Guinea Conakry and the Meaning of Democratic Reform

The colonially engineered nation-state of Guinea in West Africa has faced decades of authoritarian leadership and ethnic conflict ever since independence from French-rule in 1958. After a coup led by Moussa Dadis Camara in 2008, there was much enthusiasm about a break with that past. Then, on a day which will live in infamy, September 28, 2009, a protest against Camara's military junta turned violent when at least a hundred and fifty-six people were shot dead and women gang-raped in the streets. You can see and hear an audio slide-show in the New Yorker on the history. A video of the ensuing political crisis is below.

Today, Guinea is headed for a reportedly "free, transparent and credible" election on June 27, 2010, that will usher in a civilian controlled government. A list of presidential front-runners in the election are already announced. The Guinean military has sworn that it will not interfere in the election process. A Guinean diplomat happily told Reuters,"for now, the army has remained out of the political process."

But is it really possible? Has Guinea, after years of brutal dictatorship finally entered into the paradise of a Western approved multiparty democracy? A timely analysis in Foreign Policy magazine warns that transition from military to civilian rule will in no way challenge Guinea's kleptocracy (rule by thieves)---a system in which multinationals and elites work with the military behind the scenes to ensure the safe extraction of resources.

"No one doubts that the military, through its affiliated networks of businessmen and political allies, will continue to overshadow the running of any elected regime. Guinea is the world's largest bauxite exporter and home to vast iron ore deposits, and possibly even oil reserves -- all of which the military is keenly aware."

The challenge therefore is to understand just how much democracy Guineans can expect after the polls on the 27th? If a sign of democracy is how much Guinea's people directly share in the fruits of the nation's wealth, signs are so far not looking positive. After all, the free-flow of Guinea's mineral resources in past have not in anyway improved the social and economic lives of the country's majority poor population. According to U.S. sources, when economic growth rose slightly in 2006-08, due to increases in global demand and commodity prices on world markets the standard of living fell. Guinea remains among the poorest countries in the world despite its rich natural resources.

Another historical problem in Guinea is the habit among the state to utilize political violence against opposition movements and political parties (often along ethnic-lines). And while a transition to a nominally civilian government represents the opportunity for a serious change, the amount continuing military intrusion in economic and political affairs is a warning sign. The Foreign Policy article lists the continuing influence of the military as a warning sign for future violence along ethnic or religious lines.

"Most alarmingly, serious splits have emerged within military circles. Last year, Camara brought in Israeli mercenaries to train as many as 10,000 new recruits for the army. They came mostly from Camara's ethnic Geurzé tribe in the isolated Forestiere region....Over the last few weeks, ethno-religious clashes have killed several people in Forestiere amid fears that Camara may be stirring up trouble ahead of the polls."

I recently listened to a piercing analysis in a Brecht forum podcast on Western military and judicial influence in the African continent. One speaker noted toward the end of the discussion the fact that forms of natural resource extraction conspicuously match political structures in Africa. Guinea is a text-book case of this phenomena even during significant moments of regime change as we are about to witness later this month. What does democratic reform mean in a state like Guinea where the political structure is configured for the cheap extraction of the country's mineral resources rather than endogenous social development of its citizens?

Will the Real Pan-Africanists Please Stand-Up?

Senegal's president Abdoulaye Wade calls him self a Pan-Africanist. He offered to give land to Haitians who lost their homes in the recent earth quake. In April, he will unveil a new statue dedicated to what he calls the "African Renaissance". However, Wade's policies of neo-liberal privatization, demagoguery against his political opponents and his outrageous attempts to win the favor of foreign investors and Western presidents are the polar opposite of what revolutionary leaders discussed at the 6th Pan-African Congress, when the last wave of African liberation movements were struggling against neo-colonialism. Wade, and the other presidents who share similarly right-wing visions for Africa, are impotent against ramped corruption and extreme ethnic and religious violence happening in Africa today. The major reason why is that their visions of Pan-Africanism or African Renaissance draw their strength from the institutional foundations of neo-colonialism.

During European colonialism, traditional or customary ethnic and religious identities were politically exaggerated by racists to legitimize their own dominance in Africa. Colonizers realized early on that by capitalizing on the cultural and historical Native Authorities of rural Africa they could put a local face on external domination and pit traditional factions against one another. This system of indirect rule thrived in an atmosphere of "divide and conquer" where ruthless competition between identities for a piece of the pie kept colonialism in tact. Even after the European powers, exhausted by World War II, decided to grant political independence to their colonies, many African countries chose to maintain the same colonial-type institutions that politicized ethnic and religious differences.

