Quote:
Originally posted by calculoso+Jul 4 2005, 12:43 PM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (calculoso @ Jul 4 2005, 12:43 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin-Hakan@Jul 4 2005, 01:11 PM
I think it's a much more salient point to understand that crippling trade agreements have far more negative impacts on 'Africa' (I hate reducing 50 countries down to one continent but for the sake of brevity I will) then corruption does. Africans unable to sell their goods at a wealth generating rate is far bigger a problem then government corruption.
|
Who makes those trade agreements? It's the governments of the countries. They're the ones who most would say are most corrupt (granted, not in all cases, but many).
Where is the motivation for them to prevent the poverty? They have all the power they want and need, and have money (through corruption) to cater to their whims. They control how things are sold.
Corruption is a huge issue! [/b][/quote]
The problem with these kind of arguments is that you can spout whatever mindless and uninformed opinion you want and make it a nice sounding neatly wrapped package while to prove my point I would have to write an essay with data and many references.
I suggest you read a book on the topic. Globalization and its Discontents by Joseph Stiglitz is a good place to start but there are many many books which analyze why the African plight is so pronounced beyond sophmoric assertions that corruption is the problem.
That said, corruption is a big problem. I published a paper about the rampant corruption in Zimbabwe which has decimated their GDP to 1/2 of their 1999 levels. But to say that corruption is the problem with ALL of Africa is assinine and ignorant. The problem is global commodity cartels being price makers not price takers and the support of these cartels by unsympathetic western governments and international institutions such as the IMF and WTO.
Nice try though.