Nipate
Forum => Kenya Discussion => Topic started by: Dear Mami on March 31, 2018, 01:41:14 PM
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I noticed sometime back that you enjoy quora like me so I got this comment below for you. I did not like your implying that China runs on a dictator's model of governance. They are a combined political meritocracy + grassroots democracy. Soma hii hapa chini, I like how this guy explains the way people like Rutolings who salivate over the "Chinese model" are the last people who would ever actually implement the actual Chinese model. Here is the link if you want to read other answers but this one below ni tamu kama asali, tafadhali soma kisha uniambie, is this not something we as Africans should have implemented kitaaaambo tungelijua tu? https://www.quora.com/Why-is-China-s-model-of-governance-meritocracy-superior-to-western-democracy
This contradicts the official Chinese stance. The official Chinese stance is that all political systems require constant improvement and patch-up, each country should figure out what’s best for itself, so far the CCP has been good at self-correction. And by the way, there’s no such thing as “China Model”.
I can agree with this. Different countries have different history, culture, and different primary concerns, so they ought to be different. There’s no “better” or “worse”, but “what’s suitable”. The biggest calamity in the West in recent history was WWI and WWII, essentially started as a piff among royal cousins, that ended up grinding millions of young men, athletes, artists, scientists, into hamburger over a couple inches of dirt. Battle of Verdun Democracy became a matter of principle in the aftermath, as a way to prevent things like this happening again. And if not, at least get a fair shakedown from the ruling class afterwards. How Winston Churchill lost the 1945 election
The biggest calamity in China in the last 2,000 years have been foreign invasion and internal anarchy. Both types of events easily wiped out 30% - 50% of the population. In the Sichuan province, less than 2.5% of the local population survived the Mongol Invasion. So China favors stability and strong central government. Also, keeping the most populous country over a huge piece of territory has been no small task. Nothing but the strongest internal consensus will do. So you have meritocracy.
There’s no need to make either variant into a religion. Just check to see if they are doing the job, and whether they need any patch-ups as societies evolve.
But you need to be careful here. China’s “meritocratic system” is basically National Exam as entry criteria to public service, and KPI-based promotion system afterwards. China has been using this basic government system for ~ 2,000 years. Even when it was the most prosperous country in the world, there has never been a single country that copied this system, and the chance of any country copying this in the future is infinitesimally small! That’s like asking, why can’t we copy Cheetah to Australia and why can’t we copy Koala Bear to Africa. The Chinese system basically evolved through 2,500 years (from -700 BC to now) of changing social conditions, which did not happen in other places. The vast majority of the people in other countries don’t even know what this “Chinese system” is. Instead, what I see is all sorts of political scoundrels, all over the world, using “China” as an excuse to strengthen the power of the current ruling class. This is, in fact, exactly what the Chinese system designed to ELIMINATE on a permanent basis!
National Higher Education Entrance Examination
You see, in order for someone to excel and climb to the top in the Chinese system, you need two things: you need to be super-smart, otherwise you can’t get to the top of your class; you also need to have practical experience and extraordinary work ethic, otherwise you can’t get promoted through the KPI-based system. Well, it turns out that Intelligence has a strong tendency of regression to the mean, and people who grew up in adverse conditions tend to work harder, and understand human nature and society as a whole in a more profound way. So super smart scholar-officials from relatively poor families ended up being the mainstay of China’s bureaucracy.
Thus if you look through China’s two thousand years of record of famous cabinet ministers and prime ministers, two-generation is extremely rare. Three generation is unheard of. The competition is too fierce to allow the likes of Marlboro / Spencer / Kennedy families to come into existence. This should not surprise you. Look, how many famous soccer players can pass their “superior bloodline” to their kids, even though physical traits are the most genetically inheritable, when you have a fairly objective criteria of being able kick the ball into the goal? Not many? Has there been even one? Or what about a father-son-grandson Olympic gold medal winners in 100 meter dash? Well, there you go. This is also why movies such as the Star Wars have such poor showing in China. This “inherited noble ability”-concept is such extraordinarily anti-common sense BS to the Chinese that it’s just too weird for popular consumption!
The Chinese system is by far the most fundamentally ANTI-ESTABLISHMENT governing systems out there. It’s designed as a peaceful periodic transfer of power - to people who are smarter, and more capable, than the current cohort. So there’s no way any ruling class in any country serious wants to adopt the Chinese system. If someone is serious about trying the “China model”, first they need to educate the citizens so that everybody is qualified to take the National Civil Service exam. Then they must recruit only from the very top 5% into government service. Then they must have everyone starts from the bottom, and only promote those who can hit KPIs based on hard numbers, like GDP growth + # of college graduates + lower crime statistics + renewable energy growth +… Is there anybody doing this? No? Well then, what “Chinese Model” are you talking about? And the hard-earned power you have, you can’t keep it in the family, you can’t pass it on to your children, you lose it as soon as you fail to perform at the highest level. Which political elite would advocate for such a system for himself?
When people say they want to try the “China model”, they are not talking about the real China. They are talking about this Authoritarian China Avatar that’s created by the Media, like you can be an unaccountable dictator or something. In reality, Xi can’t make any Politburo decision unless he can persuade at least 5 out of the other 6 Politburo members, who are all elected on their own merit and can not be fired by Xi. Because Politburo decisions require 7:0 or 6:1 consensus. Can you imagine if Mr. Trump has to persuade Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Sanders to agree with him in order to get any decision out? Yeah, it’s like that. It would have been extremely painful for Mr. Trump. The other side of the coin is, if, say, Mr. Trump, Mrs. Clinton, Mr. Sanders, all agree to push for a Campaign Reform plan, and work hard for it, that would be really powerful and will sail through the Congress too. You may even call that “authoritarian”, but that “authority” comes naturally from this level of political consensus.
