1. Should Europe follow suit and drop its conditionalities so as to better compete with China in Africa?
Europe should not drop its conditionalities for competition with China in Africa.
Europe’s conditionalities include democracy, free elections, human rights, gender equality are implemented as part of the compromise in the “Economic Partnership Agreements” (EPAs). Democratic Governance and Human rights were further mentioned again in the Joint Africa-EU Strategy adopted by Heads of State and government from Africa and Europe at the Lisbon Summit in December 2007. By putting these terms into trade agreements proves the European countries had made these their core values. Before analysing whether the European countries to drop the values, we first need to examine why these values are implemented to the African countries.
Firstly, these conditionalities are basis of European values: democratic political systems and the foundation of European powers and their histories. If lifting these terms in the economic corporation means abandoning of their European identity, which usually as said the civilization power of the west as written in The Maastricht treaty. Secondly, the imposition of Human Rights are often due to domestic public pressure. Prime Minister Gordon Brown of England refused to attend the Euro-African summit in Lisbon last weekend because President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe would be in attendance. (BBC, 2008) The third reason is European’s colonial legacy provided superior feelings and the responsibility for European nations to educate the African countries, which provided a favourable background for China who in absence of colonial link with Africa. Implementing the conditionalities paved a way for European countries to...
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2 Charles S. Maier, ed., The Cold War in Europe: Era of a divided Continent (New York: Markus Wiener Publishing, Inc., 1991) 27.
Europe, in the late 1800’s, was starting a land grab on the African continent. Around 1878, most of Africa was unexplored, but by 1914, most of Africa, with the lucky exception of Liberia and Ethiopia, was carved up between European powers. There were countless motivations that spurred the European powers to carve Africa, like economic, political, and socio–cultural, and there were countless attitudes towards this expansion into Africa, some of approval and some of condemnation. Europe in this period was a world of competing countries. Britain had a global empire to lead, France had competition with Britain for wealth and so did other nations like Germany and Russia.
Sedelmeier, Ulrich. ‘Is europeanisation through conditionality sustainable?: lock-in of institutional change after EU accession’ West European politics, 35(1), 2012, 20-38
In the nineteenth century, Europe finally exerted dominance over Africa, after 300 years of trying to do just that. Their eventual success was mainly due to technological advancements that the Africans didn’t have at the time. The major European powers (Great Britain, Germany, Portugal, Belgium, and France) had many reasons for imperializing the African continent including: economic, political, and technological factors which all contribute to a country’s success. Some people would argue that Europeans took over Africa to improve African quality of life. However, it is clear that the main driving force behind European imperialism in Africa was the fact that Africa was rich in valuable resources. By tapping into this sort of wealth, Europeans were able to consolidate even greater power and prosperity.
Mutulu, F. (2013, September 28). China’s strength holding sway over U.S. influence in Africa. Retrieved March 29, 2014, from The Atlantic Post: http://www.theatlanticpost.com/economy/chinas-financial-muscle-holds-sway-us-africa-influence-3676.html
With Europe in control, “the policies of the governing powers redirected all African trade to the international export market. Thus today, there is little in the way of inter-African trade, and the pattern of economic dependence continues.” Europeans exported most of the resources in Africa cheaply and sold them costly, which benefited them, but many Africans worked overtime and were not treated with care.
Vesnic-Alujevic, L. and Nacarino, R. C. 2012. The EU and its democratic deficit: problems and (possible) solutions. European View, 11 (1), pp. 63--70.
It is thought-provoking, in the sense that Africa’s need for foreign created a race to the bottom, much like what Pietra Rivoli described in The Travels of a T-Shirt in the Global Economy. Due to some African states’ reliance on foreign aid in order to mine and profit on their resources, they allow business standards to be lowered and for Chinese firms to tip the contracts moresoever in the favor of Chinese firms. This lowers the potential earnings of African states by lowering royalty rates, for example. Additionally, Burgis’ research was thorough and transparent. When he did not receive a response or if his questions were dodged, he made it obvious to the readers. Sure, some could view this book as too anecdotal to be used as a credible source of Africa’s situation. However, this is due to the nature of the system Burgis is writing about; after all, they are shadow states for a reason. Some readers will be saddened by this text, others angry, most curious to learn more, but above all, everyone will be intellectually stimulated and
The European Union (EU), since the initial foundation in 1952 as the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) and throughout periods of development, has been considered one of the most advanced forms of regional integration. It, based on numerous treaties and resolutions, has strived to promote values such as peace, cooperation or democracy, and in 2012 was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for having “contributed to the advancement of peace and reconciliation, democracy and human rights in Europe” (Nobel Media AB, 2012). Despite its struggle for promoting democracy, the EU itself has long experienced scholarly criticisms that it suffers the democratic deficit, from which its democratic legitimacy is undermined by observable problems in political accountability and participation. As the importance of legitimacy in a democratically representative institution is hardly debatable, the criticism of whether and why the EU lacks democracy has been given a considerable gravity in academia.
