Laying transoceanic cables on Africa s shores: a Neo-gramscian study Derbe, S.T.

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1 UvA-DARE (Digital Academic Repository) Laying transoceanic cables on Africa s shores: a Neo-gramscian study Derbe, S.T. Link to publication Citation for published version (APA): Derbe, S. T. (2010). Laying transoceanic cables on Africa s shores: a Neo-gramscian study General rights It is not permitted to download or to forward/distribute the text or part of it without the consent of the author(s) and/or copyright holder(s), other than for strictly personal, individual use, unless the work is under an open content license (like Creative Commons). Disclaimer/Complaints regulations If you believe that digital publication of certain material infringes any of your rights or (privacy) interests, please let the Library know, stating your reasons. In case of a legitimate complaint, the Library will make the material inaccessible and/or remove it from the website. Please Ask the Library: or a letter to: Library of the University of Amsterdam, Secretariat, Singel 425, 1012 WP Amsterdam, The Netherlands. You will be contacted as soon as possible. UvA-DARE is a service provided by the library of the University of Amsterdam ( Download date: 23 Jul 2018

2 Chapter Six: Information Society within a Restructured Africa This chapter examines the relationship between African and global capitalist firms and think tanks in shaping Africa s development ideology. The first section assesses the African Information Society Initiative (AISI), which was prepared under the auspices of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA). The AISI was a blueprint for national policies designed to bridge the digital divide. Various NGOs, local and foreign and governmental actors and international organisations were active participants in the process of designing AISI. It is argued that the AISI represents a conscious agency of reproduction of the global ideational and material structure in Africa. Currently, the New Partnership for Africa s Development (NEPAD) is in charge of the information society policy of Africa. The second sub-section, therefore, investigates NEPAD using the Neo-Gramscian concepts of hegemony and counterhegemony. Africa s Information Society Initiative The majority of digital divide initiatives are designed, undertaken and supported by the international development practitioners, such as the Canadian IDRC (International Development Research Centre), the Dutch IICD(International Institution for Communication and Development), and the UK 135

3 DFID (Department for International Development), ITU, USAID (United States Agency for International Development) 47. Africa was represented by South Africa in the G-7 ministerial meeting of 1995 in which the agenda for global information society was set by the US. In the same year, a conference entitled African Regional Symposium on Telematics for Development was organised by the UNECA, UNESCO, ITU and IDRC. The participants from Africa included ICT consumer organisations, ISPs and regulators, whereas external participants included IT specialists and representatives of bilateral, regional and international organisations. This conference reviewed existing initiatives in Africa. It was then agreed that there is a need to devise national strategies and policies emphasizing market-oriented approaches and opportunities for partnership between user groups, telecommunications operators and public authorities ( One of the participants of the conference summed up the agenda for policy reform as follows: The real challenge is not technical or financial, but organizational and political. While there are no technological barriers to rapid expansion of Internet service in Africa, there are many in the sphere of obsolete regulatory frameworks that result in constricting barriers to information access and knowledge expansion. ( adis/telemat/africa03.htm). Therefore, the conference participants decided to lobby the Organisation of African Union and the G15 Heads of State meetings to address the issue of information society in 47 According to Zongo (2001), there are so many international development agencies in ICT related projects and activities towards Africa that it may not be possible to go through a full list of them in [a] short overview paper (p.20). 136

4 Africa. It was also underlined that more stakeholders have to be involved to shape the information society policy of Africa. ( The telematics conference was a watershed event because it marked the beginning of the information society policy in Africa. It was followed by the UNECA Conference of Ministers responsible for social development and planning in 1995, which passed a resolution, entitled Building Africa s Information Highway. A High-Level Working Group was appointed to draft an umbrella policy that will streamline the various Internet initiatives in Africa in a definite direction ( The High-Level Working Group, composed of 11 ICT experts, came up with African Information Society Initiative (AISI): An Action Framework to Build Africa's Information and Communication Infrastructure" in The premise of the framework was that information technologies are tools that enable low capital investment and efficient exploitation of Africa s vast information resources. The objective of the framework is to guide African leaders to take advantage of this technological revolution by opening up their market to global ICT providers. Hence, mirroring the information society agenda set forth earlier by various global organisations, the AISI recommended: inclusion of the private sector and NGOs in the national policy making process, strong protection for intellectual property, free flow of information within African countries and to/from the rest of the world, 137

