The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries are Failing and What Can Be Done About It [Paperback]

As a kid growing up in Nigeria, I thought that it was `normal' that Latin Americans, Asians and Africa were classified as The Third World. Now as an adult living in the West, it would seem that the only pictures of starving children I see on TV are those from my native continent. It seems that despite all the aid and attention that Africa has received in the last 20 years, most African countries are still stuck in pre-industrial poverty. Professor Collier's highly accessible book provides some illumination on the matter.

The basic outline of the book is that the economies of the poorest countries in the world, the so-called bottom-billion, have not grown in the last 30 years because they are stuck in one or more of the following traps:

- The conflict trap;
- The natural resource trap;
- The "landlocked with bad neighbours" trap;
- The "bad governance in a small country" trap.

He further proposes a number of solutions to the problem:
- Military intervention;
- Adoption of voluntary laws and charters;
- Changing rich-world trade policy.

WHAT I LIKED ABOUT THE BOOK

The book is written in a logical, easy-to-read style. Professor Collier, former head of research at the World Bank, shows remarkable familiar with African societies. He rightly points out that aid and revenue from commodities have enriched local parasitic elites, which prefer to maintain the status quo, rather than invest in development. `Rent' money, based solely on patronage, funds the gravy train for elites.

The narrative is laced with delectable anecdotes of author's travels in Africa. He recalls how he was treated as a celebrity in the Central African Republic and how, after he disclosed that he worked for the World Bank, he was shunned by the Immigration official in Nigeria. One even gets to learn some economics term such as the `Dutch disease' and `ex and ante' conditionality for investment.

He does not pull any punches when it comes to the entrenched elite in the bottom-billion. If, after reading the book you think, "Geez, African elites are self-serving, egoistical spurns of the Devil", then you would not be too far from the truth; I know. He reserves his most excoriating remarks for the Angolans. According to Collier, when the East Timorese government needed an example of how to spend their anticipated oil revenues, they turned to Portuguese-speaking Angola. Collier snidely opined that they (the East Timorese) could have asked a brothel for a lecture on sanctity! Funny, sad but true.

He also rightly points out that in a number of bottom-billion countries, there are courageous men and women, who are working hard at reforming their economies. He names a few of them like Nigeria's Ngozi Okonji Iweala and Charles Soludo. Professor Collier notes that these brave people deserve support. So true!

Furthermore, he criticizes aid policy as had been administered to date. Aid has not worked and for good reason: it has been badly administered and done with the heart and not the head. As one who is sceptical of the arguments of both the aid-loving left and the aid-bashing right, I was pleased to read how Collier strikes a balance between both camps. His point: aid does not have to be given to poor countries as a sop for colonialism. It must be committed, targeted and given for over a decade to post-conflict societies.

CRITICISM OF THE BOOK

The first few chapters are about the Professor and his students/co-researchers. He manages to reduce the complexity of human interaction to fancy, sterile models, which may be - wait for it - be used to predict the risk of civil war. How neat! He manages to do the odd name-dropping also; how his models were recognized by the CIA and the United Nations. An effort to put some humanity in the numbers would have helped the tone of the first few chapters.

He purposely skipped the names of the bottom billion countries except for a few countries like Nigeria, Central African Republic and Zimbabwe. What harm could have been done by mentioning the names of the countries? Moreover, he does not give any information on the equally poor Central Asian countries. It would have been nice to see how the dynamics of poverty differ between Africa and Afghanistan, for example.

Professor Collier observes that Africa has the largest number of landlocked countries in the world. According to him, "...The international system should not have let them become economic entities in the first place..." Well, that's putting a gloss on the issue here. Why not call a spade a spade? The reason why there are so many landlocked countries in Africa is colonialism. Countries like Chad and Burkina Faso were carved up as French zones of influence in 1888 and remain so till this day. The Professor does not even mention the "C" word. In his book, he asks us to get over it and move on as these countries are here to stay. True, but this is an injustice to the readers, who may not understand that most African countries are not really "nations".

Reading the book, you'll get the impression that Africans just squandered the heaven-sent aid from the West in the last 50 years. The truth is slightly more complex: there was the added complication of the Cold War, which was anything but cold in the Third World. Indeed, Africa and Latin America where key frontlines in the Cold War. It is in Africa, for example, that the US supported unsavoury dictators like Mobutu Sese-Seko and Jonas Savimbi's UNITA, leading them to commit the most egregious crimes against their own people. Professor Collier does not tell this side of the story well.