At the close of World War Two (WWII), the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) emerged as the dominant superpowers. Despite their coaction during the combat against the Axis powers, serious ideological problems emerged once the powder had settled. Both competing do war geographically expanded their political phantom across the mankind. While Western Europe remain democratic governments, Eastern Europe fell under the iron veil. Other areas, similar northwardly Africa, did not have politic excellence until the provincial infrastructure evolved into full-blown stock quality by 1958. Simultaneously, the freshly found interest in African nations attend to promote the civil rights figure at tenement. The US message to promote democracy internationally provided an equal to ecosystem for activists to raise man match and change. Notions of promoting the free mankind became questionable when coupled with the truth that segregation was still legal. Therefore, the renewed interest in Africa during the late 1950’s acted as a catalyst for shifting domestic race related policies as well because of the incidental clock and distribution of the civil rights movement.
In order to be a member of the European Union, an applying nation must first meet the requirements of membership as described in the Copenhagen Criteria. There are geographic, democratic and economic criteria. Geographically, the applying nation must be classified as a European nation, as exemplified by Morocco’s rejection. The applying nation must also have a secure and functional democratic government that only acts in accordance with the law. This means that any citizen should be able participate in the political system and that there are free elections with a secret ballot. The government must also respect human rights and have protection policies for minorities, meaning that a persons’ inalienable rights are protected by law and minority groups can retain their culture and language without discrimination. Economically, a country must have a functional market economy on which it can feasibly support itself and other member nations if need be. The country’s economy needs to be able to compete on a global scale and deal with economic pressures. There are also separate guidelines for countries wanting to convert to the Euro. Finally, countries that want to join must agree to uphold laws and regulations t...
O’Murchu, Cynthia, and Peter Spiegel. "Europe’s Grand Vision Loses Focus." Financial Times [London] 29 Nov. 2010. Print.
How Europe Underdeveloped Africa by Walter Rodney, was one of the most controversial books in the world at the time of its release. The book seeks to argue that European exploitation and involvement in Africa throughout history. This is the cause of current African underdevelopment, and the true path to the development is for Africa to completely sever her ties with the international capitalist economy. Rodney describes his goal in writing the book in the preface: “this book derives from a concern with the contemporary African situation. It delves into the past only because otherwise it would be impossible to understand how the present came into being and what the trends are for the near future” (vii). Rodney writes from a distinctly Marxist perspective by arguing that the inequalities inherent in European capitalism and required exploitation of certain countries in order to sustain capitalism.
Because it could be quite complicated to look at the EU model from a point of classical democratic nation-state, it seems to be reasonable to discuss this problem, not by abstract reasoning, but by focusing on a concrete case. European Union is the best case available, which in recent decades has developed into a new type of political system with enormous consequences on democracy and governance in its member states. Despite repeated attempts for major institutional reforms, this system is likely to persist in its basic structures for the future and is unlikely to develop into a federal state or to disintegrate into a classic international organization. The present state of democracy and governance in the EU is therefore worth to be analyzed, as it is not a mere transitory state.
Therefore, some sates denied supporting human rights law because they believe it can destroy their own non-western culture (Wright 2014, p. 4). Since the day of adopting human rights doctrine, Saudi Arabia argued that the norms and values of human rights are contradict to the values of Quran (Anjum 2013, p.170). Some states which ruled their citizens according to the religious rules (Sharia law) like Brunei did not sign the Human Rights Declarations. Moreover, Singapore asked exceptionalism from universal human rights because she believe that “Asian values” are reverse to the Western norms (Frank 2001, p.195). Unlike the western countries, the philosophies and religions of many non-western countries have strong society focus and deep stress on duties and social responsibilities. They favour community rights rather than individual claims (Wright 2014, p.5). It is the significant differences between human rights value and non-western cultures. In Africa, their traditional culture allowed only collective rights. Therefore, for example, according to their land ownership law only collective land ownership are allowed. No individual has the rights to own private land. Africa perspective on human rights is literally opposite to the west priority Therefore, modern human rights norms are not compatible with the requirements of non-western