Cobb

Well, here's a comment. I don't know if you will like it or not.

African nations founder because of tribalism, not because of any lack
of multi-whatever ism. Your example of the Hutu and Tutsi tribes shows
that very clearly. The violent deaths of some 18,000 to 20,000 black Matabele
people in Zimbabwe back in the early 1980's, at the hands of black soldiers
of a black-run government (aided, to be sure, by their North Korean 'advisors)
is another. The torment of the Ibo over the years by other black Africans is
another. The list is a long, and sad one, and no matter how hard one tries to
lay it at the feet of "colonialism" or "whitey", it's a flaw of culture that
every human grouping has suffered from at some time or other.

Go back far enough in history, and every culture from China to the Inca has
suffered to some extent from "my tribe is better, we're gonna kill them over
there".

Until black Africans find their own way out of the social defect of tribalism,
there's going to be these kinds of wars in that part of Africa. Nobody can do
it for them; the UN can't fly in and erase hundreds, even thousands of years
of tribal hatreds, with pamphlets and videos. The US can't do it with foreign
aid or cultural exchanges. Individuals deciding that mutual humanity is more
important than tribal labels, on the other hand, that can have an effect.

Now, this won't end war in Africa; the ongoing Islam/Christianity troubles in
places like Nigeria and the genocidal insanity of Sudan won't end because Africans
south of them give up their tribalism. But it is a required first step to sanity.

My point is that nation-building will not work in an environment in which people have more to gain by attaching to their ethnic group than to the national commons. There's nothing special about African nations in that. It is exactly as it would be in every other nation.

I'm not certain, as you assert, that the defeat of tribalism is a sufficient condition for civil and stable society, but it certainly is important.

It doesn't fit into my picture of liberty that any liberated nation stand by and wait until African nations work out things completely by themselves. Certainly Zulus and Xhosas in South Africa have not completely resolved their differences, yet they have a civilized and democratic republic. Inherent in this understanding is that ethnic divisions may persist. In fact, I would say that the RSA under the nationalists beginning in 1948, had just about everything they needed except pluralism. The economic and military success of South Africa proved that ethnic rivalries could be exploited for the ends of a successful state. But such a state is a pariah state and should not be welcolmed into the free world.

It is the responsiblity of strong free nations to demonstrate the value of pluralism. This may very well be the key difference between the old and new colonialism.

"My point is that nation-building will not work in an environment in which people have more to gain by attaching to their ethnic group than to the
national commons."

That is a more general statement than the one I replied to, which stressed "multiculturalism". In the US and Europe, "multiculturalism" often
refers to issues of skin color, but the problem in much of Africa south of the Sahara Desert doesn't involve skin color, it involves people of the
same skin color but of different tribes. So my point wasn't clear, or perhaps what you mean by "multicultural" isn't what I think of when I read
that word.

So we seem to agree on this point, don't we?

"There's nothing special about African nations in that. It is exactly as it would be in every other nation."

Yes, that's what I meant by writing: "... it's a flaw of culture that
every human grouping has suffered from at some time or other."

and

"Go back far enough in history, and every culture from China to the Inca has
suffered to some extent from "my tribe is better, we're gonna kill them over
there". "

So far we are on the same page, right?

"I'm not certain, as you assert, that the defeat of tribalism is a sufficient condition for civil and stable society, but it certainly is important."

I don't assert that getting rid of tribalism is a sufficient condition for a civil and stable society, but I do assert, based on years of observation
and on years of study, that it is necessary. See the difference?

"It doesn't fit into my picture of liberty that any liberated nation stand by and wait until African nations work out things completely by themselves."

Ok, then how many African countries do you want the US or UN to invade and occupy? Hasn't that already been tried one or two times in the past? How did it
work out?

Or are you arguing in favor of some other form of influence? If so, what?

"Certainly Zulus and Xhosas in South Africa have not completely resolved their differences, yet they have a civilized and democratic republic."

They have sufficiently resolved their tribalism to the extent that Zulu, Xhosa & others in the Army of South Africa regard themselves as South
Africans first, and something else second. They don't decide, for example, to take their issued weapons and go start killing "the other tribe",
right? How did they get to that point? Did the UN teach them? Or was it an indigenous, African, solution?

"It is the responsiblity of strong free nations to demonstrate the value of pluralism."

Is that a universal? That is, do you apply this maxim to all free nations and all peoples within them?

"So my point wasn't clear, or perhaps what you mean by "multicultural" isn't what I think of when I read that word.

So we seem to agree on this point, don't we?"

