Why is Africa so backwards still?

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^ Yeah, that article on the Mississippi civilizations is great. Nobody knows that existed, becasue smallpox (or something) had wiped them out before the Europeans made it that far inland. They just didn't leave monumental architecture around after they had to revert to wandering. Except for the mounds that the houses and temples were built on. Tons of those around the midwest here, even up in Iowa and Minnesota.

They're not backward just because they don't live like middle class Americans for god's sake. And what's with all this "primitive" BS? You can't "stay primitive for too long", living in the technological age doesn't make you culturally superior and living in a self-made hut/shack in some remote desert doesn't make you underdeveloped. It's a very arrogant view.

Correct about the Eurocentricism part.

However, living in "the technological age", by which I will assume you mean the Information Age, does make one technologically superior by definition to someone who is not in the Information Age in the same way that Industrial Age civilizations are technologically superior to unindustrialized civilizations. Such was also the case within Precolonial Africa: Nri was certainly more technologically advanced, having steel, writing, agriculture, &c., to the San People who had none of those things. Technology does not develop in the same way everywhere, as can be seen with the Inka and being more developed in engineering, medicine and textiles than the Spanish yet completely lacking the ferrous metallurgy, complex mechanical devices and printing that the Spanish had. Likewise, sociocultural development is not simple nor linear: To go further with the Inka-Spanish example, the Inka were clearly more developed in most way, such as economics, gender relations and statecraft though the Spanish had an edge in inventiveness. Thus, overall, the Inka Empire was more or less technologically equal to the Spanish but socioculturally effectively superior; thus, in those two areas at least, it is certainly fair to say that the Inka were a civilization superior to that of the contemporary Spanish.

With regards to Africa, the main issues I can see with the development are of course colonialism but also many African cultures: Most were very tribal and the ones that were the least tribal, like the Ethiopians and the Nri, were the most developed, as tribalism makes the building of large states or a centralized bureaucracy very difficult due to promoting subjugation of conquered peoples over assimilation of the conquered; a similar problem with a much more polite name, nationalism, prevented the West from keeping its colonies around the globe, except where there was a more or less complete genocide of the population, as in the USA and Australia, unlike the Chinese or the Inka who both used assimilation into their culture over subjugation of others. Within living memory, this same nationalism in Europe is the reason for the failure of the EU, the success of Nazism, and the fall of the West's dominance of the Earth while it is the cause of numerous civil wars and lack of development in Africa.

Primitive as primitive civilization, not as primitive beings.

Now, spare me the moral speech.

I wouldn't say that Africa is "backwards", certainly not as a whole. The legacy of colonialism certainly is the biggest factor of those listed in the poll. Lets not forget that a good portion of Africa went from colonialism immediately to Cold War battle ground, it's not surprising that they are where they are now. There are a ton of other factors to like disease and ethnic/sectarian conflict.

All good points. I think isolation from other civilizations play a key role, the indigenous of Australia and the Inuit were been quite alone for long time. You can't really compare the Egypt/Arabia's desert with the Australian desert or the icy lands of the Inuits, while the Central Australia might be harsh but it had enough food access, and the people had the whole continent for themselves so they could move to the shores during the drought and the Arctic regions aren't really poor of animal life.

As for the Maya, I found this piece:

"Even the rainforest experiences an annual dry season; the trees hang on by tapping groundwater. “The Maya couldn’t use groundwater because it was 500 feet below them, and they had no technology to reach it, so they depended on rainwater.” In the Petén region Sever studies, rainwater accumulates in swamplands, known as bajos, that cover about 40 percent of the landscape. Today, that rainwater evaporates before anyone can use it effectively, but excavations and satellite images have revealed networks of canals among the Cibales or bajos, (the breadbasket of the Maya world), (left picture: Bajo in blue, dry land in green, and higher elevations in orange), apparently dug during the time of the Maya. Sever, suspects that the Maya used the canals to redirect and reuse the rainwater. This labor-intensive agriculture, which probably kept farmers working diligently all day, would have barely outpaced demand. "

http://www.authenticmaya.com/maya_agriculture.htm


The Aztec as far as I know relied much more on hunting and gather and had very primitive agriculture, an interesting unique combo.

[emboldening mine]

This is probably the most accurate and concise post in this thread so far. Add to this that colonialism is still going rather strong in Africa, only it operates under the guise of multinational corporate interests instead of state governments. So yeah, African nations have lots of resources, but aren't allowed to use them for their own benefit. Political leaders in 3rd world resource rich nations who oppose multinational corporate business interests don't seem to last too long.

Take Nigeria, for example. Nigeria has the 11th largest stash of oil reserves in the world, is the 8th biggest oil exporter in the world. Most nations have a state run oil agency that uses oil revenue to give everyone health care, build infrastructure and so on. Not Nigeria. Foreign oil corporations own their oil (Shell and Chevron), and give some massive bribes to corrupt government officials, but the Nigerian people don't get much of anything from it. This led to forced evictions of local populations living over the oil fields, and subsequent civil war. It wasn't until 2001 that the new Nigerian "democratic" government decided that prectice wasn't popular, so they put in a "Nigerian Delta Development Commission" to rectify the disparity. It hasn't done much of anything other than some greenwashing. The Nigerian Delta is still in a civil war of locals vs. oil workers.

