And why are we even consenting to this user inserting an arbitrary recency rule? The nation states of today stand atop the atrocities of their past. I don’t give my country a pass on indigenous genocide or chattel slavery just because they happened before I was born. Quite the opposite, they’re fundamental to the nation state that encloses me today. Nationalism is fucking gross, individuals are distinct from the states that lay claim to them and shouldn’t be confusing their own honor for that of the state, a trap I feel this user has fallen into.
Do you believe in the sins of the father?
Do you believe in changing your behavior and being treated by your current self?
Do borders of the past define your lawful territory and justify wars and claims?
It’s not a blame game. The wealth stolen by the father remains with his children unless they do something to redistribute it. The British, French, and Americans could all massively improve the lives of those they formerly oppressed, including in ways that help them. Increase the opportunities and economic prosperity by limiting capitalist exploitation and unfair resource extraction. Eliminate diseases with well funded vaccination campaigns, reducing the risk of those diseases making it back to your country. Return stolen cultural artifacts, even if it destroys your own museums. Give straight up reparations for all the trouble caused, with no expectation of any repayment. When that happens, then you can rest easy.
Due to public perception the west is largely hands off in terms of exploitation of africa and made space for china and the near elastic as well as the locals to do their thing. Arguably some things have changed for the worse.
Investing in vaccination campaigns isn’t as easy as paying for the vaccines but suffers from local corruption. Meddling in the statehood of african nations is also colonial.
Returning arts and relics has died down after the Benin bronzes and other treasures have been returned to be stolen by corrupt elites. Those cultural artifacts are lost for good now. This is one of the reasons why experts have gotten silent on the matter.
Reparations are controversial when there are no governments that would act for the good of their people. And enforcing a benevolent government of the people is colonialism.
There is a lot that could be done but nothing would be uncontroversial. Even donating clothes and food stuffs has significant adverse effects such as destroying local supply chains. Doing effective development help is difficult in the best of times when people are in favor of colonial policies.
And a lot of African/colonial countries are suffering from domestic corruption and exploitation. Getting rid of that with force is bad. Without it is harder. Dealing with them is propping them up. They are committing atrocities on the regular and care about cementing their rule and lining their pockets.
Of course the shit that works would be controversial; it costs something. The neoliberal world order would never do the most important thing to help developing nations: hold back their own capitalists. They aren’t even willing to redistribute wealth or regulate business within their own country, let alone to people abroad.
It’ll never happen so long as oligarchs call all the shots, but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible and that doesn’t mean it’s a solution we shouldn’t even consider. Something being difficult doesn’t make it less right. Afterall, easy measures were never gonna cut it.
Western capitalists are holding back in Africa for fear of costly outrage though. And not just capitalists are at fault here, but every self interested party. Neoliberalism isnt everywhere, at least not in the same sense. Compare Denmark, swiss, Norway and USA. They clearly use different systems of economics and governance.
something that ended in the 70s is pretty current imo
And why are we even consenting to this user inserting an arbitrary recency rule? The nation states of today stand atop the atrocities of their past. I don’t give my country a pass on indigenous genocide or chattel slavery just because they happened before I was born. Quite the opposite, they’re fundamental to the nation state that encloses me today. Nationalism is fucking gross, individuals are distinct from the states that lay claim to them and shouldn’t be confusing their own honor for that of the state, a trap I feel this user has fallen into.
That’s halve a century ago. No person in any role back then still exists in a similar role. They are retirees at best.
Do you think geopolitical situations get resolved in half a decade or something?
Do you believe in the sins of the father? Do you believe in changing your behavior and being treated by your current self? Do borders of the past define your lawful territory and justify wars and claims?
It’s not a blame game. The wealth stolen by the father remains with his children unless they do something to redistribute it. The British, French, and Americans could all massively improve the lives of those they formerly oppressed, including in ways that help them. Increase the opportunities and economic prosperity by limiting capitalist exploitation and unfair resource extraction. Eliminate diseases with well funded vaccination campaigns, reducing the risk of those diseases making it back to your country. Return stolen cultural artifacts, even if it destroys your own museums. Give straight up reparations for all the trouble caused, with no expectation of any repayment. When that happens, then you can rest easy.
Due to public perception the west is largely hands off in terms of exploitation of africa and made space for china and the near elastic as well as the locals to do their thing. Arguably some things have changed for the worse.
Investing in vaccination campaigns isn’t as easy as paying for the vaccines but suffers from local corruption. Meddling in the statehood of african nations is also colonial. Returning arts and relics has died down after the Benin bronzes and other treasures have been returned to be stolen by corrupt elites. Those cultural artifacts are lost for good now. This is one of the reasons why experts have gotten silent on the matter. Reparations are controversial when there are no governments that would act for the good of their people. And enforcing a benevolent government of the people is colonialism.
There is a lot that could be done but nothing would be uncontroversial. Even donating clothes and food stuffs has significant adverse effects such as destroying local supply chains. Doing effective development help is difficult in the best of times when people are in favor of colonial policies.
And a lot of African/colonial countries are suffering from domestic corruption and exploitation. Getting rid of that with force is bad. Without it is harder. Dealing with them is propping them up. They are committing atrocities on the regular and care about cementing their rule and lining their pockets.
Of course the shit that works would be controversial; it costs something. The neoliberal world order would never do the most important thing to help developing nations: hold back their own capitalists. They aren’t even willing to redistribute wealth or regulate business within their own country, let alone to people abroad.
It’ll never happen so long as oligarchs call all the shots, but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible and that doesn’t mean it’s a solution we shouldn’t even consider. Something being difficult doesn’t make it less right. Afterall, easy measures were never gonna cut it.
Western capitalists are holding back in Africa for fear of costly outrage though. And not just capitalists are at fault here, but every self interested party. Neoliberalism isnt everywhere, at least not in the same sense. Compare Denmark, swiss, Norway and USA. They clearly use different systems of economics and governance.