You have to see- both the “Western model” and the “China model” are somewhat selective elitist - “Democracy” in the Great Britain started as a peaceful transfer of power from Duke A to Duke B, and evolved into the US model of peaceful transfer of power from Billionaire A to Billionaire B, which the Chinese system is essentially a peaceful transfer of power from experienced scholar administrator A to experienced scholar administrator B. Both, by itself, are inadequate in covering the fundamental interest of those who are really poor or really disillusioned. So you need a political culture or social norm that can wrap these people back into the mainstream. When this “patch” fails, you have civil war.
Among the ones who talk about “giving the China model a try”, there may be a few very slightly genuine ones in Africa. Usually because their country is so poor and desperate that they will endure the pain and try anything. The rest are all talking about this hypothetical China with an authoritarian ruling class, instead of the real China where great men arise out of ordinary people, and great families usually drop back to being just ordinary after 3 generations. This is when “democracy”, as it is practiced in most countries right now, is already doing a fantastic job rewarding selfishness, keeping the rich rich, and keeping the powerful powerful. These guys really just want to be a Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, but it doesn’t sound good so let’s get a different avatar, something none-existent in real life, to help push for more of that.
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I agree that China is not run on the individual whims of some kleptocrat. But Robin Daverman makes some shockingly lazy arguments about absence of dynasties in a country whose history is almost synonymous with them.
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kadame,
I had a change of heart.
One thing you can’t argue with is result. Whatever China is doing is working, economy has grown,far fewer people are poorer than before,and if their stats are genuine,this is laudable.
The fascination with China I agree is shallow and it fails to account for so many things including their rich culture.
As I shared with Termie in another thread, I doubt Uhuru dictatorship would improve our fortunes. I mean I can’t see any way that works. How our poor excuse for democracy restraints Uhuruto from ‘development’ has never been clear to me.
I asked Pundito to help but he is reluctant
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Termi, don't be so quick to dismiss a system that has pulled off the biggest economic miracle in a long stretch of history. In fact, vooke, Termi, listen to this dude. He has actually studied the Chinese governance structure/model up close. According to him, among the politburo's 25 members, only 5 are princelings, and the two powerful heads are not princelings (this was in 2013, Idk if things are different now) and the second most powerful body of 300 has an even smaller percentage of princelings. China is far more biased towards the ordinary/common man rising through the ranks through sheer talent and hard work than it is towards dynasticism. Enjoy this Ted! It's true that results speak for themselves. You don't pull 800 million people out of poverty in three short decades unless you are doing something very, very right. The West has never done anything nearly so transformative on such a scale and within such a frame of time as China has pulled off within my lifetime. It's truly impressive. Tell me what you guys think, I really enjoyed this talk.
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Kadame,
I haven’t dismissed China. I am pointing out the author’s historical inaccuracies to put it mildly. The Ming and Qing dynasties each lasted over a quarter of a millennium. When someone gets such basic facts wrong it makes me reluctant to take what they say seriously.
Even then, I agree there is more to China’s totalitarian system than just the autocracy. It has institutions and discipline that have created an environment in which rewards mirror effort.
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We can argue about the cost of corruption to the economy but we know for sure that our political bikering has a definite cost..every election year we lose abt half the gdp growth..which is equivalent of new SGR or maybe 300billion.If we factor the constant bdaily political tribal energy invested in our politics it even get worse.I am mean from 90s till now we been in constant unending tribal wars fought on the media or bars or sometime even physically.This is cost China doesnt incurr.There is peaceful transfer of power under one party system.This true in orher countries too that have stable political system.Jubilee the last 5yrs have been far more stable regime bar the supreme court induced nonsense of Raila the last yr.I think the more jubilee become stronger the more stable and predictable our politics will be..10yrs under Uhuru..10yrs under Ruto..then 10yrs under someone else should get us china model.
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So^^ the Chinese model came from 30 years of dictatorship? Pray tell, why did it not magically occur during Jomo's or Moi's eras or in the myriad of dictatorships we've had on this continent since independence? Heck, if this is what it took, Africa should be teeming with Chinese models by now.
Termi, I think you may have misunderstood him a bit. He was not referring to the emperors but to the administrators/the old "civil service". You can see he refers specifically to ministers in Chinese history. It's only this part of the old Chinese governance structure that has been replicated/continued in modern China. The emperors were replaced by the CCP's highest bodies, I guess.
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So^^ the Chinese model came from 30 years of dictatorship? Pray tell, why did it not magically occur during Jomo's or Moi's eras or in the myriad of dictatorships we've had on this continent since independence? Heck, if this is what it took, Africa should be teeming with Chinese models by now.
Termi, I think you may have misunderstood him a bit. He was not referring to the emperors but to the administrators/the old "civil service". You can see he refers specifically to ministers in Chinese history. It's only this part of the old Chinese governance structure that has been replicated/continued in modern China. The emperors were replaced by the CCP's highest bodies, I guess.
I agree with your observation on Africa. The comparison with China is shallow. The Kenyan wish for authoritarian rule is informed by the desire to continue stealing and protecting ill gotten wealth.
China is similar to the other East Asian countries, just much larger and poorer. Many of these countries are not dictatorships. Some may have been under some form of authoritarian rule during their rise. But it is not the common thread. The common thread is manufacturing their way out of poverty regardless of the type of government - so something else is at play.