One of Professor Collier's instruments for pulling the bottom-billion out of poverty, military intervention, is not well-thought through. It seems to be an after-thought. He does not convincingly argue why the West should intervene in places like Congo. His argument that he does not want his son to live in such a divided world is a good one for the family dinner but may not cut much ice with hard-nosed politicians, beholden to electorates, who do not like to see their soldiers dragged through the streets of some `God-forsaken' country.

There is so much else I like about the book but will not rehash in this review such as his view on Western trade tariffs and that poor African countries need protection from Asia. Overall, it is a worthy read for anyone who is really concerned about a pragmatic approach to the problem of the poorest people on earth.

It has a message for both sides of the political spectrum. To the left: there is nothing romantic about the poor African native, who lives in abject misery but is `happy' with his lot. Aid and growth can and should be compatible if it is to be effective. To the right: Don't overplay the ubiquity of growth. It alone cannot life people out of poverty. It must be combined with some painful change of policies, such as at the WTO, to be effective.

This is a thought-provoking book: the problems of the poorest countries are deeply and cogently analysed and explained, and appropriate policies proposed. It has the added virtue of being written in simple and refreshingly straight-forward language. There is much that is absolutely original here.

The one comment I have is that Collier bases some of his policy prescriptions on the assumption that the only way to develop is through export, which seems to suggest export-led growth and large projects. There is nothing about micro projects and the need to work with the poor to alleviate poverty through the provision of appropriate/intermediate technology.

I e-mailed him about this and received a rapid and courteous reply saying that he did not have space in the book to cover everything and that he agreed that exporting only makes sense as a growth strategy for some countries and that he has no fault to find with the micro approach.

He also suggested I might write this review; so I did.

PS I also thoroughly recommend the lecture on his website.

This is another effort by the neo-liberal economic establishment to distance itself from the consequences of its policies in Sub-Saharan Africa. This book is mainly about Sub-Saharan Africa.

The former head of research at the World Bank is perplexed by the failure of Sub-Saharan countries to develop. Maybe, this failure is due to the policies forced on African countries by the Western donors, the World Bank, the IMF and the WTO.

Collier tells us that Sub-Saharan countries are not developing because they have fallen into one or more of four traps. These traps are:
1. Bad governance ( read corruption );
2. Being land-locked with bad neighbours;
3. Natural resources curse, and
4. Wars and civil conflict.

Let's take corruption first. Corruption was rampant in Europe and North America in the 18th and 19th centuries. Public posts used to be given to the highest bidder. The British Treasury was a private institution until the 19th century. In the USA, loyal supporters of winning parties used to be rewarded with public office. A practice that continues to this day-a complete change of personnel when a new administration takes office. None of this stopped Europe or North America becoming rich.

Next, let's look at wars and conflict. European nations were constantly at each other's throat until relatively recently. In the 1990s the Balkans were torn apart by war. In the summer of 2008 war broke out in the Caucuses.

In the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s the wars in Africa were mainly proxy wars brought about by the cold war. True, there have been a tiny number of inter-state wars caused by border disputes. The majority have been civil wars over resources.

Wars never stopped Europeans becoming rich.

The differnce between Europe and North America on the one hand, and Africa on the other is that Europe and North America were free to use activist and interventionist policies to promote their manufacturing industries.
Africa is forbidden from using activist and interventionist policies to promote her manufacturing industry by the West.

To get aid, Africa is forced, by the donors, to open her markets to full global competetion. The little industry that is there is completely overwhelmed. Thousands of people are thrown out of work, increasing levels of poverty.

Cheap food produced by subsidised farmers in the West is dumped on Africa, destroying local food markets.

All this is done at the insistence of the World Bank, the IMF and the WTO.

Now let me relate the story of a small, land-locked and resource rich Sub-Saharan country. Botswana is rich in diamonds. Botswana gained independence from Britain in the early 1960s. From the beginning, Botswana practised multi-party democracy. Botswana has never known military coups or civil conflicts. Botswana accepted aid only during its first few years of independence. Botswana holds the world record for the fastest growing economy over the past 40 years. I believe that Botswana has been able to do this because she hasn't needed aid. Therefore, she did not have to take the bitter pills prescribed by the World Bank and the IMF. The medicine prescribed by these two organisations usually kills the patient.

In his prescription, Collier doesn't discuss the role of Western policy on Sub-Saharan development.

Collier doesn't tell us that the economic and social policies of Sub-Saharan countries are dictated by the West. World Bank staff are embedded in African central banks and ministries of finance. Many Sub-Saharan countries cannot pass a budget into law without the approval of the IMF. This has been going on for about three decades.

Now that the West's policies have failed to deliver development, the architects of these policies are casting around for someone or something to blame for the failure.