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Africa: Swedish Policy
Africa: Swedish Policy
Date distributed (ymd): 971229
Document reposted by APIC
+++++++++++++++++++++Document Profile+++++++++++++++++++++
Region: Continent-Wide
Issue Areas: +political/rights+ +economy/development+
Summary Contents:
This posting contains a speech presenting "Partnership with Africa,"
Sweden's new policy towards Sub-Saharan Africa. The policy was worked out
beginning in October 1996, benefitting from two conferences and a series
of working papers by primarily African participants. For more information
about publications from the policy study, contact
Press and Information Department,
Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
Gustav Adolfs Torg 1, SE-103 39
Stockholm, Sweden;
tel: 46-8-4041000; fax: 46-8-7231176;
e-mail: ud-webmaster@foreign.ministry.se.
+++++++++++++++++end profile++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Relinking Africa:
For a Genuine Partnership with Emerging Africa
Address at the Makerere University
by Mats Karlsson
State Secretary, Ministry for Foreign Affairs, Stockholm, Sweden
Kampala, Uganda
14 November 1997
Students and faculty of the Makerere University,
Ladies and gentlemen, Friends!
The African renaissance has begun. The African renaissance not only
needs to happen, it not only can happen - it actually is happening. Africa
is leaving its post-colonial history behind. New generations are taking
responsibility for the future.
Africa is not uniform. Violent conflict still ravages the lives of many.
Stagnant poverty and stupid politics stunt the individual potential of
millions more. But across the continent more open and more demanding societies
shape the new Africa. A sovereign, self-reliant and democratic Africa emerges.
On that should be built a new generation of genuine partnership. Countries
which take responsibility for the public good have a right to claim their
share of what the world owes Africa - and what the world owes its own long-term
interests. Relinking emerging Africa with the globalising world is in all
our interest.
You who are here today bear a great responsibility for expanding the
capabilities of Africa's people. I pay tribute to you, students and faculty
at the Makerere University who carry and will carry that burden, in your
communities, in your country and continent and in the world as a whole.
When I went to secondary school in the early 1970s, I took a great interest
in Africa. One of my first written reports, I remember, was on the East
African Community. And I remember well reading about the Makerere University.
Today, when I travel in East Africa, I constantly meet people who studied
together, here, in Dar es Salaam or Nairobi. Their experience really seems
to have been special. I am honoured to speak at a university with that
tradition, a university that after having seen so much tragedy during a
quarter century, now again can contribute to fostering the highest quality
leaders. Africa needs them.
If Africans are again to become the subjects of their own destiny, and
not the object of somebody else's design, and if we are ever to approach
equality in the still unequal relations between Africa and the world, then
it is the capacity of African societies, their governments and people,
to analyse, choose and shape that must be strengthened. Education is the
key liberating factor.
The African societies are acutely aware of the choices they face. But
is the outside world seeing and responding? Now that many countries are
again showing substantial economic growth, what is required to sustain
and increase that growth, make it really change the life opportunities
of the poor and relink emerging African private business with the international
economy? How can aid dependency be broken, the structural adjustment programmes
be superseded, and sustainable modes of cooperation be shaped?
Not yet have Africa's partners provided a coherent response. But no
surprise. This time around, the response cannot come from them alone. This
time, the response must intrinsically build on the actions taken and answers
given by African societies. More than ever, Africa's friends need to listen
and reflect on what is actually said and done in Africa.
Allow me to quote one of Africa's foremost political scientists, Adebayo
Olukoshi, a Nigerian at present with the Nordic Africa Institute at Uppsala,
Sweden. In a book, that is part of our rethinking he says the following:
"There is a new generation which is emerging out of the ashes of
crisis and decline in Africa. It is a self-assured generation that is prepared
to engage the world on equal terms. ... That generation consists of people
who are confident of themselves and are driven by a zeal to transform Africa.
... Its goal (is) the enthronement of developmental democracies in Africa.
... (T)he international community will be welcome in the task of rebuilding
Africa but not on any terms or at any cost, least of all on conditions
drawn up and imposed from outside in a one-sided manner. If need be, this
generation is prepared to go it alone and the world should be willing to
let it be - if the international community is not prepared to listen to
and respect the self-articulated hopes and aspirations of these Africans,
then it should, at least, not obstruct them."