About the author. He does talk cabinet ministers and prime ministers. Granted I don't know the fine details. But in terms hereditary leadership, it's fair to not ignore or downplay the fact that China had dynasties. I think by doing this, he does not do justice to his case. It makes him appear too invested in his argument to care about other facts.
Suppose he is right. There is still the fact that the modern history of China, bar its recent emergence, has not been particularly inspiring, despite this vaunted thousand year system of meritocracy. We gloss over that and we miss important insights. We therefore pretend that China was doing just as well during the Mao years as it is doing today. But that is obviously not true, despite this long tradition.
What changed between the Mao years and now? I think that is more relevant to understand what's happening there. And it may turn out that meritocracy suffered under Mao.
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Termi what I find most puzzling is how this dictatorship "idea" is being touted as if it's a brilliant new experiment over here. I'm here thinking, really? Is there an older, better tested "governance model" than dictatorship on this continent including most of Kenya's history? Indeed any improvement in Africa over the last few decades has occurred in tandem with the expansion of democracy on the Continent. Now *there's* something to wrap your mind around.
You're right. Mao's years were horrendous. And they were actually the closest to the dictator's model that China has ever gotten since they dispatched the Emperors to Taiwan. Indeed, the Emperors were dictators. It's only after the ouster of that model that China's dramatic improvement occurred. Also, their great reformer, Mao's successor simply sobered up and saw what was not working, hence the move away from total communism. I guess like other places, China was lucky in its leaders at a certain crucial time (Mao's death) and certain good changes were made and institutionalized so that they outlived their good leaders.
Personally, I think we should be wise as foxes, shrewed as serpents. Take from BaChina what is good and from Bazungu what is good. Adapt, like them. Dictatorships in tribal societies are recipies for war. Africa is the World's lab in that respect. Now talk about "costs".
What we need from the Chinaman is the competence model. Blend it with our system. Make the president have to go through 30 years of proven governance before handing the fate of the country to him and even then, dont make him that important. Give him a Politburo. Force him to convince everyone of changes he wants to introduce by giving the entire Politburo both independence from him and right of veto. Let these changes once accepted, be implementable in 5 year plans, not immediately. Make politicians go through a more rigorous ethics and competence test than even our Chapter Six could ever dream about. Then keep making them go through those tests at every higher step they advance to. Take regular public surveys of those served by these folk to gauge their competence alongside other objective mesurements....now THAT is democracy on steriods if you ask me! Etc etc. THAT'S the kinda stuff we should be borrowing from BaChina, not using them to impose Mobutu 2.0 on Kenyans and Africans.
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Termi what I find most puzzling is how this dictatorship "idea" is being touted as if it's a brilliant new experiment over here. I'm here thinking, really? Is there an older, better tested "governance model" than dictatorship on this continent including most of Kenya's history? Indeed any improvement in Africa over the last few decades has occurred in tandem with the expansion of democracy on the Continent. Now *there's* something to wrap your mind around.
You're right. Mao's years were horrendous. And they were actually the closest to the dictator's model that China has ever gotten since they dispatched the Emperors to Taiwan. Indeed, the Emperors were dictators. It's only after the ouster of that model that China's dramatic improvement occurred. Also, their great reformer, Mao's successor simply sobered up and saw what was not working, hence the move away from total communism. I guess like other places, China was lucky in its leaders at a certain crucial time (Mao's death) and certain good changes were made and institutionalized so that they outlived their good leaders.
Personally, I think we should be wise as foxes, shrewed as serpents. Take from BaChina what is good and from Bazungu what is good. Adapt, like them. Dictatorships in tribal societies are recipies for war. Africa is the World's lab in that respect. Now talk about "costs".
What we need from the Chinaman is the competence model. Blend it with our system. Make the president have to go through 30 years of proven governance before handing the fate of the country to him and even then, dont make him that important. Give him a Politburo. Force him to convince everyone of changes he wants to introduce by giving the entire Politburo both independence from him and right of veto. Let these changes once accepted, be implementable in 5 year plans, not immediately. Make politicians go through a more rigorous ethics and competence test than even our Chapter Six could ever dream about. Then keep making them go through those tests at every higher step they advance to. Take regular public surveys of those served by these folk to gauge their competence alongside other objective mesurements....now THAT is democracy on steriods if you ask me! Etc etc. THAT'S the kinda stuff we should be borrowing from BaChina, not using them to impose Mobutu 2.0 on Kenyans and Africans.
Yep. Their policies are different from Mao days. Then there is the discipline that goes beyond gaudy shows and presentations. I think the relative homogeneity of East Asian countries allows them to potentially thrive in any number of different political systems. And this includes strongmen. Something that is an automatic fail for any diverse country.
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Yep. Their policies are different from Mao days. Then there is the discipline that goes beyond gaudy shows and presentations. I think the relative homogeneity of East Asian countries allows them to potentially thrive in any number of different political systems. And this includes strongmen. Something that is an automatic fail for any diverse country.
This is an unproven hypothesis. Correlation is not causation. What stops homegeneous Nordics from discarding democracy? Most of the West is homegeneous yet abhors autocracy.
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I see we are now going into race and eugenics - that Asians are somehow more disciplined bla bla. Let's not conflate the miracles or economies of location/geography as far as industrialization goes with eugenics. Asia have had it's fair share of all the shenagians we've hard - politically speaking - dictatorship, military rules, juntas, democracy, autocracy and name it.
Ultimately for me whatever political systems can guarantee political stability with peaceful exchange of power over the long term works!