Aztec agriculture was very advanced for their time: http://northeasternpermaculture.wikispa ... ardens.pdf . Not only did they practice the earliest form of intensive aquaponics to feed their heartland in the Valley of Mexico but they also farmed such productive crops as amaranth, chia, spirulina and avocadoes in addition to the well-known maize.

If you are looking for a civilization based on wild food harvesting, look to the Norte Chico: http://www.hallofmaat.com/modules.php?n ... cle&sid=85 . The Norte Chico, one of the world's earliest civilizations, barely farmed anything save cotton for their fishing nets; the fecund coast was their main source of food in the form of fish, shellfish and sea vegetables.

Their agriculture and water delivery systems were far in advance of anything Europe had at the time Cortez landed in Mexico. The Spaniards had horses, guns, germs and steel which is why they conquered the Aztecs.

ruveyn

Africa needs a space program.

Good post, this is essentially what I think it boils down to as well. It's not in the interests of these multinational corporations or the countries whom they own, such as our own, for Africa and elsewhere in the undeveloped world to become developed stable liberal democracies because the people of countries probably wouldn't sit back and allow the natural wealth of their country to be stolen by these foreign corporations.

Led by their top notch rocket engineers. All 7 of them.

ruveyn

To be fair though the other 50,000 are here on H-1B visas.

Most of our H-18s are from the subcontinent or Asia. However you might ask yourself why qualified African engineers are here and not at home.

ruveyn

Lol, no qualms with that question - there's nothing there for em. They're skills would likely just rot unless they were somewhere like South Africa, Lagos, Nairobi, or another major city in one of the developed western lobe countries.

Ok, quick history lesson so get comfortable...


The true reason why Africa is backwards is not IQ, but because firstly, Africans have never really been motivated socially to progress or advance. They're not technoligically inclined either. The generally nomadic lifestlye suited them, and they didn't have a reason to change.

Africans didn't start to be motivated to progress until they came into contact with other cultures--the first of which were the Arabs.

History shows that diversity (and to an extent competition) is what fuels progression. Because coming into contact with other groups stimulates growth. For a simple example of this, look at the level of advancement between Greeks compared to the advancement of Vandals and Vikings. Scandinavians were uncivilized and savage precisely because they weren't diverse and came into contact with no one other than un-advanced tribes, and perhaps Celtic tribes (the Celts were more advanced in terms of metal-working) to the South.

Meanwhile, while Northern European tribes were considered backwards by the Greeks, the Greeks were building cities, their artisans made statues, and they created the Olympics, and they theorized about the atom, democracy, and the Republic.
Why was this? Because Greeks were not only naturally industrious, but they had access via trade with the premier empires of the world and the cradle of civilization.

Unlike Africa, there was a free flow of ideas into Europe from Asia. Ideas traveled from Persia and Egypt to Greece. And Persia, Greece, and Egypt all benefited mutually from their interractions. Because the competition stimulated growth.

No real competition existed in Africa to stimulate such growth, because Africans as a people were nomadic and hadn't made cities until within the past 2000 years. While Babylon, Sumeria, and Akkadia had established cities all over the Cradle of Civilization: Mesopotamia.


The Greeks have much that they owe to the Sumerians and Akkadians, who invented farming and civilization. This meme quickly spread from Mesopotamia, reaching Egypt, the Indus valley (Mohenjo Daro), and then Greece.

Meanwhile, Chinese were establishing a civilization in the Yangtzee river valley.


But Africa just was too isolated. As before stated, isolationism stagnates growth. It was Babylonian and Sumerian ideas which made Greece great--thus Greece benefited from this free-flow of ideas. In fact, Greek knowledge of astronomy and science doesn't even touch Sumeria, who famously depicted the Sun being orbited by the various planets.

Rome, likewise, would have never become great if not for the exchange of ideas. Rome was, as some of you may know, initially a trading port established by Phoenicia. Phoenicia was located in modern-day Palestine and Lebanon. And Greece and Phoenicia colonized much of the Mediterranean.

Not only did the Phoenicians establish Rome, they established trading points all along North Africa. Which was the precursor to the Carthaginian empire.

After Phoenicia fell, Carthage and Rome emerged from the remnants of their civilization. Romans were highly uncivilized and took most of their culture from the Etruscans who lived nearby. However, as Rome became larger, they recieved an influx of Greek culture. By the time Rome controlled the entire Italian peninsula, Alexander the Great had already conquered the known word, bringing in new ideas from Persia, Egypt and even India.

