The Shackled Continent: Power, Corruption, and African Lives

Rating:
Summary: Tragedy and hope
Review: The author shares his experiences of Sub-Saharan Africa, exploring the reasons for the region's abject poverty and suffering. Guest takes into account factors like for example climate and history, whilst quoting African writers like Chinua Achebe, Themba Sono and Chenjerai Hove.

Amidst all the despair, the text often highlights rays of hope so the book is not a relentless tale of woe. Guest identifies issues like tribalism and corruption and the waste of aid money while pointing out positive developments in places like Botswana, South Africa, Uganda and Senegal.

The author examines the good results in countries that follow sound fiscal and monetary policies as opposed to the vampire state in places like Zimbabwe or the failed state in e.g. Congo (Zaire). A very important point that Guest makes is that Africa can develop and improve the lives of its people without sacrificing its culture. Japan is proof enough that modernity does not necessarily threaten an indigenous culture.

He discusses Rwanda's holocaust and religious clashes in Nigeria, takes a balanced look at South Africa's successes and its failures like its lack of an AIDS policy and criticises western countries for their agricultural protectionism. Apparently Africa has already received the equivalent of six Marshall Plans in aid and in some places mineral wealth has been more of a curse than a blessing.

Guest makes a plea for increased trade and praises the stability that exists in those countries where property rights are respected. He also surveys the situation of the media, where both oppression and lack of money are impediments to a free press. The book ends on an optimistic note with the example of a young man in the KwaZulu province of South Africa having become a successful businessman after abandoning a life of violence.

The book concludes with bibliographic notes and an index. The Shackled Continent can be heartbreaking at times, but the overall tone is optimistic, and realistically so. The book leaves an impression of hope and the reader can only pray that good government may soon come to Africa. The poignant title of South Africa's national anthem by Enoch Sontonga, says it all: "Nkosi sikelele i'Afrika", meaning God bless Africa.

Rating:
Summary: Outstanding journalism on the African continent
Review: The Shackled Continent is a tour de force. Robert Guest is a writer for The Economist and the style and quality of writing is outstanding. Guest is a brave soul for bringing us the true story of Africa: a continent full of potential that has been wasted by the deeds of socialist leaders who, in casting off their colonial chains, have destroyed their people's lives and, worse, much of their hope for a better future. The root cause of these problems? Tribalism.

After reading this book, I am convinced more than ever that Africans are entrepreneurial and hard-working with a good head for business. They are let down by creaky government infrastructure, corruption, and a lack of foreign direct investment from wealthier nations. But the rest of the world pays little attention to what goes on in Africa (sub-Saharan at least) and until more scrutiny is directed at governments in countries such as Zimbabwe, nothing much is going to change and the cycle will continue as is.

Guest's book paints a frustrating picture and one does not finish reading it wholly satisfied, which I think was his point, mirroring the current situation in Africa.