Kenya in this regard has been doing relatively well - 55 yrs later - we have had relative peaceful hand overs and stable gok. We just need to deal with election year anxiety and trouble. This been going on since the re-introduction of multi-party systems. Every election year we seem to tither on the brink. I think the solution ultimately is one strong political party that can dominate the rest and make election a rather forgone conclusion - if we cannot have two parties like US that can compete and have the discipline to accept to win or lose. One or two strong parties in a multiparty doesn't equate to dictatorship.
We just need to avoid elections which are won on 50-50 and go for decisive wins! KANU did this until the 90s. NARC and the tribal opposition parties that followed never lasted a day. ODM had a big promise but Raila mismanaged it. Now I see Jubilee slowly and surely re-establishing the KANU machinery of the yore - which will replicate CCM of TZ or ANC of RSA or Communist Party of China or the Ethiopia rulling coalition party - and ultimately set us on path of less tribalism and more stable gov - that allows us to now focus on other things - rather that endless tribal political wars.
NASA refused to gell into one party & offers us a US like dual party system and it's very gratifying to see it dying a slow painful death.
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No, I don't think it's necessarily hard work on the part of the population (though they certainly are!) as the same population was very poor not too long ago, or even homogeneity which is a Western assumption but is not exactly true. China is SUPER diverse actually. They have however had the advantage of 2,000 years of conquering, unifying etc so that they have an overarching Chinese identity that mediates all that diversity. Our problem in Africa is we have not yet successfully achieved that so our diversity is always like a ticking bomb. We must think of how to achieve unity as well as prosperity. I wish we could have a do-over and the chance to implement something like this, to be honest. The Western model isn't that good for us, we need to take from it some and then modify it to our own circumstances and problems.
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Yep. Their policies are different from Mao days. Then there is the discipline that goes beyond gaudy shows and presentations. I think the relative homogeneity of East Asian countries allows them to potentially thrive in any number of different political systems. And this includes strongmen. Something that is an automatic fail for any diverse country.
This is an unproven hypothesis. Correlation is not causation. What stops homegeneous Nordics from discarding democracy? Most of the West is homegeneous yet abhors autocracy.
You are responding as if I said that homogeneity leads to autocracy. That's putting words into my mouth. I said that autocracy is less of a destabilizing factor if a society is homogeneous.
That means if the Nordics find themselves under an autocracy, they are likely to fair better than a more diverse country in the same conditions, all else being even.
That said, I will point out that it's not a cut and dried argument. Somalia is homogeneous, maybe the most ethnically homogeneous country in Africa. Yet they have found a way to accentuate whatever small divisions they have. But by your own admission, Africa is a special case(and I agree, but not with your underlying reason :D ).
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No, I don't think it's necessarily hard work on the part of the population (though they certainly are!) as the same population was very poor not too long ago, or even homogeneity which is a Western assumption but is not exactly true. China is SUPER diverse actually. They have however had the advantage of 2,000 years of conquering, unifying etc so that they have an overarching Chinese identity that mediates all that diversity. Our problem in Africa is we have not yet successfully achieved that so our diversity is always like a ticking bomb. We must think of how to achieve unity as well as prosperity. I wish we could have a do-over and the chance to implement something like this, to be honest. The Western model isn't that good for us, we need to take from it some and then modify it to our own circumstances and problems.
As you mention, the identity is more important than other factors. What people think they are, they become. That is why Igbos who had no idea what that even meant barely 70 years ago, quickly morphed into one the largest ethnic groups in Africa. That is why Tanzanians next door cannot comprehend the ethnic animus that dominates Kenya. In that sense, China is homogeneous.
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Behind all the stable political systems lies a deep federalism or devolution..this is true for usa or china or etc..the more people have power real issues that affect..the they dont care about the big jobs for whoever.That seem the trick.The nonsense that some people are more hardworking or discipline or whatever is the purest form of stupidity in 21st century.
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Behind all the stable political systems lies a deep federalism or devolution..this is true for usa or china or etc..the more people have power real issues that affect..the they dont care about the big jobs for whoever.That seem the trick.The nonsense that some people are more hardworking or discipline or whatever is the purest form of stupidity in 21st century.
I agree, especially the last part. Africans are pretty hardworking. If you ask them to get up at 2 am in the morning to go to work, they will do it. They are like mules. What is not happening is the proper organization of that effort to benefit the society at large.
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I agree, especially the last part. Africans are pretty hardworking. If you ask them to get up at 2 am in the morning to go to work, they will do it. They are like mules. What is not happening is the proper organization of that effort to benefit the society at large.
All humans are equal? I will let you and Pundit to explain why the African is yet to figure out a fitting model centuries behind the rest of humanity.
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I agree, especially the last part. Africans are pretty hardworking. If you ask them to get up at 2 am in the morning to go to work, they will do it. They are like mules. What is not happening is the proper organization of that effort to benefit the society at large.
All humans are equal? I will let you and Pundit to explain why the African is yet to figure out a fitting model centuries behind the rest of humanity.
They are even millennia behind in some cases. A typical Turkana probably doesn’t live above the Neolithic lifestyle apart from an AK 47. He rarely uses any machinery or even beasts of burden. But yes, he is just as capable as Elon Musk :D given the right circumstances.
It’s culture, not nature. Nordic folks were literally cave dwellers at the height of some civilizations in parts of West Africa. But that did not hold them back from eventually sorting their shit out.
Kichwa would say, “History is an ongoing thing and it’s not over until it’s over.”
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Mr bitmask, Glad you inch towards reality. I don't buy the Kadame line that civilization or development is cyclical and the ancient African was a global leader at some point. I have not seen technology or inventions beyond the Pyramid and the Scroll to impress the ancient African's industry upon my pessimism.
