The Ottawa Citizen May 2, 1993, Sunday, FINAL EDITION SECTION: FORUM; (NEWS); ARGUMENT; Pg. C1 HEADLINE: THE NEW COLONIALISM; Some countries just can't govern themselves and the world should help BYLINE: PAUL JOHNSON
Recently in Liberia, where rival bands of heavily armed thugs have been struggling for mastery, a humble inhabitant of the capital, Monrovia, approached a Marine guarding the U.S. Embassy and said, "For God's sake come and govern us!
The grassroots origin of the appeal for the return of colonialism puts the whole phenomenon in a different perspective.
The present generation, even in the former colonial powers, has been brought up to consider any form of colonialism as inherently evil, a gross form of oppression practised by technologically superior powers on weaker races.
That, of course, is not how its practitioners, throughout history, saw it. By the early 20th century, however, colonialism operated under growing restrictions imposed by liberal opinion.
Indeed, by the end of the First World War, colonialism was manifestly on the moral defensive.
Hence, the Versailles Treaty, instead of carving up the former colonies of Germany and Turkey among the victorious powers, created trusteeships. These were territories not yet considered fit for self-government but mandated by the League of Nations to various powers to be prepared for independence.
This British notion that there was no such thing as a colony in perpetuity, but that all territories would become independent when they were ready for it, was already implicit in British administration throughout its empire and had been put into force in its so-called White Dominions of South Africa, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
From Versailles on, then, there was a growing assumption that all colonies would eventually be freed. Hostility to colonialism increased through the Second World War, fuelled by American high-mindedness and by the ideological beliefs of the Soviet regime, where Lenin's anti-colonial tract Imperialism was part of the canon.
These new moral forces, and the physical impact of the war, which weakened the old European colonial powers, especially Britain, brought about the age of decolonization.
There was a paradox in this process. Colonies had never been better administered than during their last phase. But precisely when colonies were deriving the maximum benefit from European rule, the decision was made to liberate them forthwith.
There are fashions in geopolitics as well as in clothes and instant decolonization was one. By the mid-1960s it was virtually over.
Not everyone has suffered. Three categories have flourished: the professional politicians, the army officers and the less scrupulous business executives. But most ordinary Africans have done badly, as a result of the collapse of constitutional government and the rule of law, as well as civil and tribal conflicts, invasion, corruption and man-made famines.
Western experts who had backed the rapid transfer of power argued that Africa, in particular, was going through a difficult transition and that patience -- plus assistance of all kinds -- was imperative. That view is now discredited.
During the 1980s it came to be recognized that government-to-government aid usually served only to preserve unsuccessful and often vicious regimes.
As for patience, the historical record shows it served nobody. By the early 1990s two of the world's most unstable and poorest black states were Haiti and Liberia, which had been governing themselves for 200 and 150 years respectively. In both, ordinary citizens, who had no security for property or even life, clamored for Western intervention.
During the 1980s, old-style aid was largely discontinued. Western governments underwrote specific, approved projects and supervised the spending. At the same time, huge quantities of money and goods were distributed by international charities.
But both methods in many cases ran into the insuperable problem of government breakdown, which meant supplies were looted or sold on the black market by tribal factions and brigands.
By the early 1990s, some international agencies were beginning to argue openly that, in crisis situations, such as the famines in East Africa, a Western military presence was essential to supplement a largely non-existent government.
Recall that it was UN theory and practice to deploy troops at the request of a legitimate government. But what was to be done in places such as Haiti, where there was no legitimate government, or Somalia, where there was no government at all? Were the United Nations and the West to stand by?
During the 1970s the answer would almost certainly have been yes. But in the 1980s geopolitical fashion once more began to change, as Western powers showed a renewed willingness to use force in what they believed to be right -- in the Falklands, Grenada, Panama and the Persian Gulf.
The decision of the United States, with UN authority, to send Marines into Somalia marked a new turning point. Here there could be no question of invitation from the local government because no such body existed. The purpose of the landing was to ensure aid got where it was needed, and to protect it, and aid workers, from armed bands.
But such armed intervention, by its very nature, is bound to prove unsatisfactory and the effort has already run into difficulties.
It is worth remembering that the original Dutch, Portuguese and British traders who came to the African coasts in the early modern period, with the aim of doing business and with no intention of settling, faced exactly the same problem.
So, European colonialism in its origins was to some extent a reluctant and involuntary process. Happily, the civilized powers need not get stuck in the old colonial quagmire because they have the example of the trusteeship system before them.
The Security Council could commit a territory where authority has irretrievably broken down to one or more trustees. These would be empowered not merely to impose order by force but to assume political functions. They would in effect be possessed of sovereign powers.
Their mandate would usually be of limited duration and subject to supervision by the Security Council. Their ultimate object would be to take constitutional measures to ensure a return to effective self-government with all deliberate speed.
I stress "effective because we must not repeat the mistakes of the 1960s. The trustees should not plan to withdraw until they are reasonably certain that the return to independence will be successful. So the mandate may last 50 years, or 100.
Reviving trusteeship means reversing the conventional wisdom of the last half-century, which laid down that all peoples are ready for independence and that any difficulties they encounter are the result of distortions created by colonialism itself.
The basic problem is obvious but is never publicly admitted: Some states are not yet fit to govern themselves. There is a moral issue here: The civilized world has a mission to go out to these desperate places and govern. By "civilized world we ought eventually to include among potential trustees not only Germany and Japan, which will soon be eligible for permanent membership in the Security Council, but countries such as Singapore, which have proved models of public administration.
There must be several models of trusteeship, ranging from the provision of basic government where none exists to setting up internal security networks and mandatory economic management.
If done firmly and confidently, such state-building will prove popular. It is important, therefore, that the first pilot projects should be carefully chosen and their trustees experienced. Somalia is an obvious choice. So is Liberia and perhaps Haiti. Zaire, where the crumbling Mobutu tyranny will be followed by anarchy, is another candidate.
The only satisfaction will be the unspoken gratitude of millions of people who will find in this altruistic revival of colonialism the only way out of their intractable miseries.
(Historian Paul Johnson is the author of Modern Times. He is at work on a history of the American people. This is excerpted from The New York Times Magazine.)
GRAPHIC: (Map of Africa) Africa is one place where this type of intervention might be welcomed. -- Yoshie
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