NEVIS Review No
23
Section I
Ref#23.1
August 12, 2013
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Ethnicity and
development in sub-Saharan Africa- Part I
By NDANGA NOYOO
(Source-JOURNAL OF SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT IN AFRICA VOL 15
NO.2 JULY 2000)
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Introduction
Sub-Saharan Africa is
presently confronted by many sociopolitical and economic maladies. Many of
these negative forces have reshaped people's lives and the manner in which
institutions respond to their needs. It has been argued in the past that many problems
currently besieging the sub-continent of Africa emanate from the wanton
exploitation by imperial European nations of the region's human and natural
resources for more than four centuries. This exploitation and subjugation still
continues today although in a more subtle and refined way. Even though political
or "flag independence" has been attained in sub-Saharan Africa there has been
insignificant progress in areas of economic emancipation. This has led to the
re-colonization of the region through conditional aid and the regulation of
prices of the region's exports by former imperial nations.
Although this conspiracy thesis
was accepted for some time, especially during the anti-colonial struggles of
the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, some Africans today have also come to terms with
the fact that many of the problems facing sub-Saharan countries are self
inflicted. Indeed the blatant and senseless killing of Africans by depraved
African regimes, such as those of Idi Amin in Uganda and Jean Bokasa in the
Central African Republic after the attainment of political independence, has
reawakened both scholars and activists to the reality that such factors
contributed immensely to the region's current poor performance in areas of
human development. Rightminded. Africans are now more cautious about
attributing Africa's woes wholly to colonialism or neo-colonialism. When we
analyse Africa's political and economic catastrophes it is clear that one self
inflicted misery that is central to Africa's current situation is that of
ethnicity.
To someone who has not visited
the continent, Africa south of the Sahara conjures up images of emaciated
children, the victims of famines caused by drought and desertification. This is
a very different image from the Africa of thirty years ago when the flags of
the newly independent states were being raised and a feeling of optimism were widespread
beyond as well as within Africa (Grove 1991:39). In contemporary political and
economic parlance it is the continent's unstable and volatile situation
that stands out.
Although this manner of speaking
does not signify a rediscovery of sub-Saharan Africa it merely alludes to the
unstable conditions in the sub-continent by highlighting the colossal human
tragedies that became pervasive in the 1990s. Much of sub-Saharan Africa is on
the verge of imploding as civil wars
ravage families and communities while poverty-related problems continue to
escalate. The falling prices of the continent's exports on international
markets have led to a downward spiral of the economies in the region. Added to
this, the Structural Adjustment Programmes
(SAPs) of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank continue to
accentuate this already unacceptable situation.
Our countries' economic crises
appear most pronounced in the field of social welfare, poverty and in standards
of living, infant mortality, school enrolment and life expectancy (Hassan
1997).The debt burden compounds the sub-continent's socio-economic and political
problems. By the mid-1980s the share of
debts incurred by sub-Saharan Africa was simply enormous, considering that most
of the world's poorest economies are to be found in that sub-region. For example the total debt stocks
for sub-Saharan Africa stood at US$ 55.6 billion in 1980, US$ 98.1 billion in
1985 and US$171.4 billion in 1990. In other words the sub-Saharan African debt
more than tripled between 1980 and 1990 (Adekanye 1995:358).
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Ethnicity
conceptualized
THE TERM ethnicity refers
to some form of group identity. Ethnicity applies to a group of persons who
accept and define themselves by a consciousness of common descent or origin,
shared historical memories and connections (Chazan et al. 1988).
Ethnicity can be broken into two components:
• Instrumental
ethnicity - this
emanates from material deprivation,
• Symbolic
ethnicity - based
on the anxiety to preserve one's cultural identity.
In extreme situations the two
strands of ethnicity can combine and serve as a motive force for state
formation (Oomen 1997:21). Such a situation epitomizes the present conflagration
of internecine wars in countries south of the Sahara.
Ethnicity seems to thrive in
chaotic social and political environments. Ethnicity is not only a contemporary
phenomenon. It was also rife in the colonial era. In many instances African
social interaction in urban colonial
settings has been typified by ethnic rivalries. Here people of different ethnic
groups and cultures met for the first time. Some of these contacts .culminated
in ethnic feuds which were - ironically - quelled by the white settlers. White
settlers also established bodies such as the
tribal elders' system to enforce law and order as well as manage conflicts
between the natives. For instance in colonial Zambia on the Copperbelt there
was hatred and fighting between different ethnic groups and killings as gangs of
young men prowled around the mining compounds making it unsafe for people to
appear outside their homes after dark. The hostilities in these colonial urban
settings in turn cemented tribal stereotypes (Epstein 1973). In South Africa
during the 1950s the tribal climate was not dissimilar from that in Zambia. In the
African township of Alexandra the tribal gang comprising the Bavenda and Bapedi
tribesmen terrorized other tribes in the area (De Ridder 1961). This was more
or less the picture when different African tribes in colonial Africa met for
the first time.
Davidson (1992) perceives
ethnicity as a negative force and asserts that it is utterly destructive to
civil society, undermining a country's morality and flouting the rule of law.
But Glickman (1995) takes a more optimistic view by linking it to political
processes. He points out that, despite the persistence of ethnic conflicts in
the politics of all African states, signifIcant liberalization and
democratization are possible. One reason is that the nature of ethnicity in
most African states is instrumental rather than primordial.
(Ed’s note- The
next part of the article which analyzes the link between ethnicity and
development, and the conclusion part will be presented in the next issue)