This is important because if the African's diagnosis was a concensus, perhaps a solution would be in sight. The American taps global manpower elaborately via the Green Card. The South African is busy evicting remnant white capital... upon which I'm vehement.
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Mr bitmask, Glad you inch towards reality. I don't buy the Kadame line that civilization or development is cyclical and the ancient African was a global leader at some point. I have not seen technology or inventions beyond the Pyramids and the Scroll to impress the ancient African's industry upon mu pessimism.
This is important because if the African's diagnosis was a concensus, perhaps a solution would be in sight. The American taps global manpower elaborately via the Green Card. The South African is busy evicting remnant white capital... upon which I'm vehement.
That's just history. Most of it North African. The Sub-Saharan probably didn't have much beyond a hoe and a spear. Primitive societies. That's all it is. Not inferior people. You are conflating knowledge with innate ability. The tragedy for me is not in the the helplessness of the Negro, but in repeated missed opportunities to tap into his potential.
I do not see the need to point to some past achievement when I know you can take a child from Lake Turkana living in the stone age and turn him into a rocket scientist, something that nobody was doing a few generations ago even in the advanced West.
I know its cliche, but I think colonialism and the way it lumped together different groups of Africans did do a number. It introduced some modern ways into the system, but it is ridiculous to think that we would not have been exposed to them without being colonized. It would still have happened by diffusion and trade.
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You're right except you're hard on Africans. Africa was mostly a closed continent - it didn't benefit from all inventions and innovations - both economic or political or social - until colonoliasm.Why it didn't benefit - possibly due to malaria and other climatic conditions that made Africa hard to conquer until the late 19th century. Now barely 100yrs since Africa was mainstreamed into the modern world we want it to compare and compete with Europe (with solid 1000 yrs of advancement) or Japan or China with even older civilisation.
What Africa has done the last 100yrs for me is nothing but commendable. You need to understand 100yrs in human modern history is very very short period. Africa rise is inevitable.
If you want to understand why Africa or XYZ is the way it is - look at it at micro level - at your family level. My paternal late great grandfather born in 19th century was basically unschooled and died early 1930s - like the rest of Africans - after living a short brutish life. He only had 1 son and I think 2 daughters. My paternal great grandfather had better luck because he was born around 1915 - and died around 1994 -about 80yrs - with my paternal grand-mother - they bore 9 kids - 8 sons and 1 daughter - which according to her was miracle - all thanks to medical invention of the white man - of course they were unschooled.My father born in 1940s studied with great difficulty and eventually did his A levels in 1980s as teacher aged in 40s - and got even more kids - now it our generation - who probably didn't struggle a lot to study and are mostly living comfortable middle class life. If you ask me - who in our many generation of family failed? What more did you want my great grandfather to do except till Mzungu farm in exchange for pasture. What did you want my great father to do that he didn't do? How would you berate my father who like many worked extremely hard to see us in school and saved enough to acquire some wealth? What have our generation done that you can say we failed - we studied harder than anyone this world san maybe chinese - carried 20 books to schools kilometers away and studied under little resources & still made the best we could? Our Kids are probably now enjoying just about the same lifestyle and education opportunities a white kid has.
This story is the same with other families. There is nothing wrong with Africa or Africans. We just need Time. And Time in this case is not 10yrs - it 100yrs - in fact African will probably the first race to turn from primitive man to modern man in 150yrs. And I am not talking about one turkana boy - but the whole of Turkana turning into the average modern man. Of course there are probably 100M Africans living in Africa living as good life as anyone anywhere in the world - Kenya alone has more than 10,000 dollar millionaires. But the fortunes of entire country and continent takes time....the average has to move painstakingly slowly...a single percentage...every year...and that to me is worth celebration. Otherwise you won't be there 100yrs later when Africa will be at par with everyone.
Give Africa TIME.
That's just history. Most of it North African. The Sub-Saharan probably didn't have much beyond a hoe and a spear. Primitive societies. That's all it is. Not inferior people. You are conflating knowledge with innate ability. The tragedy for me is not in the the helplessness of the Negro, but in repeated missed opportunities to tap into his potential.
I do not see the need to point to some past achievement when I know you can take a child from Lake Turkana living in the stone age and turn him into a rocket scientist, something that nobody was doing a few generations ago even in the advanced West.
I know its cliche, but I think colonialism and the way it lumped together different groups of Africans did do a number. It introduced some modern ways into the system, but it is ridiculous to think that we would not have been exposed to them without being colonized. It would still have happened by diffusion and trade.
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Mr bitmask, Glad you inch towards reality. I don't buy the Kadame line that civilization or development is cyclical and the ancient African was a global leader at some point. I have not seen technology or inventions beyond the Pyramid and the Scroll to impress the ancient African's industry upon my pessimism.
This is important because if the African's diagnosis was a concensus, perhaps a solution would be in sight. The American taps global manpower elaborately via the Green Card. The South African is busy evicting remnant white capital... upon which I'm vehement.
I'd like first of all a link to the thread/post where Kadame made this rubbish claim first, please, before things proceed.
Robina, the thing I despise about you is your ability to make s*** straight up, put it in my mouth and then pretend to be disputing stuff I've never said on this planet since the day of my birth. Please just stop this. It's grating. If you are not interested in actually reading what people say, don't bother responding to it, mkay?
I have never said that Africans were global leaders. I do have a brain and access to books and history, okay? Nor have I ever claimed that develpment is "cyclical"....the hell does that even mean, "cyclical development"? smh.
