans and ex Soviets! Actually, I might be on to something here. All poor people are just good at fixing things, usually bicycles, and recycling. It's like, necessity taught them or something. I have also noticed that people in the developed world are just as good at "fixin" things, albeit non-physical things. I greatly admire your ability to "startup" and advance your lives in anyway possible. Sometimes I wonder if our ancestral village elder traveled to your lands and tutored you in the ways of survival. Amazing you are!

samueladam 17y ago
You missed my point. Those sentences were to introduce the fact that they don't need help they're not asking for. Why do you feel the need to take them as offending? Those are things i admire in Africa, like the fact that you are considered as a human being rather than a consumer. Yes, because of the lack of wealth as we know it in occidental countries, but wealth can take many forms.
- mahmud 17y ago
  I am not offended, just confused by your afro-centrism ;-) It's very typical to mystify and revere Africa (or the non-occidental Other, in general) as something noble, rich in tradition, hospitable, etc. but even these kind words alienate the people spoken of (as opposed to the people spoken to) Admiring "resourcefulness", a universal human trait, in just the Africans means one of two things to me: 1) Inability to see the same quality in non-Africans (which is afro-centrism) or 2) Patronizing Africans for their ability to, well, "use what they've got" :-P If you want to see sheer human ingenuity and resourcefulness all you have to do is look at prison tools and weapons. Any 1st world citizen will be reduced into an "African" once thrown in jail and stripped of all property; they end up collecting small items and fashioning them to works of art. It's nothing special. You can see traces of this "patronizing" of the other going as far back as Rouseu and his noble savage. The modern day, American, equivalent is a funny series of commercials ran by GEICO, and American insurance company. A caveman is portrayed having a very normal life; he plays tennis, has an on again off again relationship, goes out with friends, yet he is treated as different everywhere he goes. To himself, he is just "like us" :-)

TrevorJ 17y ago

I once traveled to Africa with a documentary film crew. One of our battery packs broke and a local was able to whip out a soldering iron and take the whole thing apart. He quickly identified the fuse as the offending part. Rather than asking if we happened to have a spare, he simply heated the fuse, teased the metal end caps off it and used a bit of similar-gauged wire to rebuild the fuse itself. This all happened in under ten minutes in a dark hallway while he was sitting on the floor. Sure, lots of people in lots of places are handy with various things but here in the states we rarely HAVE to fix things with no possibility of acquiring replacement parts, so I think sometimes it doesn't even occur to us to try.