“There was time for just one more question. Another doctoral candidate introduced himself. He said he too had been examining the statistical record. It looked as if the African contribution to globalization was to participate as victim in a system of pillage.” “He was challenged to lay out his reasoning. He did. ‘We’ve read over and over again that economic prosperity grows out of the processing of raw resources. If so, what is the export of raw resources but the creation of poverty? Apparently, the United Nations system recognizes this fact, otherwise, why offer Poverty Alleviation as a rational economic policy for Africa? Why not industrialization? Why not value-added production?” “The GloDev representative smiled as he enunciated his response. He too, he said, had held such views in his youth. But he now recognized that it was an exaggeration to reduce the record of Africa’s post-Independence economic performance to simple participation in pillage. He recommended a nuanced view, a dialectical approach. He was about to end it there, but the PhD candidate asked what he meant by a dialectical approach.” “The GloDev representative answered that sometimes a process of economic growth had to begin with a period of rationalization in which the local economy shrank. Such shrinkages, taken over the long range, could be seen as preparation for expansion.” “’Growing small in order to grow big?’ the candidate asked.” “Well, yes. A dialectical process.” “Is dialectics then the art of redefining reality as its opposite?” Ayi Kwei Armah “Resolutionaries” Page 294
Posted on: Sat, 19 Oct 2013 02:52:06 +0000
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