Story summary:
The next U.S. president needs to urgently rethink America's relationship to Africa. In the past, America has often treated Africa as a backward "Dark Continent," a place bedeviled with poverty, tribalism, AIDS and post-colonial conflicts. Africa is and should be a concern for all Americans- and for the next U.S. president. To be sure, not all of Africa's post-colonial problems have vanished. Poverty is still a serious burden, as are AIDS and malaria in many African nations. But in the U.S., Africa is still often viewed through the lens of the exceptions: Yes, Darfur is a gruesome tragedy, but the conflict there is no longer typical of Africa. In much the same manner, Zimbabwe's faulty election hardly proves that Africa is unprepared for democracy. In fact, Africa is far more democratic today than ever before.
The next U.S. president needs to urgently rethink America's relationship to Africa. In the past, America has often treated Africa as a backward "Dark Continent," a place bedeviled with poverty, tribalism, AIDS and post-colonial conflicts. Africa is and should be a concern for all Americans—and for the next U.S. president.
To be sure, not all of Africa's post-colonial problems have vanished. Poverty is still a serious burden, as are AIDS and malaria in many African nations. But in the U.S., Africa is still often viewed through the lens of the exceptions: Yes, Darfur is a gruesome tragedy, but the conflict there is no longer typical of Africa. In much the same manner, Zimbabwe's faulty election hardly proves that Africa is unprepared for democracy. In fact, Africa is far more democratic today than ever before.
From Mauritius to Botswana, Ghana to Uganda, African economies are growing at a rate of 5 to 6 percent a year. The new prosperity and emerging middle class in African societies are visible in the banking, building, and automobile sectors as well as in communications, mining, and mobile telephone penetration.
The three main challenges awaiting the next U.S. president in a new partnership with Africa are building the global economy, balancing the planet's energy and environmental needs, and promoting cultural and religious understanding. But this partnership will not move into the 21st Century without a sea change in media coverage and political attitudes toward Africa.
The future of our continent will not be rooted in Western aid packages, despite the generous and welcome boost in U.S. funding to combat AIDS. Instead, African nations must also be recognized as creators of wealth, as entrepreneurial engines.
Investment initiatives should thus be focused on reinforcing and developing the infrastructure of the continent and bolstering support for the private sector. China and India have understood the need for this shift.
Yet the U.S. is largely absent from the most dynamic sectors of Africa's economic boom. The African Growth and Opportunity Act trade agreement has helped to promote trade between Africa and the U.S., but the agreement is limited and little used.