Today, ethnic and religious groups in rural Africa desperately jostle for political authority or economic gains from mineral riches, fertile lands, and increasingly scarce water resources. Far from the romanticized conceptions of African Renaissance with aborigines beating tom-toms, dancing half-naked, and eating mangos, over half of rural Africa is consumed by ruthless competitions between extremely poor people organizing on essentialist conceptions of their identities. Armed with automatic machine guns, machetes, or voting ballots these groups fight to protect the interests of the friends who worship as they worship or the distant cousins who can their bio-cultural origins to a common ancestor, all while working to eliminate competitors. These remarkably static conceptions of identity are not natural but the result of very specific political cultures that emerged as a result of Western social engineering.

The current un-governability and divisiveness of much of rural Africa plays directly into the hands of Western economic powers who take more than their fair share of Africa's wealth. On the one hand, the historical fragmentation of the post-colonial state along ethnic or religious lines has prevented the emergence of national, broad-based political and social movements that can demand fast-track redistribution of lands and mineral wealth to the countryside. As we have seen in the unfolding "Bolivarian Revolution" in Latin America, the U.S. government believes that the ultimate challenge to domination of its "own backyard" is national democratic and popular alliances organized around distributional rather than nativist political cultures.

More importantly, in keeping with classical liberal economics, imperialists (governments who actively support or practice the act of imperalism) benefit from a central government that is too weak to regulate multinational corporations in remote areas where the raw mineral resources being extracted or to ensure the revenues from the resources are being taxed to fund public services. A central African government that is constantly threatened by ego-tripping rebels scrambling for power or working to satisfy the interests of religious brotherhoods is an enthusiastic customer for military weapons sales or potential dependent on aid.

There were radical nationalists like Julius Nyere, Kwame Nkrumah, Amilcar Cabral and Samora Machel who explicitly attempted to de-legitimize Native Authority and unite the most oppressed sectors of their countries under national liberation movements for social and economic justice. These leaders originally mobilized heterogeneous movements in solidarity that could dismantle the institutions of colonial rule and isolate traditional African elites who empowered them. Furthermore, they advocated the direct takeover of the commanding heights of the economy including the technologies responsible for the extraction of strategic natural resources and agricultural production---a step taken to ensure as broad a program of poverty eradication as possible. The combination of these two events resulted in direct confrontations with the combined forces of Western military might and economic isolation but also internal opposition from conservative Native Authorities. After the implosion of the Soviet Union and de-radicalization of Communist China these rebellious African regimes lost their main sources of technical and financial assistance.

Despite their eventual defeat, radical nationalists in Africa did leave behind one major victory---national political identity. For example, Tanzania is among the few territorially large African countries that has not seen essentialist identity politics spill-over into extreme violent conflict. Ugandan political scientist Mahmood Mamdani has spoken about the nationalist legacy of Julius Nyere in Tanzania pointing out, "the success of Tanzania as a nation that is getting it right the continent is because the nation's erstwhile leader, Julius Nyerere, during his tenure dismantled the customary law, thereby making every one a Tanzanian citizen." Radical nationalism sought to do the very difficult task of changing rural dwellers perceptions about political legitimacy.

The demonization of African leaders who supported "left-wing" political views and policies that emphasized economic sovereignty and sweeping agrarian transformation of society always takes outside of the context of contemporary African politics where genocide and religious fundamentalism exist side-by-side with crippling social injustices. And when discussing genocide and religious fundamentalism, the exact inverse is true. Commentary on violent ethnic or religious factions are taken out of the context of a documented imperialist strategy of neutralizing any political movement that sought to unite citizens under bold agendas for radical social change.

I am involved with the Pan-African Youth Summit 2010 in Dakar that is trying to organize a new coalition of grassroots "left" organizations united in the reconstruction of a legitimate Pan-African movement. The term "left" is necessary in this case to distinguish between Pan-Africanists who believe the driving force of progressive change is the most oppressed and exploited members of society from those who believe traditional elites and politicians can deliver that change. Without the emergence of broad-based popular alliances organized around agrarian reform and a government that can provide widespread social protections, Africa will likely continue to have scenes of discriminate carnage and extreme poverty. I hope that my African friends and allies will answer the challenge. Africa is in need of a revolution, not a renaissance.

REFERENCES

1. Mahmood Mamdani. Citizen and Subject- Chapter Eight Conclusion: Linking the Urban and the Rural

2. Sam Moyo and Paris Yoros. The Resurgence of Radical Nationalism in the South Atlantic

Which Road to Development? Nationalization or Socialization?

