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To: Willie Green

Well, I applaud the impulse to self-reliance. I think the notion of starting out with high-tech production is un- realistic. What African countries need is to set up the rule of law and market economies. If they had those things, foreign investors would start to build factories there, though probably not high-tech at first. However, so far nobody has figured out how to bring rule of law to most of Africa.

I heard a proposal that the European powers were thinking about taking over the mines and oil wells of Africa by force. The idea would be that they would administer them and provide the profits to the people and some meaningful way. The further notion being that this would take away the motivation for outside countries to provide the weapons for demagogues to take over the country---by eliminating the short-term profit.

Naturally, many would decry this is racism. However, at least is a suggestion that might have some chance of working.


4 posted on 07/25/2005 1:01:51 PM PDT by strategofr (What did happen to those 293 boxes of secret FBI files (esp on Senators) Hillary stole?)
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To: strategofr
If they had those things, foreign investors would start to build factories there, though probably not high-tech at first. However, so far nobody has figured out how to bring rule of law to most of Africa.

Private property rights and the rule of law are certainly necessary.
However, I disagree with the emphasis on foreign investors.
African nations would be better-off encouraging their own entrepreneurial industrial development, building "sweat equity" in their own businesses. Inviting investment by the transnational giants would only erect barriers to market entry through economies of scale. Individual African nations are too small to be economicly self-sufficient. But perhaps they can trade amongst each other to develop and strengthen their industries prior to entering into the international markets.

6 posted on 07/25/2005 1:20:42 PM PDT by Willie Green (Some people march to a different drummer - and some people polka)
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