5 liberalisation of national telecommunications and public broadcasting services, and creation of enabling environment for investment through policy and legislation. The AISI was endorsed by the Summit of Heads of States of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) at the 64th Ordinary Session of the Council of Ministers meeting held in Yaoundé, Cameroon in July It was subsequently approved by influential international organisations such as the G8 ( The ECA took up the task of coordinating and guiding the implementation of the AISI based on this blueprint. The E- readiness reports prepared by the ECA provided an update on the investment realities in African countries. It also made investment scans to indicate the business opportunities available in Africa (See Scan-ICT at The ECA also coordinated the preparation of a common African position at the WSIS. In general, it played a central role in formulating Africa s position with respect to the ICAIS and other global information society issues. In 2002, African leaders introduced another high profile development blueprint, NEPAD. Hence, NEPAD s e-commission for Africa took over the assignment to federate all the ICT initiatives of the continent and mobilise resources for funding of the major African projects ( Bamako2002/. 138

6 NEPAD, African Development and E-strategies The first sub-section deals with the origin of NEPAD, its vision and strategies. The second sub-section assesses political response to NEPAD from regional and international political actors. The third sub-section provides an interpretation of the role and function of NEPAD from a Neo- Gramscian perspective. Genesis of NEPAD A number of political and economic programmes have been proposed to end the cycle of poverty and conflict in Africa. The Lagos Plan of Action of 1980, Africa s Priority Programme for Economic Recovery of 1986, the African Alternative Framework to Structural Adjustment Programme for Socio- Economic Recovery and Transformation of 1989 are only a few of these policy proposals. NEPAD is yet another such initiative that aims to address the continent s economic, political and social problems (Adedeji, 2002). The NEPAD initiative was derived from two recovery plans for Africa drawn up by Presidents Abdoulaye Wade of Senegal and Thabo Mbeki of South Africa. The first, called the Omega Plan for Africa, stressed that the major causes of disparity in productivity and living standards between developed and developing countries emanate from the difference in their respective level of infrastructure. Hence, if the gaps in physical infrastructure, education, health and agriculture are bridged, Africa will have the capacity to participate in global production and trade. The practical problem that needs to be addressed is, therefore, securing finance for infrastructure construction. The Omega plan insisted that 139

7 Africa should not rely on foreign aid or debt to finance its infrastructure projects. Instead, the resources should be drawn from creation of special drawing rights for Africa, borrowing from African national treasuries, foreign direct investment, etc ( /PDF/About% 20Nepad /planomega.pdf). The Millennium Partnership for African Recovery Programme (MAP) was the plan contributed by Thabo Mbeki of South Africa. The MAP was more far-reaching and comprehensive, and it has been almost entirely incorporated into the final NEPAD document. NEPAD attributes the impoverishment of the continent to its colonial legacy, especially to the exploitation of raw materials for the production of value added products in the West. Subversion of traditional values, institutions and structures for imperial ends, and the heritage of a weak capitalist class and weak...accumulation process are the major features of this legacy. The poor rate of accumulation in the post-colonial period coupled with a dysfunctional and corrupt leadership is the single most important obstacle to Africa s economic recovery (OAU, 2001). NEPAD declared its vision and firm conviction" to be the eradication of poverty in Africa and abolition of the development chasm between the continent and the international community. The specific goals to be attained in the medium term include achievement of an economic growth of 7% per annum in the next 15 years and attainment of the UN Millennium Development Goals. The latter include reduction of the proportion of people living under extreme poverty, infant and maternal mortality, and increasing student enrolment, provision of basic health services, etc (Para.1). 140