Many third world countries, under the disguise of nationalism, have created state-owned enterprises or parastatals that are reinforcing social and economic inequities between people rather than reversing them. This statist model of development has been adopted in rapidly developing East Asian countries like China and South Korea. As the neo-liberal development strategy (rightfully) continues to decline in Africa and Latin America, many governments there will look toward variants of authoritarian "Asian Capitalism". The debate in South Africa over this particular version of nationalization therefore should be followed closely by progressives in the Global South.

As a key member of the African National Congress-led alliance, the South African Communist Party (SACP) must often balance between revolutionary leadership for the country's marginalized and a policy 'think-tank' for the state's bureacracy. This dialectical relationship between fundamental transformation of the system and gradual reform within the system was on full display during the Party's most recent Politburo meeting. Their first meeting of the new year featured a heated debate with the ANC Youth League over nationalization of mines in South Africa. I would like to re-post the meat of the SACP's argument on nationalization because I think it speaks to a general contradiction within the developing world today---the movement toward greater state nationalization of industries without popular and democratic content.

"In the first place, state ownership of key sectors of the economy is, in itself, not necessarily a progressive still less anti-capitalist move - the apartheid regime and various fascist states had extensive state ownership. Key financial institutions in the UK and US currently are also now effectively "nationalised". In all of these cases, state ownership has not been about rolling back the logic of private profits for a few in the interests of meeting the social needs of the majority - but rather bureaucratic interventions to rescue capitalism in crisis. The recent bank buy-outs in some advanced capitalist countries have been correctly described by mainstream economists as "socialism for capitalists", while the majority are burdened with a huge national debt to pay for the bail-outs.

In the second place, as the many recent scandals in our own parastatals have underlined, public sector ownership, on its own, is no guarantee that this public property will not be plundered by senior management for their own private accumulation purposes. Primitive accumulation rent-seeking is one of the major plagues currently afflicting our democracy and it lies at the root of many sectarian battles and disputes within our broader movement. It is absolutely essential that we wage an intensified battle against it. It would be the height of hypocrisy, by the way, to be calling for "nationalisation" on the one hand, while being intimately involved in the private plundering of public resources on the other."

Likewise, fighting corruption, another shared strategic priority, critically relates to bringing the state and especially the SOEs under a social/developmental mandate - as opposed to using them as sources for primitive accumulation. The current crisis around governance, golden hand-shakes, exorbitant tariffs, and failures to actually effectively deliver in many SOEs provides us with an opportunity to advance (not the cause of privatisation, as the DA will do) but rather their effective and increasing socialisation - i.e. subordination to the logic of meeting social needs not private profits."

There are more effective ways of challenging the dominance of transnational capital or promoting economic sovereignty than narrow nationalist statism. As the SACP correctly points out, nationalization without democratic socialization and participation is surrendering public resources to defend private profits. The next decade will feature other high profile debates about the role of the state in developing economies. Repeating the perverse 'developmentalist' policies of East Asian countries will only serve to further marginalize the poor and popular classes who are waiting so desperately to be empowered during the global recession.

Haiti: The New (Old) Frontier

"Frontier markets could become the sweet reward of 2010 if investors are willing
to take risks in underdeveloped, illiquid and potentially unstable markets."

OK. In the midst of one of the great natural disasters of our time, you could only hope governments would put geo-politics as usual aside and cooperate in anyway possible to rescue victims of the earthquake in Haiti. But instead there is a mounting battle over Haiti's security future and several nations including France, Venezuela, Brazil and Nicaragua are convinced the U.S. military is trying to occupy there permanently. The U.S. Southern Command, which is overseeing the U.S. military relief effort in Haiti, maintains that its military role is humanitarian only. As more U.S. soliders landed at the Haitian Presidential Palace the AP reported a Haitian hair dresser named Fede Felissaint said, "We are happy that they are coming, because we have so many problems," and added "If they want, they can stay longer than in 1915," in reference to when the U.S. occupied Haiti for 19 years last century. Felissaint may get his wish.

While the attention rightly focuses on U.S. military presense, much less consideration is given to the potential role of multinational companies in the country just a few months from now. Haiti is not historically well- known for being rich in natural resources, however insiders know better. In a 2007 article entitled, "Haiti's Future Glitters With Gold", geologists were said to be scouring the hilltops of Haiti in search for gold and copper deposits.

