Great article but I think the baseline for comparisons should be based on how long a country has existed as an independent cohesive entity. Malawi has only been an independent state for 58 years so maybe the comparison should be done based on the level developed countries were at when they were at 58 years in modern times. I think if this was done Malawi may look a lot better. I’m skeptical that the process of nation building and developing national cohesion can be shortcut. I also think without such national cohesion it’s difficult for broad based economic growth to happen. It seems a lot of comparisons are made between countries in sub-Saharan Africa and countries that have existed in some form or another for centuries or where the populations have remained homogenous enough that there is not significant internal friction limiting economic activity. These 2 things are not true for most sub-Saharan countries where there is a lot of internal division. Many people if not most in these countries have more allegiance to their tribes than the state and this really affects how politics and governments are run. It also affects how resources are distributed and levels of trust in society. I’d guess that in my own country it will take maybe 2 to 3 generations of intermarriage and other societal processes for tribal lines to get sufficiently blurred such that the nation state becomes the preeminent identifying group for most people. I don’t find this depressing as it seems to be a process states have to go through. It would be absurd(in my view) to expect that a young child grow into a matured adult within say half the time it takes other children, similarly I think its kind of absurd to expect young countries that didn’t exist a century ago to become fledgling utopias within say 50 years.
Great article but I think the baseline for comparisons should be based on how long a country has existed as an independent cohesive entity. Malawi has only been an independent state for 58 years so maybe the comparison should be done based on the level developed countries were at when they were at 58 years in modern times. I think if this was done Malawi may look a lot better. I’m skeptical that the process of nation building and developing national cohesion can be shortcut. I also think without such national cohesion it’s difficult for broad based economic growth to happen. It seems a lot of comparisons are made between countries in sub-Saharan Africa and countries that have existed in some form or another for centuries or where the populations have remained homogenous enough that there is not significant internal friction limiting economic activity. These 2 things are not true for most sub-Saharan countries where there is a lot of internal division. Many people if not most in these countries have more allegiance to their tribes than the state and this really affects how politics and governments are run. It also affects how resources are distributed and levels of trust in society. I’d guess that in my own country it will take maybe 2 to 3 generations of intermarriage and other societal processes for tribal lines to get sufficiently blurred such that the nation state becomes the preeminent identifying group for most people. I don’t find this depressing as it seems to be a process states have to go through. It would be absurd(in my view) to expect that a young child grow into a matured adult within say half the time it takes other children, similarly I think its kind of absurd to expect young countries that didn’t exist a century ago to become fledgling utopias within say 50 years.