Robina hears you say one thing, like human societies have followed the same patterns of evolution (not talking about biological evolution here but the change of human social organization in the past 5,000 years or so) and then she decides this means she can donate to you every silly argument she's heard/seen from misinformed "black power" idiots arguing in youtube comments and what-have-you. It's super annoying.
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As to the topic, I agree with Pundit and Termi. For whatever reason, civilization sprung up around the Mediterranean. All peoples that were not cut off from it eventually were influenced by it through colonization, trade and other forms of diffusion as Termi puts it.
Britain well under 2000 years ago was a place full of mud huts and so-called primitive savages whom Roman missionaries were afraid to visit due to their so-called primitive and savage ways. People love to lump all Europeans together as if all Europeans were the Romans and the Greeks when these were two very, very tiny groups of peoples in a very small corner of the world that was perpetually and very connected to Asia.
The same Romans that conquered Britain and Ireland also conquered North Africa and parts of Asia. Were it not for the jungles and desserts, there's really no reason to think they, or the Greeks before them or the Persians before them would have failed to colonize even Cape Point and Mombasa at the same time as they were colonizing the "savage/primitive" folk of Britain.
Lots of peoples around the world that were disconnected and did not discover agriculture were not all that different from Africans before colonization came upon them, just like the Irish were not that different before colonization, and even on our continent, these changes were still happening at different paces in different societies by the advent of colonialism 200 years ago, sometimes because of diffusion through the Arabs.
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Mr bitmask, Glad you inch towards reality. I don't buy the Kadame line that civilization or development is cyclical and the ancient African was a global leader at some point. I have not seen technology or inventions beyond the Pyramid and the Scroll to impress the ancient African's industry upon my pessimism.
This is important because if the African's diagnosis was a concensus, perhaps a solution would be in sight. The American taps global manpower elaborately via the Green Card. The South African is busy evicting remnant white capital... upon which I'm vehement.
I'd like first of all a link to the thread/post where Kadame made this rubbish claim first, please, before things proceed.
Robina, the thing I despise about you is your ability to make s*** straight up, put it in my mouth and then pretend to be disputing stuff I've never said on this planet since the day of my birth. Please just stop this. It's grating. If you are not interested in actually reading what people say, don't bother responding to it, mkay?
I have never said that Africans were global leaders. I do have a brain and access to books and history, okay? Nor have I ever claimed that develpment is "cyclical"....the hell does that even mean, "cyclical development"? smh.
Robina hears you say one thing, like human societies have followed the same patterns of evolution (not talking about biological evolution here but the change of human social organization in the past 5,000 years or so) and then she decides this means she can donate to you every silly argument she's heard/seen from misinformed "black power" idiots arguing in youtube comments and what-have-you. It's super annoying.
Get a room both of you
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No, I don't think it's necessarily hard work on the part of the population (though they certainly are!) as the same population was very poor not too long ago, or even homogeneity which is a Western assumption but is not exactly true. China is SUPER diverse actually. They have however had the advantage of 2,000 years of conquering, unifying etc so that they have an overarching Chinese identity that mediates all that diversity. Our problem in Africa is we have not yet successfully achieved that so our diversity is always like a ticking bomb. We must think of how to achieve unity as well as prosperity. I wish we could have a do-over and the chance to implement something like this, to be honest. The Western model isn't that good for us, we need to take from it some and then modify it to our own circumstances and problems.
Lakini, is ‘toxic diversity’ our biggest headache?
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That's just history. Most of it North African. The Sub-Saharan probably didn't have much beyond a hoe and a spear. Primitive societies. That's all it is. Not inferior people. You are conflating knowledge with innate ability. The tragedy for me is not in the the helplessness of the Negro, but in repeated missed opportunities to tap into his potential.
I do not see the need to point to some past achievement when I know you can take a child from Lake Turkana living in the stone age and turn him into a rocket scientist, something that nobody was doing a few generations ago even in the advanced West.
I know its cliche, but I think colonialism and the way it lumped together different groups of Africans did do a number. It introduced some modern ways into the system, but it is ridiculous to think that we would not have been exposed to them without being colonized. It would still have happened by diffusion and trade.
This analogy is faulty: anyone can ride a Ferrari the issue is earning it.
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I'd like first of all a link to the thread/post where Kadame made this rubbish claim first, please, before things proceed.
Robina, the thing I despise about you is your ability to make s*** straight up, put it in my mouth and then pretend to be disputing stuff I've never said on this planet since the day of my birth. Please just stop this. It's grating. If you are not interested in actually reading what people say, don't bother responding to it, mkay?
I have never said that Africans were global leaders. I do have a brain and access to books and history, okay? Nor have I ever claimed that develpment is "cyclical"....the hell does that even mean, "cyclical development"? smh.
Robina hears you say one thing, like human societies have followed the same patterns of evolution (not talking about biological evolution here but the change of human social organization in the past 5,000 years or so) and then she decides this means she can donate to you every silly argument she's heard/seen from misinformed "black power" idiots arguing in youtube comments and what-have-you. It's super annoying.
Grow up. This is a blog not a courtroom. Mentioning you does not make you grow a tail. I mention others all the time you don't see them overreacting like you.
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Kadame to level up the despise is mutual. You are immature.
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I'd like first of all a link to the thread/post where Kadame made this rubbish claim first, please, before things proceed.
Robina, the thing I despise about you is your ability to make s*** straight up, put it in my mouth and then pretend to be disputing stuff I've never said on this planet since the day of my birth. Please just stop this. It's grating. If you are not interested in actually reading what people say, don't bother responding to it, mkay?
