The Coming Anarchy - Robert Kaplan Essay

In the late nineteenth century the European powers of the world began imperializing Africa. This annexation, occupation, and division of African territory has since led to much strife within the continent and has caused many struggles politically. This period known as the “Scramble for Africa” has led to the many problems that Africa faces today and has been the root of several wars in Africa to assume control. After World War II many European imperialists began to give African nations autonomy. This seemed like a step forward for African nations, but without any plan to transition into self governance many African nations have faced bloody civil wars and corruption. Along with political struggles, numerous African nations face rising debt and other economic problems. Many of these political and economic issues stem from the “Scramble for Africa”. Once the European countries left Africa had very little to support itself. To explain the issues left by imperialism the three African nations of Rwanda, South Africa, and Sierra Leone will be put under the scope.

Sub-Saharan Africa’s economic growth has increased rapidly since the turn of the 21st century. GDP growth in the region was expected to rise over 5% between 2013 and 2015 (Source: World Bank Database). This growth is largely driven by an increasing population, a commodity-price boom, rapid urbanization and rise in use of information and communications technologies (ICTs). Within Sub-Saharan Africa, Ghana’s economy has expanded due to political stability, relatively liberal economic policies and a growing middle class.

Modern African states have various problems ranging from corruption, to armed conflict, to stunted structural development. Africa’s ongoing political instability and economic crisis have hindered the improvement of Africa. Thus, the lack of money, advancement in technology, and climate has hampered economic development. Despite European mistreatment and oppression African’s have endured hardships that have encouraged economy, education, and political

Do you think you’re life is hard? How would it be if civil wars, corrupt government officials, gunfire in the streets, extreme poverty, severe illness and no indoor plumbing were added? That is what most Liberians had to deal with on a daily basis, due to the problems forced upon them that they had to attempt to solve as individuals not as a country. But these problems were caused by an already weakening system that was waiting to be toppled, taken advantage of and destroyed. Many Liberians would die and many lives would be shaken before it would rise again, yet when its change comes it will be stronger than ever. But before any of this happened Liberia would first have to be established as a country.

The continent of Africa has been exposed to countless of years of tragedy including forced slavery and colonialism. One of the most devastating hits to Africa is the civil war that occurred in Sierra Leone from 1991 to 2002. This country experienced a decade long war in an endeavor to achieve economic stability and a democratic political system for Sierra Leoneans. There are many facets that contributed to the warfare that occurred in the small nation, from the reason why the conflict started, the numerous participants and their affiliations, and cessation as well as the effects thereafter.

In developing countries such as Sierra Leone and Sudan, there are many types of violence, propaganda, and corruption used to create this vulnerability, which leads to vicious cycles of displacement and war. The corruption that is present in these governments is rather significant and the fear that is instilled into civilians by the military or militia causes a power imbalance. Furthermore, the abuse of drugs and alcohol is caused by the lack of education in many of these developing countries. Civilians are persuaded to join these organizations with the use of drugs such and cocaine and crack. The lack of availability of education and awareness of the effects of such drugs puts civilians in a vulnerable position. Being born in certain developing countries comes with everlasting conflict, which commonly leads to vulnerable environments and further displacement. Most of the time these conflicts arise over natural resources, religion or contrasting political views. The current action being taken by foreign aid has had a very minor impact. New Statesman writer Dinaw Mengestu discusses African literature comparing past to present, “Growing up in the United States, I was acutely aware of how everything I saw and heard about my native Ethiopia was being translated...We died by the millions, and with the exception of a handful of thoughtful accounts by western journalists, little was said and done from the outside, and even less was uttered out loud from within” (Mengestu, 2007). This further reflects the issue of not being recognized on a global scale and being misinterpreted by the rest of society. In order to protect these civilians from the corruption, violence and propaganda, there is a need for further action. Firstly, this issue needs to be recognized and humanized by foreign governments. The amount of awareness needs to drastically increase in order for civilians and foreign

Greed and grievances are found to be two of the most crucial causes of most violent conflicts as well as the driving forces of mass rebellion. In the case of Sierra Leone, a war that went on from 1991 to 2002 killing about 50,000 people and displacing almost two thirds of the total population is a great example of a violent conflict that fits both the greed and grievance based explanation. At the time, Sierra Leon was a country based on a one party system and dominated by the APC also known as the ‘All people’s congress’. During the APC regime there was great misuse of political power for the parties personal gain. There appeared to be great decline of “total output, neglect of agriculture, increase in unemployment, deterioration and neglect of agriculture, increase in unemployment” (Naguib, 2015). Although the president at the time made major reforms that pushed for a more democratic state, that guaranteed basic human rights, he did not keep his promising allowing the APC to continue in