But Greece was eventually conquered by Romans. The Greeks viewed Romans as savages with no culture, and the Romans were in awe of Greek culture, thus they adopted not only words from the Greek language into Latin, but they adopted the Greek pantheon, Zodiac, astrology, and all Greek science.

Thus we can see an unbroken archeological line where ideas moved from Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq) and made it to Phoenicia (Palestine/Lebanon) and from there to the warring city-states in Greece.

After the Vandals and other tribes invaded Rome from Northern Europe and Scandinavia they knocked Europe back intellectually perhaps a 1000 years. And Europe experienced a Dark Age and became more isolated than it was during the days of Rome. Thus, there is a correlation between isolationism and lack of intellectualism. Coupled with anti-scientific Church suppression, Europe languished as a continent of warring Christian kingdoms and factions. They had virtually abandoned the legacy laid down to them from Greece, Sumeria, Babylon, and others.

Meanwhile, the Islamic conquest was taking hold in the Middle East. After Northern European tribes had defeated Rome, leaving Constantinople behind, Arab conquests took control of North Africa, Egypt, and Mesopotamia. While Europe languished in the Dark Ages, the Islamic Empire created the greatest civilization of the time. It imported the ideas from Rome and Greece and the old Persian culture. It didn't have to start from scratch, just like Rome and Athens never started from scratch. There is a reason Mali is often cited as one of the few examples of Sub-Saharan civilization - the adoption of Islam, brought there by Muslim Berber and Tuareg merchants. Islam also spread in the region by the founders of Sufi brotherhoods. Even then, because of the (sub-saharan) African lack of emphasis on the written word, events were recorded only by outside muslims introducing the religion. With this came Islamic manuscripts. However, while the North, West and East coasts (esp the Horn of Africa) benefitted from contact with muslim traders (mostly Arabs), the interior's population were still largely nomadic and isolated, with no real need/motivation to advance themselves.

Meanwhile, Alexandria was arguably the greatest center of intellectual thought. The Byzantines had the rest of the Great Library effectively destroyed, previously (because the church in Constantinople viewed science as heretical to Christianity). Thus Alexandria passed to yet another culture. This sparked intellectual growth in the Arabic Empire. Among other things, Al Gebra was invented there. "Algebra" as it's known today still possesses its Arabic name. The modern checking and banking system was established there, whereby Islamic traders would establish their presence in Africa and China. The number system was also established there. The numbers we use today "1, 2, 3, 4..." are called "Arabic numerals" as they were invented and used by Arabic traders.

Why was the Arabic Empire so successful? Because it was diverse and open. It connected with other cultures. Paper money was invented by the Chinese and the Arabs quickly imported this concept. The word "Check" comes from the Arabic word "cheque/cheq" since Arabic traders couldn't afford to bring gold with them on trading excursions, since they might be robbed.

After Europe opened itself back up to diversity and knowledge, after the Arabs had been defeated by Ottomans, who brought guns and cannons to Europe, the resulting period became known as the "Renaissance." The Renaissance (And you can read the work of historian Gavin Menzies on this) was largely funded by Chinese and Arabic capital. The Arabs had economic interests in Venice. However, the Spanish, Dutch, and Portuguese tried to find new routes of trade to China because. But the Arabic empire controlled a monopoly on most of the trade routes, so they could sell their products to Europe for higher prices because they viewed Europe as a new market for profit.

In the process, European explorers "discovered" the Americas. Once the Europeans started to colonize these areas, they brought in more capital--and the "Cold War" between the Arabic Empire and the European kingdoms was broken because the Arabs couldn't compete financially as Europeans had reached new markets. Thus, civilization started to return to Europe as the Middle East slunk into a Dark Age (that lasts today) and the Middle East and Europe traded places.


And that's the best summary as any that can be given for why Africans were always behind. They just weren't subject to the factors that made Indo-Europe and the Middle East great. As you can see, in the Old World, knowledge was shared and passed between peoples.

This was all thanks to the Phoenician, Sumerian, and Babylonian writing systems. The modern writing system we use today comes from Phoenician. Greeks developed their writing system centuries later to model the Phoenician system, and from the Greek and Phoenician alphabets emerged today's "Latin Alphabet" of the characters "A, B, C, D,..." and so on.

But no such writing system existed in Africa. Africans couldn't trade or exchange ideas because there was no writing system.


Thus, if you don't have the time to read the above summary, it boils down to six things.
SUMMARY: Trade, proximity, free-thought, diversity, trade routes, and written "PHONETIC" language from the Middle east helped the Old World become great.

Africans only had themselves, while Mesopotamia, being conveniently located in a "fertile crescent" surpassed them on all counts. Mesopotamia was also conveniently located within proximity to the Nile culture, as well as the Indus river valley (the Harappan civilization and Mohenjo Daro). Though, the Nile culture wouldn't exist for sometime after.

Anyway, thanks for your time. I realize this board isn't scientifically or intellectually inclined, and is instead nationalistically inclined, but I hopefully wasn't hurting anyone by stating facts.
Hopefully, there will be sensible responses.