I think we do. But upon reflection, I think that multiculturalism depends upon pluralism which in turn depends upon nationalism. When I think of multiculturalism I think of it in terms of a sophisticated appreciation of the cultural differences between ethnicities. This only makes sense when it is commonly held that none in particular should dominate. (That might sound like relativism, but in the end is it cultural chauvinism that makes a nation great? I think not. Certainly the North Koreans are cultural chaauvinists.)

"There's nothing special about African nations in that. It is exactly as it would be in every other nation."

Yes, that's what I meant by writing: "... it's a flaw of culture that
every human grouping has suffered from at some time or other."

and

"Go back far enough in history, and every culture from China to the Inca has
suffered to some extent from "my tribe is better, we're gonna kill them over
there". "

So far we are on the same page, right?

So far so good.

"I'm not certain, as you assert, that the defeat of tribalism is a sufficient condition for civil and stable society, but it certainly is important."

I don't assert that getting rid of tribalism is a sufficient condition for a civil and stable society, but I do assert, based on years of observation
and on years of study, that it is necessary. See the difference?

"It doesn't fit into my picture of liberty that any liberated nation stand by and wait until African nations work out things completely by themselves."

Ok, then how many African countries do you want the US or UN to invade and occupy? Hasn't that already been tried one or two times in the past? How did it
work out?

Or are you arguing in favor of some other form of influence? If so, what?

I am arguing in favor of something akin to a 'government of the first world' which behaves similarly to global markets. National sovereignty, to my mind, is as fungible as national currency. It may seem to be something unto itself, but it truly floats based upon the esteem in which it is held by others. In global affairs, as in global markets, the currency of any government's policy rises and falls. While I think much of the international dissent to American unilateralism is somewhat misplaced, I acknowledge it. In the end we all use diplomatic power in the same way toward mutually discernable ends. As time goes by, I beleive the interests of the first world will require more concerted, and for all intents imperial, efforts if our concepts of liberty are to prosper.

"[Zulus & Xhosas] have sufficiently resolved their tribalism to the extent that Zulu, Xhosa & others in the Army of South Africa regard themselves as South
Africans first, and something else second. They don't decide, for example, to take their issued weapons and go start killing "the other tribe",
right? How did they get to that point? Did the UN teach them? Or was it an indigenous, African, solution?"

I believe it was the pluralist nationalism offered by the ANC, as opposed to the ethnic focus of the Zulu Inkhata Party, that offered greater liberty. Now both ethnics have a stake in the larger nation, whereas before they had only a stake in bantustans, which was exactly the racist Nationalist Party plan. It was worth sharing power in a plural nation to put away certain levels of animosity. Clearly the ANC leadership was well-educated in the first world, even the Communists among them. That did not change the fact that they were African.

I think you and I simply need to negotiate our terminology, because I am not so certain that African concepts of tribe are any more or less engrained than European concepts of ethnicity or religious affiliation. It is clear that plural nationalism works in the European context (otherwise why would we seek to free former Soviet satellites?) but the implication of 'tribalism' is that it has a greater hold on the African mind and that the same concepts of nationalism that work for us would not necessarily work for them.

We have had essentially one generation of nationalist self-determination in Africa in the post-colonial era. It has largely failed. I believe that pluralism was the missing ingredient. It was missing in the way colonial powers left things, it was missing in the way natives took over things. I think we would find evidence of this in some core concepts of Pan-Africanism which, like Black Nationalism in the US, usurped diversity and forced unity despite ethnic and class differences.

"It is the responsiblity of strong free nations to demonstrate the value of pluralism."

Is that a universal? That is, do you apply this maxim to all free nations and all peoples within them?

Yes I do think it's universal.

It is notable that both the UN and the United States played favorites. We favored Mandela's ANC. The UN may serve as a proxy for the first world. If our declarations of human rights mean anything at all, then they should be applied equally to all humans. If those are the reasons from which we gain consent of the governed, our very own governments have no real authority if we do not take those declarations seriously. A human, after all is a human. Therefor all are entitled to equal protection mitigated only by our practical inability to provide that which can secure the blessings of liberty. It is this promise of protection that separates this first world 'neoconservative' empire from all others. It is indeed what underlies the rationale for the Security Council of the UN that we would accept its morality.

Which nations contribute what to the universal task of human liberation is what we have yet to work out. But I believe there is little question that our destinies are not intertwined, and that first world progress cannot be sustained without global interventions.

Dear sir,
I am a french student for one year in Pretoria, South Africa. I have to do a important report for my school in France(Political Institute of Paris). I am deeply interested in south African tribes. I think the following subject could be very interesting: tribes and politics in the modern south Africa.
I am looking for information about this subject.If you could help me by giving me e-address, contacts, or books to sell, it will be very great.
Thanks in advance,
olivier
You can contact me on: olivierboubou@hotmail.com