That about sums it up. The Africans' liberation must be their own.
We should be aware, however, that this powerful insight may well be
misused and perturbed into "Let the Africans take care of their own
problems!". It would then become a cover-up for disengagement. And
many in the North would be only too happy to disengage. Some in the North
seem today to have the attitude that if things go well in an African country,
they don't need our help, if things go bad they don't deserve it. Either
way, you lose.
Development cooperation is not the only answer. But it certainly is
a part. After years of working together, and tons of evaluations, we know
that it can be effective, even decisive. That is why the rapidly falling
aid volumes are so disturbing - and irrational. That is why the tortuously
slow response to the debt crisis is a historic scandal. That is why the
bad aid coordination is a threat to development.
If the African nations are now ready to deliver radically better governance
- and that still requires a lot of change - their partners must not let
them down.
Everybody speaks about partnership, but what should we mean? We should
look both at quality and at methodology. First of all, look at the qualitative
aspects of partnership. I believe the following five aspects are crucial.
- A subject-to-subject attitude. There is need for a real change of attitude.
- Being explicit about values. You cannot engage in a partnership without
sharing values. And only sincerity will reveal them.
- Transparency in interests. Even if interests diverge - and they may
for no bad reason - common ground can be found and deals made. That requires
openness.
- Clear contractual standards. New contractual relationships should focus
on the critical factors for success and avoid the plethora of conditionalities
that today bedevils cooperation. But then there should be no backtracking
by either party. African civil society tells us clearly, that indulging
reluctant or corruption-afflicted governments is just another form of paternalism.
"Never expect less of an African partner than what you expect of youself,"
tells us Angela, a Ghanaian academic, critically.
- Equality of capacity. In entering a fair contract, both parties need
to be in equal command of all the issues that go into the contract. The
aid relationship may be inherently unequal - one has money, the other doesn't
- but you can have and essentially must have equality in the capacity to
analyse the terms of a contract. In a development partnership, that capacity
has to be exercised broadly in society.
These partnership qualities deserve, I believe, to be made more explicit.
We should develop a code of conduct, so that the way our partnerships work
can be judged. It could further provide a basis for the new partnership
modalities, under strong country leadership, that we desperately need.
The World Banks's SPA, the UN system-wide initiative, the consultative
groups, sectoral programmes all need a new footing through country-led
coordination.
Or as one of Africa's grand old men in the humanities, Joseph Ki-Zerbo
from Burkina Faso has said: "How can you help somebody you don't know?"
and "The only conditionality I accept is that the Africans constitute
themselves. Ki-Zerbo will in early December receive the Right Livelihood
Prize, also called the alternative Nobel prize, in Stockholm.
Ideas of this kind have been advocated by many Africans. They inspired
my Government to reassess its overall Africa policy. That policy will be
based, not on another set of consultancy reports, but on an intense listening
exercise with African policy makers, academics and civil society. "Partnership
Africa" we have called it. We held a major conference in Stockholm
in June in the presence of more than one hundred Africans, from civil society,
government and academics. Your Vice President Specioza Kazibwe, and the
Vice Presidents of South Africa and Botswana were some of our most prominent
guests. So were the people I have just quoted. The first report is just
out.
We will ask Parliament for a new mandate to guide our policy, not just
an aid policy but an integrated policy covering trade and political cooperation,
into the new century.
Three ideas to guide us seem to emerge: - change under African democratic
control, - space and respect for African voices in the world, and - long-term,
broad-based relations between our societies.
We feel confident about this approach. In confirmation, you might say,
we have already achieved approval from Parliament to increase Swedish aid
by 20 percent by the year 2000. Most of that will benefit Africa.
When my parents were born, around 1920, Sweden was a developing country.
Agriculture dominated. Infant mortality rates were like East Africa's today,
life expectancy like South Asia's. We had malaria. How could people create,
during a period easily within living memory, the welfare of modern society?
I see three factors:
- The poor organised to demand their rights. Civil society created a
democratic culture. With us, that came first.
- Capital and labour compromised around a social market economy.
- Education unleashed the creative energy of the many, for the first
time in our history. We actually had universal primary education, a decisive
asset, but it was shallow and of poor quality. Take-off came when the poor
gained access to higher levels. Adults got a new chance, not least through
informal channels.
