Month: September 2009

Categories
Books

Courage in the face of great danger

ellen-johnson-sirleafThe current president of Liberia’s autobiography is entitled This Child Will Be Great: Memoir of a Remarkable Life by Africa’s First Woman President. With a title like that, the reader cannot expect a tome replete with self-deprecating humility, but in amongst the politician’s appreciation of her own achievements there is plenty for the reader to appreciate as well. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf is an outstanding leader and a truly remarkable person.

Liberia was colonised in the 19th century by emancipated American slaves, the descendants of whom formed a powerful political elite in a country culturally divided between Americo-Liberians and native Liberians. The author, despite being of native Liberian heritage, managed to work her way up to the position of finance minister in the government before tensions arising from political and economic inequalities erupted into a bloody military coup in 1980, followed by a downward spiral of corruption and violence and then many years of savage civil war.

Time and again Ellen Johnson Sirleaf showed astounding courage in confronting injustice and oppression, first standing up to the president and demanding better conditions for the poor in the days of the Americo-Liberian government, then standing up to the brutal military dictator President Doe and expressing her opinions freely notwithstanding the imminent risk to her life. After many years in exile working for the World Bank and Citibank, the author returned to Liberia to run for president and surprised the experts by winning. The book is very interesting to read and contains many useful leadership lessons.

Categories
Poverty

A bleak outlook for those who remain poor

empty-pocketsThis is the final post in a weekly series discussing themes from Gregory Clark’s book A Farewell to Alms. In chapter 18, Clark concludes that: “in the years since the Industrial Revolution, there has been a progressive and continuing disengagement of economic models from any ability to predict differences of income and wealth across time and across countries and regions.” In other words, economics models predict poverty quite well, but they struggle to explain how to escape from poverty.

Clark says that: “local social interactions that determine the attitudes of people towards work, and co-operation in work, are magnified by the economic system to generate unprecedented extremes of wealth and poverty.” He then goes on to say that the West does not have any viable economic development model to offer the countries which remain poor. Aid does not work. Trade is not working. Complicated economic surgery has just made things worse.

I disagree with Clark’s final pessimistic assessment. In my view it is conceptually quite simple how a country can become wealthy. All that is required is that the citizens be motivated to become as productive as possible, and that the systematic things which prevent economic growth – such as corruption, war and insecurity, disease, lack of education, lack of infrastructure, lack of reliable institutions, and anti-productive cultural values – be eliminated. These things are easy to understand, but extremely difficult to achieve.

Categories
Future

Investing in social innovation

investmentJust as we invest 2% to 3% of our GDP in technological research and development, we should be putting say 1% of our GDP into social innovation, according to Geoff Mulgan, former director of policy for Tony Blair’s government, at a TED conference in July. The types of social innovation we should be investing in include elder care, new kinds of education, and new ways of helping the disabled, and perhaps we could achieve productivity gains in society similar to those we have achieved in the economy over the past few decades.

In the past we have set ourselves technological challenges like getting a man on the moon; perhaps now we should be setting ourselves social challenges like eliminating child malnutrition, stopping trafficking, or achieving 1 billion extra years of life for today’s citizens. To achieve these goals would require radical and systematic experimentation not just with technologies but also with lifestyles, culture, policies and institutions.

Capitalism is going to become more social. The central position of finance capital is going to come to an end. Unlike what you read in economics text books, capitalism is not a self-sufficient system. It depends on other systems – ecology, family, community. Human nature is not just selfish and competitive; it is also compassionate and caring.

Categories
Present

Britain pursues foolish path

foolish-pathA team of up to 14 men from Britain’s SAS has for the past six months been providing training to Libyan special forces in “counter-terrorism” techniques including covert surveillance, according to a news report. This news comes shortly after Libya received home to a hero’s welcome Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi, the man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing. Somehow the bumbling Brits, based on no visible evidence, seem to think that Colonel Gaddafi will, for no apparent reason, abandon his past ways of terrorism and torture and become a model world citizen.