8 The strategy for economic growth advocated by NEPAD focuses on increasing and diversifying African exports and enhancing its competitiveness. The marginalisation of Africa from the world market is considered the manifestation of its poverty. While globalisation has increased the cost of Africa s ability to compete, we hold that the advantages of an effectively managed integration present the best prospects for future economic prosperity and poverty reduction (Para.28). The mobility of capital across the globe enables governments and private entrepreneurs to secure financial resources from global markets. To sum up, the globalization process offers Africa greater opportunity for real injection of private funding and risk taking, creation of new markets and harnessing of increased economic capacity (Paras ). However, according to NEPAD, there are still two major obstacles to end the marginalisation of Africa. Firstly, the developed countries have taken advantage of the marginalised sections of the world due to the absence of fair and just rules to regulate global integration of economies. NEPAD insisted, however, that the call for a fair global rule of business is not only a moral but also an economic imperative. In the words of the Ethiopian Prime Minister, Meles Zenawi, A small minority of the world creates much of current wealth. That wealth cannot continue to grow indefinitely so long as it continues to be based on a narrow circle. The base of the wealth creation has to be expanded to include the rest of the world for it to be sustained. In the absence of such an expansive process, it is only a matter of time before the economies of the developed world stagnate with all the dire consequences of such a phenomenon Africa s development is thus a necessary means of preventing ultimate stagnation in the developed world....nepad is thus based on the recognition of the fact that Africa s development is vital to the realization of the direct material interest not only of Africans but also of the rest of the world (Quoted in Abraham, 2003, pp.19-20). The other obstacle is the failure by African governments to introduce good governance. NEPAD, thus, vouched to create a market friendly environment in Africa through its peace, 141

9 security, democracy and political governance initiatives. The African leaders behind NEPAD have assured their partners that the numbers of democratically elected leaders are on the increase in the continent and, hence, the positive outcome of this latest initiative is guaranteed (para.42). However, market assessment reports released by Western economic institutes in the same year NEPAD came to existence seemed to negate this assurance. For example, according to the Report of the Economic Freedom of the World in 2003, except for six African countries (Botswana, Namibia, South Africa, Tunisia, Mauritius and Tanzania), the rest have unacceptable legal structures and weak protection of property rights. Similarly, the corruption index places most of African countries among the worst offenders. Only fourteen countries have managed to put in place enough discipline on their fiscal regime through spending cuts, reduction of stabilisation funds, and accelerated privatisation (cited in Loots, 2003). The African Peer Review Mechanism was created to lock in the political commitment of each African country. This is a voluntary mechanism by which member states undertake periodic review of the policies and practices of one another and exert peer pressure on the laggards. The review aims to ultimately ensure that the political and economic processes in the African countries conform to best practice guidelines stipulated by their development partners. By 2008, 29 African states had already gone through the Peer Review Mechanism ( Loots, 2003, p.4). NEPAD requested foreign financial aid to bridge existing gaps between Africa and the developed countries so as to improve the continent s international competitiveness and enable it to participate in the globalisation process (Para.95). A large capital inflow, 64 billion USD every year, 142

10 was sought by NEPAD to carry out its plans and programmes. The partners for development are, thus, expected to provide debt cancellation, aid and other financing mechanisms in the short run. However, NEPAD relies on expected private capital flows to harness the wealth of Africa and achieve its objectives (Para.144). The role of ICTs in the integration of Africa into the global economy is given a special focus in the NEPAD strategy. The current economic revolution has, in part, been made possible by advances in information and communications technology (ICT), which have reduced the cost of and increased the speed of communications across the globe, abolishing pre-existing barriers of time and space, and affecting all areas of social and economic life. It has made possible the integration of national systems of production and finance, and is reflected in an exponential growth in the scale of cross-border flows of goods, services and capital (Para.29). The benefits expected from utilisation of ICTs range from enhancing opportunities for global trade, investment and finance to creation of a common regional market and even an African Union (Paras ). The small size of African markets is singled out as the major obstacle to attract foreign direct investment. Thus, by rolling out regional Internet connectivity, NEPAD aims to link these markets the global economy. The e-africa commission of NEPAD was established early in 2001 with funding from donors such as the World Bank, the African Development Bank, UK, Japanese, Swiss development agencies as well as the governments of South Africa and Egypt. This organ is responsible for ICT initiatives. The commission, operating in alliance with regional organisations such as Southern Africa Development Cooperation (SADC), shapes policy and regulatory framework to facilitate telecommunications reform and e-readiness. The fibre optic cable project discussed in the previous chapter, thus, was one of the tasks 143

