Remembering The Past...

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This week, whilst trying to find information for my next blog post, I came across a TEDxTalks called 'Africas Post-Colonial Development' by Fatoumata Waggeh. It struck me how important it is to highlight this background when I am talking about development issues in Africa. 


Fatoumata asks the question at the start 'why are resource-rich African countries, like Nigeria, underdeveloped?'. Obviously, this is a very complex question but she highlights that the practices and policies of development institutions, specifically, Bretton Wood institutions have exacerbated the issue. Going back to the post WW2 era when development practice became mainstream, wealthy western institutions set up programmes such as the Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) to help countries, like Nigeria, to develop. Although, these programmes forced governments to radically privatise education and health in order to receive their loans. This was in line with neoliberal capitalism ideology permeating international development agencies at the time. However, this ideology was hugely unsuccessful for countries like Nigeria as they were left with huge amounts of debt whilst also experiencing increasing infant mortality, reduction in life expectancy, and a reduction in primary school enrollment. 

This exemplifies how even though as a Western country we may think it is important to help developing countries, whether that be through government aid, international development institutions or NGOs. There is a fine line between helping the African people and helping them for our own capitalist interests. If western countries hadn't colonised African countries and controlled them through development practices it is fair to say countries like Nigeria could be in a very different position now. 

This brings me onto my next blog post which will explore whether bottom-up or top-down approaches are better for African communities, and also looking at some of the work that may have been more harmful than good. Although this hasn't been directly related to water, I felt it was important to be aware of the malpractice of development institutions in the past and making sure that our approach today is very different when targeting issues regarding gender and water. Development done well will create spaces for marginalised groups to be heard. 




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