And for the past half century we have benefited extraordinarily well
from free trade and international integration, regionally among the Nordics,
in Europe and globally. We know we depend on the multilateral system, with
the United Nations at the core.
And that, by the way, is why you will always find us among those who
want to strengthen and renew multilateralism, in security, in development,
in environment. It is in all our interests that the UN reform pursued under
Secretary-General Kofi Annan's leadership succeeds. And may I mention here
the invaluable importance of the World Bank as part of that system, especially
with its new leadership under Jim Wolfensohn. I know Africa has mixed experiences
with the multilateral system. Yet it is the only system that in the long
run can secure small countries their place in the world system.
Our experience was not unique. This century has seen so many countries
transform. I believe Africa will do it early next century. The speed and
complexity of global change makes transformation more challenging today.
The trick, however, will be to make the new opportunities benefit Africa.
Africa fears marginalisation in an interdependent world. I claim globalisation
can work in Africa's favour - but there are many ifs. I will point to three
choices.
First of all, to deepen or disregard the culture of democracy. Democracy
has roots with all peoples. Progress over the past decade has changed Africa.
More countries have had a second round of free elections. Some countries
have had constitutional change of leadership more than once. But stable
democracy is some way ahead for many countries, not only where ethnicity
divides or an authoritarian legacy is heavy. Challenges to democratic progress
exist even where, or rather precisely where, civil society has long been
active. Backlash is possible. Stagnation is dangerous. To move forward
is decisive.
Partnership will follow those who lead their countries to greater openness,
respect for human rights and deeper democracies. Those who do not will
see their legitimacy erode, and with it the basis for partnership. The
world must understand the difficulties of Africa's history. Real democracy
can only appear from within, in Africa as elsewhere. Yet the other side
of the respect that this insight calls for is that African nations must
actually persevere in their pursuit of democracy and human rights.
Africans don't have different individual rights from anybody else. The
challenges may seem formidable to transform African nations into modern,
open societies where the respect for human rights seems to come easy, but
African governments must be held accountable for how they respect human
rights.
Africa is undergoing a tremendous political revolution just now. It
is the gender revolution. It belongs to the context of democracy and human
rights. For long I thought I have understood these issues. We have since
long tried to mainstream them in Swedish politics and also in our development
cooperation. But it was only recently that I've come to realise the dimensions
of what is going on. Women everywhere are actually taking the step out
of "gender apartheid". This is happening on a major scale, not
always recognised, and of course neither is progress easy or self-evident,
but it is happening. And society will be better for it.
At the Partnership Africa conference in Stockholm, 40 percent were women.
It transformed the discussion. Explicit anger and frustration combined
with confidence, humour and readiness to act. It was like drilling for
oil and hitting an artery. Or you are sailing on an ocean without wind
and current and you are without direction. Suddenly, you strike an undercurrent
and you are swept away. Leading the discussion was Ugandan Vice President
Kazibwe. Seldom have I seen a meeting so galvaniized by the presence of
the critical mass of self-conscious women.
Students and faculty within these walls deal daily with the key attributes
of democracy: openness, critical understanding, tolerance, respect for
the other, women's equal rights and opportunities, freedom of expression
and of association. In the information age no country, no economy, will
prosper in the long run without them. Teachers and students, academics,
young or established, independent or in the public service, will often
be the ones who stand on the fault line of democratic change. Your daily
choices shape your society's choices as to your democracy's future.
Second choice, a social or a captured market economy. No longer is the
choice between a free and a non-free market economy. That choice is made.
We know that a free market with private enterprise gives more people more
freedom, capacity and opportunity to create better lives for themselves
and their societies. The real choice is whether to develop, temper and
sustain that free market and give it a social and human-oriented character,
or whether to let that market be captured by elites of various kinds.
An economy can be captured through too little or too much regulation,
by elites, old or new, political, economic, family or military, through
outright corruption or in more sophisticated ways. Both on moral and sustainability
grounds such a market remains fundamentally flawed, even if free in the
everyday sense.
The choice is most apparent where economies are in transition, Russia,
South East Asia, Latin America, but is highly relevant also in the modern
western economies. But Africa may be well be more vulnerable. Loyalties
that stem from family, regional or ethnic ties are strong. The scope for
non-price factors to influence demand and supply thus increases manifold.