"'Haiti's logical,' says Alex Turkeltaub, managing director of Frontier Strategy Group, a consulting firm that advises mining companies. 'The assumption of most mining executives is that its proximity to the United States and its relatively small size mean that they will have a lot of leverage as large players in a small economy, and that the Americans will always be there to protect against complete disaster.'"

Before the earthquake this year Haiti was considered a Frontier Market, which could result in big profits if international investors are willing to take significant enough risks. Those risks under the current social instability would definitely be to high for any company looking to do business there. That is of course unless you send in thousands of U.S. troops to help control the situation well into the long-term.

Player Hatin' on the People's Republic of China

In an article about China's remarkable economic resilience the New York Times writes,

"China once could wave off complaints about its currency
policies, arguing that it was a developing nation entitled to a bit of
slack from its Western customers. But with the world’s fastest-growing economy —
and more than $2 trillion in foreign reserves — that argument looks
increasingly untenable."

Wait. When did China stop being a developing nation? There is no one measure of a country's level of development but for the most part the classification "developing" is based on Gross National Income (GNI) per capita. Another measure which is somewhat less 'economistic' is the human development index (HDI) that measures social development in general.

GNI-per capita (PPP)
U.S.A. (46,970)
China ($6,020 per capita)
HDI ranking out of 182-
U.S.A. (13)
China (92)

According to the World Bank both middle- income and low-income countries are designated as "developing". With a GNI-per capita (PPP) of 6,020 China not only is a middle-income developing country it is still considerably less wealthy per capita than the U.S.A. And with an HDI ranking of 92 China again falls into the medium human development category, significantly lower than the U.S.A.

When the New York Times and other Western media outlets are finish hating on the People's Republic of China, they should take 5 minutes to look at the development statistics on google like I did. Beyond the numbers there are still rural regions of China like Nanliang, Shaanxi Province where extreme poverty persists and prosperity has not yet spread. If the Chinese Communist Party stopped providing opportunities for higher-living standards today, they would still be a developing country with a big economy and a lot of disillusioned poor people. The fact is, China has a right to play loose with their currency because it is still developing and the United States continues to be the richest, most wasteful country in world history.

Making Sense of Iran: A Political Economy in Transition

The Islamic Republic of Iran shares many of the same problems facing other countries in the global South. The economy is largely underdeveloped, highly dependent on one export commodity, and the state is unable to meet many of the lingering demands of the population. These contradictions in the political economy of development in Iran serve as the backdrop of the ongoing nuclear debate, the controversial re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and relationship with the rest of the Muslim world.

The historical origins of Iran's current development process began before the Islamic regime existed. Mohammad Rezā Shāh Pahlavi was the Western-backed ruler of Iran whose legendary mis-management of Iranian society and economy led to the Iranian revolution of 1979. He was the last monarch of the House of Pahlavi of the Iranian monarchy. The shah of Iran initiated a series of economic and social reforms that modernized the country and set a new course for full integration into the world-economy.

But the shah also widened class-lines and sharply divided Iran into a dual society characterized by structural inequalities between the rich and poor. On the one hand were elites with close linkages with the oil industry and on the other religious clergy, rural masses, and the middle-class. This contradiction caused Iran to be dependent on oil exports and imports of expensive manufactured products. Iranians viewed the shah as largely corrupt and unable to provide basic services in education, health care and housing. The shah purchased billions of dollars in US arms building up a level of regional military might to control vital oil lifelines and exert influence in the region. Economically, the US used Iran as an economic proxy and supplier of a cheap flow of oil to the Western world. A US intelligence official once remarked,

"Iran in the 1970's was widely regarded as a significant regional if not global, power. The United States relied on it, implicitly if not explicitly, to ensure the security and stability of the Persian Gulf sector and the flow of oil from the region to the industrialized Western world on Japan, Europe, and the United States, as well as to lesser powers elsewhere."

The Iranian revolution of 1979 caused the once reliable proxy for Western influence in the middle-east to delink from the economic order, and carve out its own autonomous path toward industrialization. The revolution also sought to reverse the dual economy of the shah on behalf of the popular classes of the nation. The Iranian revolution and movement toward socio-economic transformation frightened many business professionals, technocrats and industrialists who fled to countries in the West. Many of these emigrants have been the source of external pressure on the Islamic Regime to reform.

