Africa

[James Heartfield]

The WEEK
ending 1 December 2002

DEMOCRATISING AFRICA: THE LEGACY

Missile strikes on Jewish people and businesses in Kenya, and violent 
riots against the Miss World contest in Nigeria have all added to the 
picture of Africa descending into chaos. British and American officials 
have underscored the view that Kenya - site of the 1998 US Embassy 
bombing - is a lawless state. For media commentators the overall picture 
is of people who are very different from us, and have to be treated with 
kid gloves, in case our 'Western values' cause them gratuitous offence.

But the grandiose cultural analyses of the Third World in general and 
Africa in particular as irredeemably different from the West only help 
to obscure the real sources of conflict in these societies. Furthermore, 
these analyses cover up the way that Western programmes to 'democratise' 
and civilise Africa only served to destabilise already fragile states, 
increasing the opportunities for conflict and bombings.

In May 1993 the then US Secretary of State Warren Christopher, admitted 
that  'during the long Cold War period, policies toward Africa were 
often determined not by how much they affected Africa, but by what 
advantage they brought to Washington or Moscow'. But his strategic 
apologia was only the precursor to a new US writ in Africa: Henceforth, 
'an enduring commitment to democracy and human rights' would be at the 
heart of America's relations with Africa.

Whatever the intentions, America's policy on Africa had the effect of 
destabilising already fragile regimes. A battery of policies - generally 
reflecting Western preoccupations as much as African realities - were 
directed at the continent, with little sense of what consequence they 
would have for stability. In Somalia, US troops backed up famine relief, 
quickly being dragged into a 'tribal' war. In Rwanda, and then Zaire, 
America supported the Rwandan Patriotic Front in a campaign to unseat 
the Habyarimana and Mobutu regimes in 1994-5, leaving only an ethnic 
dictatorship and a civil war in their wake. In Kenya, the embattled 
regime of Daniel arap Moi was forced to open a multi-party parliament in 
January 1993, only to close it down again.

Ignoring these setbacks, the bandwagon of democratisation gathered pace. 
In 1996, Christopher was again touring Africa, clocking up more miles 
than any other US leader. Hillary Clinton highlighted the issue of 
women's oppression in her visits to the region. In 1999 World Bank head 
James Wolfensohn launched the Comprehensive Development Framework that 
made social programmes a new condition for aid. African regimes that 
were already weakened by their low level of development were being 
overburdened by Western ambitions.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair has added to the flow of crocodile 
tears coming from Western leaders, telling the United Nations millennial 
summit on 6 September 2000 that 'there is a dismal record of failure in 
Africa'. 'Twenty-one of the 44 countries in sub-Saharan Africa are 
affected by conflict which undermines efforts at development', Blair 
continued, demanding that 'We must be partners in the search for change 
and hope'. Blair's many promises to reform Africa have become an annual 
fixture at his party conference.

The question remains why the rhetorical commitment of the West to Africa 
has only translated into heightened conflict within African societies, 
and between the West and Africa. One answer might be that the words are 
empty. But the truth is more problematic. The West's actual contribution 
to African society has been to further destabilise the continent. 
Political Islam played a peripheral role in sub-Saharan Africa until 
recently. But as nationalist strategies were compromised by Western 
domination, the regimes in Nigeria and the Sudan have appealed to 
conservative clerics as a source of authority.

The bombings and riots are wholly reactionary in their outlook, and 
deserve to be condemned in their own right. But the destabilisation of 
African states is a consequence of a misplaced attempt by Western 
societies to play the white man.
-- 
James Heartfield
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