The micro-institutional basis for a market economy is poorly recognised.
This is reality, with many societal institutions of value built-in. That
has to be kept in mind as we wonder why the supply-side response is weaker
than expected to structural adjustment.
These difficulties only require us to be more sophisticated in our approaches,
not to cut down our ambitions. The anger in Africa today over the widespread
corruption is one of the surest signs that we are not yet seeing a social
market appear. I believe, contrary to what is sometimes said, that a social
market economy is fully possible in Africa.
A social market integrates social policy into overall policy. It makes
inclusion its basis. It is not an add-on or a safety net, and of course
it cannot replace bad macro- or market economic policy. It nurtures the
institutions at all levels which provide the framework for an efficient
market. Thus it contributes to releasing productive potential. Capital
will work more efficiently. And we may achieve the leap from bare per capita
growth to the three or more percent that we need to make a difference.
A social market economy is the sustainable relationship between a free
market and democracy.
In Africa, this insight translates into the whole development agenda.
But there is one task that today stands out more clearly than others: rooting
out corruption. The anger in African societies today over the scale and
growth of corruption and the impunity with which it is carried out is volcanic.
Dealing with it now is absolutely essential. Or else, the gains in democratic
and market economic change may be lost. Your open press in Uganda is an
asset, as is the debate in Parliament, but it has to be dealt with in practice,
in courts, in everyday life. And as it takes two to tango, the corruptor
must face his responsibility as well.
The third choice is whether to give education its priority or not.
We know the agenda. Universal primary education is a sine qua non. The
Social Summit in Copenhagen not long ago committed world nations to achieve
this target early next century. Basic education may be expensive, but not
more so than the world can afford it. Maybe the most difficult issues will
be assuring quality, teacher commitment, parent priority, and especially
girl participation.
Basic education for young and adults provides a first ticket to modern
society, it increases productivity and strengthens the ability of young
women and men to plan their families. But education must be seen as a comprehensive
system. We must discuss also the secondary schooling that allows young
people to escape from low-productivity rural, or slum, life. Africa needs
a new push in improving its secondary education.
And the universities: centres of excellence, and of national memory,
breeding ground for just critique. African universities have suffered tragically
over the past two decades. Societies need their universities. With so much
African academic competence in Africa and around the world, an academic
renewal should be possible. Sweden, through Sida, Sarec and the Nordic
Africa Institute, will want to be part of that academic renaissance. You
have to make it happen.
To end, I have three things to say to you here at the University:
One. Fight for the education budgets! Use what resources you have efficiently.
Then challenge the ministers of economy and planning to prove that there
are investments that have a higher rate of social return than education.
If the ministers of finance still claim budgetary constraints and won't
give you the money, demand that he be more efficient in raising taxes.
And while you are at it, tell ministers of industry, customs and others
to root out corruption. Public service needs its resources.
Two. Wire Africa! Information technology, internet, offers precisely
the kind of technology which might allow Africa to relink, to leapfrog
into modernity. Use globalisation, don't let it intimitate you.
Three. Don't settle for anything less than a full African renaissance!
Education is the key to capacity. And capacity the key to sustained growth.
And to Africa's place in the world. Education can lift that capacity faster
than just waiting for growth to do its job. Education defines the social
market economy. Education fuels the culture of democracy. Within a generation
Africa can transform. To that Africa we want to be a reliable partner.
We need each other.
Allow me to end by again quoting Angela Ofori-Atta. For our conference
she wrote a letter, addressed to "Dear little brother Sweden!".
At the very end she writes:
"So what is it I am saying, my dear little brother Sweden? Basically
that we get to know each other better, get to like and respect each other
more, work out a good partnership based on transparency of agenda, mutuality
of need and build this on egalitarian principles.
"You do not need to come as a helper, only as a partner. This your
people can understand and respect, and my people will applaud. We will
welcome you and your expressed self interests. We will give and we will
take, fully acknowledging the mutuality of the benefits we reap from each
other."
Thank you!
This material is being reposted for wider distribution by the Africa
Policy Information Center (APIC), the educational affiliate of the Washington
Office on Africa. APIC's primary objective is to widen the policy debate
in the United States around African issues and the U.S. role in Africa,
by concentrating on providing accessible policy-relevant information and
analysis usable by a wide range of groups and individuals.
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