I have never said that Africans were global leaders. I do have a brain and access to books and history, okay? Nor have I ever claimed that develpment is "cyclical"....the hell does that even mean, "cyclical development"? smh.
Robina hears you say one thing, like human societies have followed the same patterns of evolution (not talking about biological evolution here but the change of human social organization in the past 5,000 years or so) and then she decides this means she can donate to you every silly argument she's heard/seen from misinformed "black power" idiots arguing in youtube comments and what-have-you. It's super annoying.
Grow up. This is a blog not a courtroom. Mentioning you does not make you grow a tail. I mention others all the time you don't see them overreacting like you.
You don't mention me, you straight up lie about what I said. And you make a habit of it too, this not the first time.
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Kadame to level up the despise is mutual. You are immature.
Good that's out of the way. Now don't pretend to respond to stuff I never said. And PS, I didn't say I despised YOU. I despise how you straight up makeup things I never said and attribute them to me. And usually its the most inane arguments that you donate, not even halfway decent ones. Thats worse than a strawman. It's just a clever way of calling someone an idiot.
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That's just history. Most of it North African. The Sub-Saharan probably didn't have much beyond a hoe and a spear. Primitive societies. That's all it is. Not inferior people. You are conflating knowledge with innate ability. The tragedy for me is not in the the helplessness of the Negro, but in repeated missed opportunities to tap into his potential.
I do not see the need to point to some past achievement when I know you can take a child from Lake Turkana living in the stone age and turn him into a rocket scientist, something that nobody was doing a few generations ago even in the advanced West.
I know its cliche, but I think colonialism and the way it lumped together different groups of Africans did do a number. It introduced some modern ways into the system, but it is ridiculous to think that we would not have been exposed to them without being colonized. It would still have happened by diffusion and trade.
This analogy is faulty: anyone can ride a Ferrari the issue is earning it.
That would be a valid point if one pretends that a child in Lodwar has the same opportunity to earn it as a trust fund baby. And yet tellingly some still make it in spite of the odds.
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No, I don't think it's necessarily hard work on the part of the population (though they certainly are!) as the same population was very poor not too long ago, or even homogeneity which is a Western assumption but is not exactly true. China is SUPER diverse actually. They have however had the advantage of 2,000 years of conquering, unifying etc so that they have an overarching Chinese identity that mediates all that diversity. Our problem in Africa is we have not yet successfully achieved that so our diversity is always like a ticking bomb. We must think of how to achieve unity as well as prosperity. I wish we could have a do-over and the chance to implement something like this, to be honest. The Western model isn't that good for us, we need to take from it some and then modify it to our own circumstances and problems.
Lakini, is ‘toxic diversity’ our biggest headache?
Things are very simple imo. Our biggest headache has been our leaders and their most potent tools have been the state and the "toxic diversity" you mention. We are an unlucky people.
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No, I don't think it's necessarily hard work on the part of the population (though they certainly are!) as the same population was very poor not too long ago, or even homogeneity which is a Western assumption but is not exactly true. China is SUPER diverse actually. They have however had the advantage of 2,000 years of conquering, unifying etc so that they have an overarching Chinese identity that mediates all that diversity. Our problem in Africa is we have not yet successfully achieved that so our diversity is always like a ticking bomb. We must think of how to achieve unity as well as prosperity. I wish we could have a do-over and the chance to implement something like this, to be honest. The Western model isn't that good for us, we need to take from it some and then modify it to our own circumstances and problems.
Lakini, is ‘toxic diversity’ our biggest headache?
Things are very simple imo. Our biggest headache has been our leaders and their most potent tools have been the state and the "toxic diversity" you mention. We are an unlucky people.
Methinks they would still persist in their devious ways our diversity notwithstanding
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No, I don't think it's necessarily hard work on the part of the population (though they certainly are!) as the same population was very poor not too long ago, or even homogeneity which is a Western assumption but is not exactly true. China is SUPER diverse actually. They have however had the advantage of 2,000 years of conquering, unifying etc so that they have an overarching Chinese identity that mediates all that diversity. Our problem in Africa is we have not yet successfully achieved that so our diversity is always like a ticking bomb. We must think of how to achieve unity as well as prosperity. I wish we could have a do-over and the chance to implement something like this, to be honest. The Western model isn't that good for us, we need to take from it some and then modify it to our own circumstances and problems.
Lakini, is ‘toxic diversity’ our biggest headache?
Things are very simple imo. Our biggest headache has been our leaders and their most potent tools have been the state and the "toxic diversity" you mention. We are an unlucky people.
Methinks they would still persist in their devious ways our diversity notwithstanding
But with less potent tools. If everyone is a Kale, it might be more difficult to distract them from the fact that their leader is a thief by pointing a finger at non-existent Luo pretenders. If I recall correctly Pundit once suggested that Kalenjin do not consider stealing from other tribes a crime.
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No, I don't think it's necessarily hard work on the part of the population (though they certainly are!) as the same population was very poor not too long ago, or even homogeneity which is a Western assumption but is not exactly true. China is SUPER diverse actually. They have however had the advantage of 2,000 years of conquering, unifying etc so that they have an overarching Chinese identity that mediates all that diversity. Our problem in Africa is we have not yet successfully achieved that so our diversity is always like a ticking bomb. We must think of how to achieve unity as well as prosperity. I wish we could have a do-over and the chance to implement something like this, to be honest. The Western model isn't that good for us, we need to take from it some and then modify it to our own circumstances and problems.
Lakini, is ‘toxic diversity’ our biggest headache?
