I guess you are refering to the Belgin Congo, Rhodesia, or South Africa? Sure THEY fell apart but how about ........................................... Maybe not.

It's amazing how soon we forget about our Somalia occupation in 1992-1993. How we repaid..."Black Hawk Down". I pray my husband never goes back to that country.

__________________


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HyR41JbpL_g

"Nobody really pays attention to them because they don't have any resources ..."

>>>Now that Saddam has bought up all the yellowcake on that continent, who needs Africa? hehehe

"just because we are a country of good people."

>>>Jeez, where did you get that idea?

Colonization would be good IF we could get the Brits to take back Palestine and the French take back Lebanon.

Why nobody will help Africa comes down to one thing. Population Control.

__________________

Hey, Rawanda had a good population control going. A version of it is going on in Sudan and Zimbawe. What genocide does not cull out, AIDS will.

__________________

Liberal-a person who has his cake, eats his cake, and complains that other people don't have cake, and believes that you should donate your cake to them

I remeber doing economic research on Africa for an economics class in college. They're one of the only places in the world where the death rate is higher than their birthrate.

That's not the case. Haven't you ever read one of those articles on high birth rates, overpopulation, the Malthusian crisis ? African nations have high death rates, but higher birth rates, and as a result their population growth rates are high, too high actually. According to neo-Malthusians, putting a curb on population growth is the major challenge faced by many African countries, as it impedes economic development :

AFRICA'S POPULATION CHALLENGE: ACCELERATING PROGRESS IN REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH. James E. Rosen and Shanti R. Conly. Washington, DC: Population Action International. 1998. Pp. 82. $ 9.00 paper. ©

Thomas Malthus and Paul Ehrlich would be delighted with this book which concludes that "Africa's ability to slow current high rates of population growth is key to achieving its full potential for development" (p. 77). Rosen and Conly fear the consequences of growing ranks of Africans: will starvation, famine, disease and deprivation grow along with the population?

In my opinion, it would indeed help many African countries if their population growth slowed, but I don't think population growth is the root cause of the continent's problems. Africans need some indigenous capital accumulation to develop their own national markets which would serve as a foundation for stable growth.
Unfortunately, political instability, corruption, malnutrition and disease all hinder local investments, and many economic opportunities are wasted. Add to that the undeclared nature of a large part of the African economy, and it's quite understandable why instability often prevails.
The first step should be establishing political stability by enforcing the state's monopoly on the legitimate use of physical force (cf Max Weber), which in practice means disarming the various militias and other such armed groups that cause violence and social instability. Governments should then establish a stable political system. Whether it's democratic or authoritarian, it must not indulge in tribalism (favoring one's own ethnic group over others, etc.).
Of course, this political apparatus should be "clean" : governments would need to crack down on corruption and nepotism, or at least keep it at the lowest possible level.

Once the country and its political system are stabilized, and individual safety assured, a country should be able to eradicate famine and malnutrition, assisted by the developed world.
With a correctly-fed population, governments should then adopt the economic policies developed by South Korea, Taiwan and other Asian countries and successfully implemented in the 60s : an initial phase of growth strongly supported and managed by the state, with an emphasis on education and exports; at an early stage export industries are often labor-intensive and produce little added value.
As the economy develops, the state can then adopt financial/fiscal policies that promote heavier industries, and introduce more flexibility into the national economy. New companies in those new sectors would create new jobs, with a higher productivity and more added value. The workforce can smoothly "upgrade", thanks to a solid education.
During these phases, as the country's products slowly become competitive enough for the world market, governments should progressively abolish protectionist laws and establish an unaltered form of free trade. Financial deregulation should come last.