11 the Commission set out to accomplish. The plan was to coordinate all the fibre optic cables into a ring so that every African country will be connected to the information superhighway ( Foreign and local engagement with NEPAD The NEPAD development blueprint has received favourable response from donors and Western governments. More importantly, the G8 encouraged all partnership agreements to be undertaken via the organs created under NEPAD (Abraham, 2003). In contrast, NEPAD has been a subject of serious criticism by a number of African scholars, civil society groups and social movements (Bond, 2005a). The first criticism relates to the elite driven, top-down process of its inception. NEPAD was initiated by the heads of states of Nigeria, South Africa, Algeria and Senegal and later submitted to the G8 for an approval. Questions as to the source and scope of its authority have not been answered yet (Tandon, 2002, p.10; Maxwell & Christiansen, 2002; Adedeji, 2002; Matthews, 2004; Mbaku, 2004). According to Chabal (2002), the very nature of postcolonial politics in Africa militates against any democratic process. Neo-patrimonialism and clientilism still define African politics. Despite the presence of a modern institutional facade, power is still exercised through informal patron-client relationship between the ruling elites and their support base. Chabal cites the civil service system as an example of just another link for the patrimonial chain between patrons and clients. Similarly, elections do not have 144

12 the role of establishing accountability but factional mobilisation, since the principles of legitimacy are still traditional. Hence, without fundamentally changing the neopatrimonial politics of Africa, it is impossible to have initiatives like NEPAD through a participatory process. The second theme of criticism is NEPAD s development paradigm, which is understood to be neo-liberalism. Some scholars have pointed out that NEPAD s reliance on foreign aid leads to a reproduction of colonial/dependency relationships (Adedeji, 2002). Others have contended that, as experiences of other countries such as Argentina indicate, foreign direct investment (FDI) is a risky means to build Africa s economy (Tandon, 2002, p.21). Tandon, thus, recommends that African governments open their doors to FDI selectively, and not as a matter of general policy. In particular, the provision of social services such as electricity, education, health, etc must not be put in the investment basket. The obligation to provide basic needs of the people must be placed outside the vagaries of the market and squarely shouldered by African governments. The cooperation paradigm, or partnership, is also criticised for perpetuating the inequality between donors and recipients (Maxwell & Christiansen, 2002; Matthews, 2004). According to Adedeji (2002), the subtle semantic and conceptual shift from cooperation or compact to partnership since the end of the cold war has culminated NEPAD. This shift reflects the change in the character of international relations since the Yaoundé I cooperation agreement between the then European Economic Community and Africa in the 1960s. Each successive agreement has reduced the autonomy of recipients over aid resources by introducing stringent conditionality. Adedeji argued that with the 145

13 introduction of partnership, the liberal international principle of interdependence is no more in the service of Africa. Consequently, it would be naive to expect the partnership advocated by NEPAD to signify anything other than submission of Africa to a neo-liberal discipline. Finally, academics and civil society groups have articulated alternative visions for Africa. Adedeji advocated a revival of the principles which guided the liberation struggle in Africa, namely: self-reliance, self-sustainment, the democratisation of the development process, and a fair and just distribution of the fruit of economic progress. Selfreliance, which is the core element of this vision, emphasises import substitution and internal articulation of the economy (Adedeji, 2002, p.7). Similarly, the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA) and Third World Network evaluated NEPAD in their meeting in Accra, Ghana in The common position was that current African economic problems emanate from the international economic order with its division of labour reinforcing domestic weaknesses deriving from socio-economic and political structures. Thus, the policy measures that are urgently required for the recovery of Africa were pointed out as follows: stabilisation of commodity prices, reform of the international financial system, the World Bank and the IMF, an end to IMF/World Bank Structural Adjustment Programmes, fundamental changes to the existing agreements of the WTO regime, as well as reversal of the attempts to expand the scope 146