Since coming to power though the Islamic regime has had to face perpetual economic crisis. The causes of the crisis varied from regional war, misdirected state priorities, and economic sabotage by the U.S. In the 20 years following the Iranian revolution, per capita income declined by 45 percent and inflation remained around 20 to 30 percent every year. Unemployment rose to as high as 20 percent as new entrants to the labor force could simply not find jobs in the heavily export-oriented domestic economy. As a result some 3 millions Iranians have emigrated to other countries. The rural to urban migration in Iran rapidly intensified as well with the capital city of Tehran growing from 4.5 million to 12 million people putting an enormous strain of public service delivery.

The Iranian government has continued to collect most of its non-tax revenues from exporting oil to consumer markets around the world. But despite attempts to diversify the economy, Iran has remained vulnerable to price shocks in the international petroleum market. The weakening of demand in wealthier industrialized nations during the current recession has further exposed Iran's dependency on oil to develop. Iran has failed to successfully raise oil production to collect greater state revenues. To raise production the Islamic Republic will need greater capital investment and intensive drilling technologies. In recent years, Iran has sough to improve relations with the European Union as a potential ally in the development of undercapitalized domestic petroleum.

Even with the economic crisis the Islamic regime was able to score some notable achievements of redistribution including public-spending for infrastructure development including roads, schools, and public libraries. Unlike the former shah, the Islamic regime also prioritized rural development extending running water and electricity to more than half of the villages. The regime successfully carried out a popular ambitious agrarian reform agenda confiscating half a million hectares of arable land to peasant farmers.

Most recently the administration of President Ahmadinijad has generated support from many due to his populist distributional policies within Iran. In response to energy shortages, Ahmadinejad began rationing fuel, and increasing state subsidies for items like sugar and cooking oil. During the first-term President Ahmadinejad, the Iranian government also radically increased the amount of public spending on construction. All of the increased spending kept the economy from total collapse but never tackled the profound level of dependency on oil and created a high level of inflation. Both of these problems are root concerns of the liberal opposition movement.

Reformist rivals of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad saw the last two presidential election cycles as opportunities to reverse the past statist economic policies of the government. These opponents had expected the Islamic regime to phase out public subsidies and liberalize the Iranian economy for the first time since the 1979 revolution. The president before Ahmadinejad, Muhammad Khatami was supported by the disaffected urban middle-classes, college educated professionals and labor movement who were looking for a change of course. The reformers were distraught at the landslide run-off election which elected Ahmadinejad in 2005. President Ahmadinejad's support from some ultra-conservative Iranian political parties and the poor led to a resounding mandate and presented a major setback to the reformist movement. The recent 2009 elections were seen as fraudulent by the reformists who looked forward to regaining their momentum.

Despite the television images of political repression of protests there is some support within the Islamic regime for liberal change. The reformist movement in Iran also consists of high-level clerics and many of their aims were supported by the Supreme Leader himself. In 2006, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei ordered the government to sell 80 percent of all state-owned enterprises in order to increase economic efficiency. Most clerics in Iran actually favor the conventional capitalist model of economic development. They widely support privatization of state-industries, and the development of the private sector.

However, others view such economic liberalization as an attack against the fundamental character of the Islamic revolution. These so called "hardliners" believe that maintaining tight economic control is essential to the political and social continuity of the Islamic regime. Like President Ahmadinejad, they favor central-planning, state industries, national self-reliance and a development agenda that includes poverty eradication, land redistribution, and employment in line with the objectives of the 1979 revolution.

The reformists have explicitly opposed the allocation of scarce resources to support militant Islamist forces throughout the middle-east. Groups such as Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Palestine have all been sponsored by the Islamic regime in Iran. One of the most influential moves by Iran to support such groups was the creation of the infamous al-Quds force, a highly specialized unit of Iran's military which organizes, trains, and finances Islamic revolutionary movements. The United States military has waged a series of intense counter-operations in order to neutralize key leaders within the organization and slow-down their operations.

The al-Quds Day – literally Jerusalem Day – was created by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini,at the founding of the Islamic regime, and is commemorated on the last Friday of Ramadan in solidarity with the Palestinian struggle for national liberation. During the last weeks events the "Green Movement" of reformists marched through the streets chanting "Not Gaza, Not Lebanon. We are ready to die for Iran," in a direct challenge to the purpose of the gathering its self. There have been previous chants of "Death to Russia" by the reformists as well indicating a deep suspicion of the strategically close relationship between Russia and Iran. The reformists would rather see the Islamic regime focus on domestic economic and political reform than seeking to play spoiler to US hegemony in the middle-east. Many reformists believe that Iran's counter-hegemonical posture has isolated it economically and are convinced that a softening of the country's posture in the eyes of the US could help the economy.