Also experiencing corruption, criminal violence, and a weak political system, what Haiti lacks more is a functioning economy (Carment & Samy, 2014). Haiti has very few natural resources, lacks the stability and development to encourage foreign investments, and struggles with extreme inequality amongst its citizens (de Blij, et al., 2014). Haiti’s GDP has had little if any growth or development in the last ten years (Carment & Samy, 2014), and according to the World Bank (2018), Haiti is still the poorest state in the Western Hemisphere. To make matters worse Haiti has experienced a number of environmental disasters which would upset a developed country, no less a country that already lacks security and development. Within two years Haiti experienced 4 cyclones, along with a devastating earthquake which killed over 300 000, and displaced well over a million residents. Again in 2016, Haiti was hit with another devastating hurricane. Although, Haiti suffers from a weak government and corruption, the Haitian economy is even more unstable. A very different picture than the political warfare that Somalia has experienced for the last 25 years. These two modern day examples demonstrate how unclear a single definition is in helping outsiders to understand individual state

Sub Saharan Africa has been suffering from economic blackouts for the past decades due to many reasons which stretch themselves to poor political and economic management of the black continent. As such, this crisis seem to diminish bit by bit and Africa's economy seem to grow and develop rapidly in the nearest future; from where comes the term Africa rising.

Liberia has always been under pressure, similar to other countries. At first, the establishment of Liberia in 1822 with the reinforcement of the American Colonization Society may have seemed like a pleasant time. The American Colonization Society’s enterprise was for liberated black slaves to immigrate to Africa. In general, this wasn’t an appalling event along with the time when Liberia was observed as independent by the United States of America in 1862. Although the discovery and foundation of Liberia is essential and positive, Liberia is still like a rose with thorns. Underneath the beauty of Liberia were grotesque misfortunes. In particular, these hardships were the civil war and revolution, violations of human rights, and the

Sierra Leone, a country that lies on the west coast of Africa, faced a gruesome war that occurred from 1991 to 2002. The civil war generated consequences that the people of Sierra Leone and its economy are paying for. Sierra Leone’s economic development and progress after the post-civil war became an interest to me because Sierra Leone is where my family originated from. I personally can relate to the war and the consequences it brought upon my family because I was born outside of Sierra Leone during the time of the civil war. The civil war that transpired resulted in the displacement and relocation of my family. As a result, we were relocated to the United States in 2001. Because of my personal interest in the Sierra Leone conflict, I would like to investigate the aftermath of the war on the economy and the people.

During the 1990’s, Somalia had a famine crisis, which many Westerners labeled as a ‘humanitarian crisis.’ As always, the hegemon, which was the United States, stepped up to the plate and helped in providing food for the starving Somalis. Seeing starving children drew Westerners to sympathize with these individuals and they blamed the inept Somali government for not doing enough to help its citizens. The intervention was meant to deliver food to the Somalia, but later that turned to ‘mission creep’, “the temptation commanders feel to chase success and perhaps glory around the next corner by expanding their mandate and rolling over anyone in their way” (Hoagland, 1: 1993). What was a humanitarian crisis has now turned into a nation-building

In came into vogue that economic theory could benefit Third World countries, so humanitarians began to evaluate the best ways to help Africa through the markets [Barnett 100]. Furthermore, leaps were made in bolstering the efficiency of aid efforts, and it was discovered that the most effective systems were conglomerations of the state and NGOs [Barnett 107-108]. This may suggest that humanitarian efforts were transformed into vehicles for disseminating governmental and economic agendas, but conversely, aid organizations wished to increase their impact by cooperating with governments and the markets. Humanitarians were growing to appreciate the codependence of these avenues and that “everything was connected to everything else,” so they leveraged this new insight to the Africans’ benefit [Barnett

Sierra Leone had been considered a fragile state even before its civil war from 1991-2002, this is because it had “weak capacity and will to provide security and deliver services to its population” (Pickering, 2009, p20). The decade during the civil war was overwhelmed by huge human rights abuses, lack of coherent governments, weak social security structures and masses of violence (Evoe, 2008, p2).. A number of peace efforts were generated by international institutions, none of which were extensively effective throughout all of Sierra Leone. Despite these difficulties, the intervention in Sierra Leone is considered a noteworthy success for the United Nations peacebuilding mission. The main objective of peacebuilding missions is to ‘rebuild’ failing and weak states (Cubitt, 2013, p91) and to “prevent violence from recurring in countries that are just emerging from civil conflict” (Paris, 2002, p637). The UN mission in Sierra Leone is widely regarded as an example of successful peacebuilding in a war torn country. The mission facilitated a transition from, a failing state to a moderately peaceful state. This mission is held as an example of successful intervention, and is often used as a means to justify the benefits of UN peacebuilding and peacekeeping missions.

To achieve their goals and desires, both President Taylor and the LURD created the instability of Liberia. They spawned the country by killing tens of thousands of people and millions fled as refugees. The harsh reality of Monrovia, the capital of Liberia, was that they did not have electricity or running water and the people lived in buildings that were no safe to stay. The bloody civil war between the NPFL’s government and the LURD had disabled the basic utilities of the citizens of Liberia. In other words, Liberia was destroyed by President Taylor and the LURD.