14 of this regime to new areas including investment, competition and government procurement, and debt cancellation. Likewise, a number of radical African social movements, trade unions, youth and women organisations, and religious, academic, etc groups, convened in Durban, South Africa in 2002 to denounce NEPAD. The Civil Society Indaba of South Africa, for instance, specifically addressed each segment of NEPAD s neo-liberal policies including private ownership of infrastructure, commercial agriculture, debt rescheduling, etc. They concluded that all these measures are detrimental to food security, employment, and environmental protection in Africa. The African Civil Society Declaration that came out of this meeting articulated an alternative vision for Africa based on the principles of Human Rights, Self-Reliance, Pan- Africanism, and a developmental participatory state (Bond,2005a,pp.32-35). Unlike the civil society groups that have been promoting the neo-liberal principles enshrined in NEPAD, the radical civil society elements opposed to it remain hardly visible. The first problem faced by radical civil society groups is lack of resources to disseminate information, or to carry out advocacy and lobbying activities. For instance, about 650 activists attended the 2004 Africa Social Forum, which met in Lusaka, Zambia. Most of the delegates were from neighbouring countries such as Zimbabwe, Malawi, and Zambia. Members from other parts of the continent were unable to participate due to material constraints. Besides, organisations, which were putting up resistance against their governments on issues of privatisation and environmental degradation, were prevented from attending this conference (Bond, 2005b). 147

15 In Africa, as elsewhere, there are divisions among civil society actors as to the stance to be taken against the state and international financial institutions. Some civil society actors prefer a critical engagement with both, while others call for mass action and civil disobedience. This divergence in commitment is usually presented as a lack of unity leading to the inability to design an all-africa social forum. However, such evaluation of civil society actors seems to be based on an erroneous theoretical presupposition that civil society represents a homogenous and autonomous entity. Rather, the African Civil Society Declaration points the way towards a resistance bloc that not only opposes the neoliberal path of NEPAD but also offers an alternative vision. Framing NEPAD While there is no dearth of criticism of NEPAD, there are relatively few attempts to explain why it came about in the first place. Adedeji (2002, p.11) characterised the partnership logic of NEPAD as a childlike naivety among African leaders and policy makers in expecting a relationship with donors based on equality. Tandon (2002, p.25), on the other hand, commented that the road to hell is often paved with good intentions. For these authors, NEPAD arises from a noble concern to end the spiral of poverty and conflict that is plaguing Africa. It is only the means that it chose which is inappropriate to the reality of the continent. According to these scholars, NEPAD should simply adopt a strategy of selfreliance Both Adedeji and Tandon emphasised the distinction between insertion into the global accumulation system as advocated by NEPAD and controlled integration into the global economy. The suggested path is an 148

16 Tsheola (2002), on the other hand, associated the birth of NEPAD to the role of South Africa in mediating globalisation in the continent. He traced the shift to neoliberalism in South Africa to the Growth, Employment and Redistribution (GEAR) policy of GEAR was committed to relaxation of exchange controls, reduction of tariff on imports and privatisation of public assets. These policy changes affirmed the primary role of capital in the post- Apartheid recovery of South Africa 49. auto-centred integration in which African countries do not merely adjust to the system but shape and influence it to their own advantage. Amin stressed the political goals of integration as follows: Here we have to look at the challenge of regionalism in another way: that the bourgeoisie-at the global level or the compradors at various levels in Africa and elsewhere-look at the problem of regionalism in terms of common markets and we should be very critical of this view. It is presented as follows: that if even the Europeans with strong national economies need to unite by building a common market, we should do the same. In fact, they have different problems and they have to go beyond a common market even from the European left point of view (1997, p.8). 49 The Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) stated that the wage of blue collar workers went down by 7% and number of jobs by 171,000 only a year after the introduction of this new policy. At the same time, the reduction of public expenditure and the push for a slim state has eclipsed the redistributive goals of the post-apartheid recovery programme (Vavi, 1997). Tsheola also observed that despite the sound macroeconomic fundamentals set down by GEAR, foreign investment did not materialise. In fact, there was more capital flight from the country, aided by the relaxation of foreign exchange control prescribed by the new policy. The result of this capital outflow was the state expenditure deficit leading to labour strikes and stoppage. In short, GEAR ensured foreign interests at the expense of domestic ones. 149