It seems inconceivable that any government could be stupid enough to give counter-terrorism training to a terrorist state. Gaddafi has made some token gestures, such as paying compensation for terrorist acts, which have been leapt at by the West as attempts at reconciliation, but which have merely been calculated commercial manoeuvres designed to create a large financial return for a comparatively modest outlay. Gaddafi has not repented of terrorism or showed any signs of contrition, and he continues to show utter contempt for Western leaders.

Charles Taylor, Liberia’s former head of state, is currently on trial before the International Criminal Court for his role in supporting Sierra Leone’s rebel RUF movement in its eleven-year campaign of terror, rape, mutilation and murder. Gaddafi was a co-conspirator, responsible for providing the RUF rebel leaders with military training and funding. Will anyone be bold enough to arrest him and put him on trial?

Categories
Past

World’s greatest personal contribution to poverty

gaddafi-king-of-kingsMuammar Abu Minyar al-Gaddafi recently celebrated the 40th anniversary of the military coup which brought him to power as Libya’s head of state. It is well known that Gaddafi has been a prominent supporter of international terrorism over the years, running a number of terrorist training camps in Libya and using Libya’s vast oil revenues to fund numerous different terrorist groups. Gaddafi has masterminded and supported numerous terrorist attacks including the Lockerbie bombing.

However, the only misadventures of Gaddafi which are widely reported in the Western press are those which affect Western interests. His greatest achievements remain largely unreported. Gaddafi has made a greater contribution to world poverty than any other person. He has been intimately involved in causing the poverty which now exists in many of the world’s poorest countries, including the five listed as poorest in the current CIA World Factbook:

1. Zimbabwe: Robert Mugabe’s ZANU-PF thugs have been trained and funded by Gaddafi. 2. Democratic Republic of the Congo: Libya has been an active participant in the civil war which has killed 5 million people. 3. Burundi: Jean-Baptiste Bagaza’s attempted coup in 1993 was sponsored by Gaddafi, and followed by many years of inter-ethinc conflict. 4. Liberia: Charles Taylor’s guerrillas, whose reign of terror lasted more than a decade, were trained and funded by Gaddafi. 5. Somalia: Gaddafi has been sponsoring Somalian insurrectionists for many years.

Categories
Faith

Wanting to serve

waiterWhy were there so many volunteers when, as described in Acts chapter 6, the apostles needed some people to help serving out food to widows? Maybe it was because the privilege of serving people was a much bigger thing in those days. The seven successful applicants for the positions even got their names listed in the Bible, and they became leaders in the new church movement, ranking only behind the apostles.

Today we would expect them to be appointed “vice-presidents” or “ministry team leaders”, or even “assistant apostles” or something else indicating an elevated status. But all they got to be was waiters. What does it take to get people queuing up to become waiters? One of the unstated benefits of the position was the chance to have a part in something which was starting to change the whole course of human history. This new movement was turning the world upside down, and it brought with it upside-down values.

In this new movement, the person who served could be greater than the person who was served. In fact, someone who wanted to be big had to become small. Someone who was rich had to become poor. Someone who was strong had to become weak. If the path to leadership was through service, then a job as a waiter was a perfect introduction to the new style of leadership. It is a style of leadership which still prevails in genuine expressions of the church today.

Categories
Books

How to change culture

artworkCulture is what human beings make of the world, and the only way to change culture is to create new culture, according to Andy Crouch in his book Culture Making: Recovering Our Creative Calling. The title makes the subject matter seem fairly dull and academic, and the author does not disappoint. Nonetheless the average rating given on Amazon.com has five stars, suggesting that only the academically gifted manage to read enough of the book to post a review.

In order to make culture, Crouch says, it is necessary for people to share goods; a single person cannot make culture in isolation. Culture is something which is continually changing. We can choose to condemn culture, but our condemnation will have little effect unless we offer an alternative. We can choose to critique culture, but that in itself does not create change. We can choose to copy culture, but that results in no positive change. We can choose to consume culture selectively and strategically, but that has only a minor effect. The only way to effect major change is to create culture.

