The African Crisis: Alternative Development Strategies for the Continent

Africa is currently undergoing a crisis characterized by economic recession, political decline, and social tension which will have grave international as well as national and regional consequences. The World Bank and the Organization of Africa Unity (OAU) have proposed divergent development paths for the continent that must be evaluated in light of this crisis. The World Bank, as outlined in its Agenda for Action, favors externally-oriented development whereas the OAU in its Lagos Plan of Action calls for collective self reliance. This article reviews the debate framed by these two alternative strategies and examines the implications for both Africa and the industralized world. In doing so, it discusses which African and Northern interests are likely to favor increased external interaction and continued dependence (the World Bank Agenda) and which prefer disengagement and increased intra-regional relationships (OAU Lagos Plan). The author draws distinctions between the development priorities of the minority “semi-peripheral” countries such as Nigeria, Kenya and Egypt and the majority “peripheral” states such as Zambia and Senegal: the former being more externally-oriented than the latter. The countries also differ on the degree of self-reliance they seek. Another important factor is related to the recent emergence of a variety of bourgeois classes-national, bureaucratic, military—who, having more propertied interests than the disadvantaged proletarian classes, may prefer the lassez-faire Agenda over the more structured Plan. This divisive dynamic is in turn exacerbated by rivalries between various Center factions.