The evolving political saga in Iran signals an intensification of a debate surrounding the nation's distributional policies. The reformists major aim was not to overthrow the Islamic regime, nor to challenge its fundamental structure. Rather the reform movement is mostly seeking to liberalize the political economy of Iran, improve ties with the United States and end financial support for resistance movements in the middle-east. The response of the Islamic regime to these internal pressures for reform will likely define Iran's development path moving forward. In the final analysis, the success or failure at which the Iranian government manages the national economy could be the most important determiner of the country's future.

My Guest Appearance on Radio Show, "Real Talk With Ray Baker"

Below is a recent discussion I joined on "Real Talk With Ray Baker". We reviewed the case of Georgia death-row inmate Troy Anthony Davis, the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) and the state of the US-Africa trade relationship. Ray's show is one of my favorite sources for up to date information and he keeps me honest in his questioning. I always learn a lot from being a guest. ( The file may take a second to load)

Austin Thompson On "Real Talk with Ray Baker" by aus10

The World Bank is Singing a New Tune in Africa

Brandishing an empathetic new tagline on its main website, "Working for a World Free of Poverty", the World Bank is obviously looking to address the main criticisms of its past performance and recast its formerly tarnished image. Yesterday, World Bank President Robert Zoellick finished a week- long visit to Africa in order to vocalize the Bank's committment to economic development despite the deepening recession. Among other things he emphasized that the Bank is... looking toward a world that is no longer dominated by the United States and other advanced economies?

"We need multiple poles of growth and that will make for a more solid and
balanced international economy and there is absolutely no reason that Africa
can't be one of those multiple poles of growth."

To label the call for a more egalitarian economic world-order by World Bank President Robert Zoellick as ironic, would be a supreme understatement. Zoellick, an appointee of George W. Bush, was one of the key signators of the Project for the New American Century (PNAC), a neo-conservative document that believed the US "must have a secure foundation on unquestioned U.S. military preeminence" among other imperial objectives for the 21st century. Certainly, the world has changed enormously since the 1990's with agressive calls for reform in the world economy to empower developing countries in the 21st century. Zoellick proclaimed the Bank's support for an"African Century for Development" and the creation of a new asset management unit to work with government-controlled funds to invest in African economies with the highest growth potential to spur private-sector activity.

Like the Obama administration, (which has also been looking to reform the US image around the world and Africa in particular), the World Bank is clearly focusing on delivering a message of partnership rather than paternalism in relations with African governments. Whether or not the new World Bank rhetoric will match actual World Bank policy depends on the character of the conditionalities placed on African countries in order to receive support. Let's hope they can get it right this time and avoid reviving the "Washington Consensus" of privitization, liberalization, and strict political-economic managment that ruined the prospects of genuine poverty eradication and development in recent years.

Rwanda Breaking the Mold?

Last November I made my first trip to Kigali, Rwanda attending an Appropriate Technology Conference. The tiny east African nation infamously known for a 1994 genocide, which saw the deaths of over 800,000 people, was barely recognizable as such. I left Rwanda with a keen interest in what some have considered a developmental "miracle" and especially its proclaimed leader, President Paul Kagame.

Consider this. Since the genocide, the Rwandan government has managed to bring relative peace to the former civil-war torn nation, passed progressive reforms to empower women and minorities, and also developed a plan to spur high-speed economic growth in the years to come. During our conference we visited among the largest solar panel grids in all of Africa--- just one of many alternative energy projects being supported by the government. Recently, the country's President Paul Kagame gave an excellent interview on CNN's GPS, where he discussed Rwanda's ongoing efforts at reconciliation between Hutu and Tutsi and the nation's goal of becoming a self-reliant economy. The transcript of the interview was re-posted via allafrica.com.

Rwanda, like other least developed countries faces a host of gigantic challenges. To be sure, Rwanda is a landlocked country and largely depends on international aid and international market prices of coffee and tea. And despite the progress that has been made on reconciliation between parties, there are local claims that President Kagame is using strong-arm tactics to keep the ethnic Tutsi population in the seat of power (this was brought up by Fareed Zakaria in the GPS interview).

However delicate the progress in Rwanda, there are some "green shoots" that I believe followers of African development should watch closely. In a continent riddled with ethnic conflict and political turmoil, Rwanda's destiny could hold a much larger significance for the future of the continent as a whole. You can see an earlier video below of President Kagame at "The State of Africa" round- table discussion at the 2009 World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.