On the problem of Rhodesia

[zarus tathra]

link

The young black doctors who earned the same salary as we whites could not achieve the same standard of living for a very simple reason: they had an immense number of social obligations to fulfill. They were expected to provide for an ever expanding circle of family members (some of whom may have invested in their education) and people from their village, tribe, and province. An income that allowed a white to live like a lord because of a lack of such obligations scarcely raised a black above the level of his family. Mere equality of salary, therefore, was quite insufficient to procure for them the standard of living that they saw the whites had and that it was only human nature for them to desire—and believe themselves entitled to, on account of the superior talent that had allowed them to raise themselves above their fellows. In fact, a salary a thousand times as great would hardly have been sufficient to procure it: for their social obligations increased pari passu with their incomes.

These obligations also explain the fact, often disdainfully remarked upon by former colonials, that when Africans moved into the beautiful and well-appointed villas of their former colonial masters, the houses swiftly degenerated into a species of superior, more spacious slum. Just as African doctors were perfectly equal to their medical tasks, technically speaking, so the degeneration of colonial villas had nothing to do with the intellectual inability of Africans to maintain them. Rather, the fortunate inheritor of such a villa was soon overwhelmed by relatives and others who had a social claim upon him. They brought even their goats with them; and one goat can undo in an afternoon what it has taken decades to establish.

It is easy to see why a civil service, controlled and manned in its upper reaches by whites, could remain efficient and uncorrupt but could not long do so when manned by Africans who were supposed to follow the same rules and procedures. The same is true, of course, for every other administrative activity, public or private. The thick network of social obligations explains why, while it would have been out of the question to bribe most Rhodesian bureaucrats, yet in only a few years it would have been out of the question not to try to bribe most Zimbabwean ones, whose relatives would have condemned them for failing to obtain on their behalf all the advantages their official opportunities might provide. Thus do the very same tasks in the very same offices carried out by people of different cultural and social backgrounds result in very different outcomes.

Viewed in this light, African nationalism was a struggle as much for power and privilege as it was for freedom, though it co-opted the language of freedom for obvious political advantage. In the matter of freedom, even Rhodesia—certainly no haven of free speech—was superior to its successor state, Zimbabwe. I still have in my library the oppositionist pamphlets and Marxist analyses of the vexed land question in Rhodesia that I bought there when Ian Smith was premier. Such thoroughgoing criticism of the rule of Mr. Mugabe would be inconceivable—or else fraught with much greater dangers than opposition authors experienced under Ian Smith. And indeed, in all but one or two African states, the accession to independence brought no advance in intellectual freedom but rather, in many cases, a tyranny incomparably worse than the preceding colonial regimes.

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In fact, it was the imposition of the European model of the nation-state upon Africa, for which it was peculiarly unsuited, that caused so many disasters. With no loyalty to the nation, but only to the tribe or family, those who control the state can see it only as an object and instrument of exploitation. Gaining political power is the only way ambitious people see to achieving the immeasurably higher standard of living that the colonialists dangled in front of their faces for so long. Given the natural wickedness of human beings, the lengths to which they are prepared to go to achieve power—along with their followers, who expect to share in the spoils—are limitless. The winner-take-all aspect of Africa's political life is what makes it more than usually vicious.

[aitm]

Fascinating, disturbing, expected to a degree, disappointed as well but no real reason to be surprised. Damn shame.

[Plu]

Seems to be expected. The wealth gets passed along until the border of our cares. If that border is "my tribe", you get this. If it's "my nation" you get socialist europe. If it's "my wallet", you get the US. I'm not sure if any is better than the rest. They all seem too restrictive.

[Jmpty]

There is no Rhodesia. Try and keep up.

[zarus tathra]

The Zimbabwe problem. The African problem?

[zarus tathra]

I have no idea why I put that. I guess it was because the guy was talking about his time in Rhodesia and not Zimbabwe.

[Mister Agenda]

It's a problem in the USA as well. When a person rises from poverty through getting a better education or being more entrepeneurial, there's still your family to think of. It's hard to live the middle class life and save for retirement while your mother and father and sister and brother are barely scratching out a living.

My mother was born in a shack and her parents lived in that shack until they died. She had six children, two of whom married before the age of 19. I'm doing all right, especially considering where I came from, but I feel a lot of responsibility toward my family, especially my nieces and nephews, to try to give them a better start. I live in a small house older than I am and drive my cars into the ground so I can help my siblings with their various emergencies while keeping up my retirement and enough insurance to give one more time when I die. I won't be like my mother and step-father and uncles where they have to take up a collection to cremate me because they died with less than nothing in terms of wealth. I'm willing to pay the price for all this because I think it's worth it...but a casual observer might think my degree didn't get me very much.

People who are solidly middle class often take the perks of having middle class parents for granted, but they are substantial. They'll buy your first car and spend considerably more than $300 on it like my step-dad did mine. They'll pay your way through college. They'll help you pay for your first house. It adds up, and it's hard to get there in one generational leap.