17 South Africa s geographical association with Africa, which is deemed a zone of danger for free enterprise, was identified as the cause for the lack of FDI. Therefore, GEAR was later transposed to NEPAD through the active leadership of Thabo Mbeki. According to Tsheola, in spite of the rhetoric of African recovery, NEPAD is but a means to attract more FDI to South Africa itself. South African economic think tanks and experts have indeed positively evaluated the NEPAD initiative as a vehicle for national economic objectives. The President of the Economic Society of South Africa spelt out the strategic advantages of corporate expansion of South Africa into the rest of the continent (Loots, 2005). Firstly, the profitability of investment in Africa is, on average, higher than in other regions of the world. Secondly, the perception of foreign investors about the continent follows a blanket approach, which tends to lump all of Africa as a single destination. South Africa and China are becoming major investors in the continent partly because they do not share this perception. Therefore, the adoption of good policies within a stable institutional framework such as NEPAD is an indispensable prerequisite to attract FDI to Africa 50. Akinboade and Lalthapersad-Pillay (2005,) provided a detailed account of the possible pay-offs of the NEPAD policy framework for South African economic interest. Accordingly, African countries need the expertise, investment 50 Loots (2003) also extensively analysed the function and role of the African Peer Review Mechanism in providing such stable institutional framework. Applying concepts from the New Institutional Economics (NIE), she outlined the role of institutions such as the Peer Review Mechanism in reducing uncertainty, promoting efficiency and, therefore, facilitating good economic performance. 150

18 and concrete business opportunities offered by South Africa to kick start their development process. Economic contact with South Africa provides an opportunity to procure internationally traded goods and services at reasonable cost from an African country (pp.5-6). More importantly, South Africa offers one of the largest and most deregulated financial industries with sophisticated banking and insurance markets. The South African stock exchange market is an important source of equity financing. Moreover, South African enterprises have the expertise and the capacity to construct and maintain transport, telecommunications and energy infrastructure in other African countries. Similarly, what South Africa can get from the rest of Africa is stated as follows: During the apartheid years cultural, political and economic sanctions were imposed against South Africa. As South Africa embraced democracy, these sanctions were lifted. This opened up the possibility of corporate expansion of dominant South African firms into the rest of Africa as a means of maintaining economic viability and acquiring more competitive strength in a globalizing world. Also expanding into other parts of Africa could minimize the impact of policy changes that are introduced under democracy on South African business interests, and should facilitate the closer integration with Africa of an otherwise previously isolated country(p. 256). Amin (2006), on the other hand, situated the NEPAD initiative and the role of African actors within a broader critique of global capitalist developments. His major proposition is that various models of worldwide capital accumulation rest on social alliances in the centre and periphery. Accordingly, the colonial, post-colonial and the current globalization phases have depended on different types of comprador classes in Africa. 151