Things are very simple imo. Our biggest headache has been our leaders and their most potent tools have been the state and the "toxic diversity" you mention. We are an unlucky people.
Methinks they would still persist in their devious ways our diversity notwithstanding
But with less potent tools. If everyone is a Kale, it might be more difficult to distract them from the fact that their leader is a thief by pointing a finger at non-existent Luo pretenders. If I recall correctly Pundit once suggested that Kalenjin do not consider stealing from other tribes a crime.
No doubt.
Toxic diversity at national level carries the risk of civil strife which is claimed to slow our march to progress. I still insist in Kenya’s case it is overrated as an obstacle.
A crude way of testing our progress sans diversity is ‘village’ county governments where it is hardly a factor. There is nepotism,ineptitude,corruption,mismanagement but nobody gets displaced,and killings,if at all, are rare.
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Why do you & bitmask divorce leadership from the other backwardness and problems bedeviling us. Our quality of leadership right from the cattle dip committee to the president is just the reflection of us. Poor decision making - and with dearth of opportunities to make money (again due to our poverty) they see it a way to make money. You cannot compare the leadership of the kindergarten committee in some boston neighberhood with say the one in my local area.
Things are very simple imo. Our biggest headache has been our leaders and their most potent tools have been the state and the "toxic diversity" you mention. We are an unlucky people.
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Robina, you are right. I overreacted before. I could have just disputed that I said the things you said I said, the rest was completely unnecesssary, especially the thing about "despising". I apologize.
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Pundit, maybe you are right. Vooke, I dont know why you struggle with the issue of toxic diversity. At the very least it has been something that has allowed us to settle for subpar performance even in places like the Capital where most people should have the highest expectations. The ethnic math our politics is based on is surely a big obstacle even down to clan levels. There is just no way you get good leaders in such a diverse country as Kenya once ethnic maths becomes the main calculation in politics.
If we had one dominant group, say 75% of the country belonging to one group, I'd say it would be less of a problem. But when you have even the biggest groups with a share of only like 20% of the populace, the competition becomes really toxic among the population over time and if even the smallest sense of unfairness is seen to be happening whether or not it is happening, the resentment and toxicity becomes a threat to nationhood which should trump any smaller sense of belonging. We have to find solutions that directly deal with this if we are ever gonna move forward and bazungu models wont work for us because these models were never designed to solve the problems WE have but the ones bazungu had throughout the last millenium.
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Pundit, maybe you are right. Vooke, I dont know why you struggle with the issue of toxic diversity. At the very least it has been something that has allowed us to settle for subpar performance even in places like the Capital where most people should have the highest expectations. The ethnic math our politics is based on is surely a big obstacle even down to clan levels. There is just no way you get good leaders in such a diverse country as Kenya once ethnic maths becomes the main calculation in politics.
If we had one dominant group, say 75% of the country belonging to one group, I'd say it would be less of a problem. But when you have even the biggest groups with a share of only like 20% of the populace, the competition becomes really toxic among the population over time and if even the smallest sense of unfairness is seen to be happening whether or not it is happening, the resentment and toxicity becomes a threat to nationhood which should trump any smaller sense of belonging. We have to find solutions that directly deal with this if we are ever gonna move forward and bazungu models wont work for us because these models were never designed to solve the problems WE have but the ones bazungu had throughout the last millenium.
I’m not disputing or even questioning any of that, all I’m saying is that we could be exaggerating its contribution to our backwardness or slow progress.
Again, I don’t see corruption,ineptitude,nepotism,mismanagement magically abating the moment we drop our ethnic consciousness
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Bazungu began like us - with many tribes - but over a long time those tribes disappeared- and from it emerged the british, the germans, the italians - etc.Kenya like other Africa countries are recent constructs - but I bet say 300 yrs from now - there will be a real kenyan identity. Obviously that is long time - but certainly as we develop and urbanize - to say 90% of urbanization - a new kenyan identity will emerge.But for now - we need to manage our differences - through devolution & federalism - and of course through national parties & leadership.
It appears to me - that most of our problems will slowly disappear on it's own - including corruption, poor leadership & tribalism - as long as we keep moving forward one step at a time.
I think it's fool hardy to imagine we can solve any of our problems say in one or two generations - we need to stop stressing ourselves and just buy time.
Corruption for example has been shown to disappear on it's own as the country become richer - and risk-reward matrix changes. The same way robbery with violence will disappear with time.So as long as the economy is growing - that will eventually take care of itself. Otherwise whatever measures you put now will always have limited effect - as we have seen with regard with Kenya - because the environment is totally corrupt. So by GDP growing at average of 6% regardless of graft - we are actually dealing with graft - by providing more opportunity for people to live honest life.
Tribalism - will change with increasing urbanization - the country in 100yrs will be totally unrecognizable from now - Imagine a country with say 50 cities - all of them cosmopolitan. You cannot ran such a country by mobilizing on ethnic grounds. In fact I don't see any of our tribal language surviving say 200 yrs from now - they will all go extinct - and Kiswahili & English will become our national language. Of course most of us are impatient and want to see things happen now - sorry these things takes centuries.
If we had one dominant group, say 75% of the country belonging to one group, I'd say it would be less of a problem. But when you have even the biggest groups with a share of only like 20% of the populace, the competition becomes really toxic among the population over time and if even the smallest sense of unfairness is seen to be happening whether or not it is happening, the resentment and toxicity becomes a threat to nationhood which should trump any smaller sense of belonging. We have to find solutions that directly deal with this if we are ever gonna move forward and bazungu models wont work for us because these models were never designed to solve the problems WE have but the ones bazungu had throughout the last millenium.