In the 20th Century, the American elites quickly embraced secularising European culture, and the mainline Christian denominations accommodated the Christian faith to the prevailing cultural trends, but when the cultural trends moved on, those denominations began to crumble. Fundamentalists withdrew to a position of condemning culture; other Christian movements took to critiquing culture, copying culture or consuming culture. However it is only by creating new culture that Christians can hope to gain significant influence.

Categories
Poverty

Explaining the Great Divergence

minor-differencesThis post continues the weekly series discussing themes from Gregory Clark’s book A Farewell to Alms. In chapter 17, Clark asserts, based on the historical evidence which he cites, that a major cause of the gap which grew in the relative incomes of different countries after 1800AD was differences between countries in output per worker. In other words, England and other countries which grew wealthy had a “better” quality of worker than many other countries which remained poor.

Clark hypothesises that “existing differences in social energy across societies” led to a significant disparity in income, and that “the technology developed since the Industrial Revolution has been of a kind much less forgiving of deficiencies in the quality of labor input”. The dominant view in economics textbooks in the first half of the 20th Century was that Chinese, Indian and African workers were much less productive than British workers.

More recently, the predominant explanation for the difference in productivity has been differences in management competence. However, at least in the case of the textiles industry, Clark controversially argues that there is sufficient evidence to show that the productivity differences were attributable to workers, not management. Clark concludes that differences in cultural values which produce seemingly minor differences in quality of workmanship create enormous differences in productivity when using modern technology.

Categories
Future

Trends in global development

upward-trendIn a recent talk given at the US State Department, Hans Rosling presented some data which challenges preconceptions. In 1950, developed countries tended to have a high life expectancy and a low population in terms of children per woman, whereas developing countries tended to have a low life expectancy and high population. In the past 50 years most countries have moved towards a high life expectancy and a low population, but the bottom billion are still being left behind.

Rosling argues that it no longer makes sense to divide the world into “developing” and “developed” countries, because there is so much difference in what is happening between countries and even within countries. Some countries at the bottom of the heap such as Afghanistan and Somalia are in the midst of war. Other countries traditionally thought of as “developing” are actually the ones which provided the bail-out in response to the global economic crisis.

Although there are high rates of HIV infection in Africa as a whole, there is enormous variation between countries and even within countries. DR Congo is a war-torn country, yet has a low rate of infection. In Tanzania, the richest quintile has a far higher infection rate than the poorest quintile. In Kenya, there is enormous variation between provinces. Thus there is no clear link between HIV and war or poverty.

Categories
Present

Kenyan corruption in the spotlight

eating-moneyThe political storm which has arisen over Kenyan President Kibaki’s hasty attempt to reappoint Justice Ringera as head of the Kenya Anti-Corruption Commission, without the approval of parliament or the KACC advisory board, has resulted in some old unresolved corruption matters being brought back into the public view. In particular, it has been alleged that Justice Ringera, instead of investigating the Anglo Leasing scandal, helped to cover it up.

The former KACC board chairman Ahmednasir Abdullahi has been reported as saying, “Kibaki and Ringera have a symbiotic relationship on Anglo Leasing. Kibaki makes sure Ringera has his job while Ringera makes sure very little is done to establish the details of the scandal.” Michaela Wrong’s book It’s Our Turn to Eat, which is about the former Ethics and Governance Permanent Secretary John Githongo, says that Ringera communicated death threats to Githongo relating to Anglo Leasing.

According to the book, Anglo Leasing was a scam in which President Kibaki and senior members of his government enriched themselves at public expense. Kibaki had come to power in Kenya in 2002 with the fight against corruption as one of his key policies, and while some minor steps forward in the war against corruption were taken early in Kibaki’s reign, the government has since been beset by major scandal after major scandal.