19 The social blocs in Africa that engaged in the liberation struggle and then in the NIEO were national populist pitted against the imperial ambitions of transnational capital. The hegemonic ideas that cemented this bloc included economic modernisation through industrialisation, internal articulation of the economy, and creation of internal demand for growth. According to Amin, these were the foundation for the economic and social transformation of the third world from the 1950s up to the 1970s 51. However, the dominance of neo-liberal blocs in the North and the material limitations in the South later brought about the reconfiguration of comprador classes in Africa. The debt burden and the discontinuation of the growth and industrialisation policies finally eroded national populism. It could be asked why the governments of the countries of the South have subscribed to all of these commandments drafted in the imperialist centres. The response, in general terms, is that we should look to the social hegemonic blocs mentioned above that make possible the reproduction of asymmetric globalization. There is a new comprador class in the countries of the periphery that actually derives its existence from the new model of globalized liberalism. This comprador class participates in the new government arrangements that followed the erosion of the national populist models inspired by Bandung (Amin, 2006, p.4). Taylor (2002) has also applied the insights of Neo- Gramscian theory for his argument that NEPAD has been the instrument of externally-oriented fraction of capital within 51 Amin distinguished a national populist bloc from a national socialist one. The former could be useful in combating colonial and neocolonial impositions from abroad. Besides, it could play a role in defining an autonomous development path for Africa. Ultimately, however, the emergence of a national socialist bloc is a necessary condition to delink from a capitalist world system. De-linkage is not synonymous with autarchy. It refers to what Amin calls auto-centred integration with the international economy. 152

20 key African states, mainly: South Africa, Egypt and Nigeria. These are confronted by inward-looking fractions who rallied around a nationalist project of de-linkage from the world capitalist system. However, the new global structure has provided favourable opportunities for the externally oriented fraction to prevail in such regional initiatives as NEPAD. These explanations have some merits when analysed on the basis of the facts and analysis presented in the previous chapters of this dissertation. The framing of NEPAD as a mere extension of South Africa s national interest into the rest of the continent appears to be the most extensively documented and evidenced of all the different arguments. Lesufi (2004,) emphasised this argument by pointing out that the presentation of NEPAD as a collective instrument of African leaders conceals the inequalities among the African states and thus the real possibilities of reproducing relations of domination and exploitation among them (pp ). Bond (2006) also underlined the thesis that South Africa is deploying its comparative advantage in the industrial sector in order to play a semi-imperialist role over other African countries. Such analysis overemphasises the role of national interest and disregards the integral role played by transnational alliance of interests 52. The agency of other actors in Africa in charting out a neo-liberal path of development is, therefore, underestimated. 52 The Sunday Times, reporting on the July 2003 African Union meeting in Maputo, stated that Mbeki was viewed by other African leaders as too powerful, and they privately accuse him of wanting to impose his will on others. In the corridors they call him the George Bush of Africa, leading the most powerful nation in the neighbourhood and using his financial and military muscle to further his own agenda (Cited in Bond, 2006, p.112). 153

21 It may be instructive to note the evolution of the Open Access Policy initiative as the key policy instrument to integrate Africa into the global economy. This initiative was, from the start, incubated by Internet service providers in Kenya, Ghana and Nigeria in particular, and in other African countries, in general, through their continental ISP association. The Halfway Proposition and Open Access policy for Africa were the contributions of this association or its members. These were only later actively supported and even funded by the South African political and corporate elite 53.However, the advocacy and policy proposals had already influenced donors and international financial organisations well before the involvement of the South African government. Taylor s assessment of NEPAD seems to be closer to the factual evidence offered in the previous chapters of this dissertation. However, his dichotomy of the present political actors into external oriented and inward looking ones is not fully tenable. It may be appropriate to characterise the difference between the proponents of NEPAD and some civil society actors and academics who espoused import substitution and self-reliance.otherwise, the Open Access versus Consortium dispute as well as the resistance by African governments to privatisation and liberalisation of national telcos did not display any inward looking political or policy stance. NEPAD s emphasis on African ownership of the fibre optic cable is, thus, specific to proprietary rights over the assets such as fibre optic cables and landing stations. It does not aim to reorient the patterns of trade and investment between Africa and foreign capital. 53 The South African government contributed 3 million Rand to NEPAD e-africa commission to supplement its budget for one year (Jensen, 2007, p.20). 154

22 South Africa is indeed the major economic force in Africa but not the only one. Egypt and Nigeria seek bigger markets for further accumulation. Egypt is one of those African countries with indigenous Pan-African operators with a stake in the global and regional information society policy. MSI and Orascom, Sudanese and Egyptian private telcos respectively, have more than fourteen licences in other African countries in 2000 (Gebreab, 2002, p. 9). These corporations have also been well represented by their state bureaucrats in the NEPAD blueprint. Egypt, it is to be recalled, was one of the countries that financed the e-africa Commission. South Africa, Senegal and Nigeria, have a relatively visible preponderance of elites that are part of an emerging transnational bloc comprised of executives and affiliates of global corporations, consumerist elites, state bureaucrats as well as politicians and professionals promoting neo-liberal policies. The considerable political and discursive power mobilised to shape African information society by NGOs, ISP associations, new ICT enterprises is a manifestation of a transnational class alliance. Likewise, the dispute around the Open Access versus Consortium models is a conflict between class fractions, rather than between national interests. ISPs, mobile providers, ICT entrepreneurs, NGOs, etc, irrespective of national origin, were supportive of a liberalised infrastructure provision whereas incumbent telcos were in favour of a monopoly provision. Neo-Gramscian studies seem to have neglected the probability of such class alliance in African social formations. According to Cox, no dominant class has been able to establish hegemony in the peripheral regions nor is the economy developed as in the hegemonic core. In other words, in 155

23 the peripheral regions, the state is Hobbesian, where civil society is undeveloped, and the ruling class is the state class. Therefore, elites in these regions are not able to articulate hegemonic ideas that have a social basis and internal logic. Thus, political change in such circumstances amounts to superimposition of global capital accumulation over the old internal power structure (Van der Pijl, 1998).Major ideological and political shifts in Africa ranging from the promotion of the New International Economic Order of the 1970s to the democratisation movement of the 1980s were, thus, summarily explained as a passive revolution. The ruling class in Africa is too weak to establish hegemony in the sense of an ideological bond between itself and the masses (Abrahamsen, 1997, p.149). However, the political processes discussed in this dissertation suggest that hegemonic politics has also its place in Africa, albeit to a limited extent. Likewise, NEPAD s neo-liberal agenda was opposed by a coalition of radical civil society actors at regional platforms. Such opposition is a prototype of a counterhegemonic exercise against the moral and political legitimacy of the NEPAD programme. Civil society groups have been able to forward ideas reflective of African reality and antagonistic to the hegemony of neo-liberalism. Hence, there are some empirical indications that a blanket characterisation of African regional and national politics as a mere transition or conveyor belt of external changes may be unwarranted 54. Rather, concepts such as passive revolution and hegemony are ideal types whose application in practical contexts may reveal nuances and variations. 54 Though Amin has noted that national populists had a hegemony in the 1950s and 1960s, he does not ascribe such hegemony to the new comprador classes active in NEPAD. 156

24 In South Africa, GEAR has generally been regarded as a broad social contract, including civil society, political parties, and grassroots movements, both radical and moderate, under the leadership of the African National Congress (ANC). As a hegemonic exercise, GEAR attempts to establish its legitimacy by invoking black empowerment in the post-apartheid period (Adler & Webster, 1995; Bond & Mayekiso, 1996). Such empowerment generally took the form of ownership and control of state enterprises by black entrepreneurs. For example, a black middle class group owned equity in Telkom (Engdahl & Hauki, 2001, Horowtiz & Curry, 2007). However, this idea of black empowerment has also been contested. Labour representatives such as the Congress of South African Trade Union (COSATU) have asserted that creation of black or African bourgeoisie merely introduces a class conflict between (black) capital and (black) labour. Thus, empowerment is progressive only when it is people centred and addresses such issues as poverty, urban renewal and gender balance (Labour Resource and Research Institute, 2001). A political contestation of comparable degree also took place in Senegal, as described in the previous chapter, where telecommunications reforms accompanied the restructuring of the state. The employees of the monopoly telco retained their privilege by becoming shareholders in the new private company. Nevertheless, a consensus was reached after a complex statecivil society engagement in which traditional authority figures (marabouts) were also involved along with the urban 157

25 middle class 55. Certainly, the political forces pitted against each other had little ideological difference than in South Africa. Even then, this kind of compromise politics occurred to a lesser degree in countries like Ghana where privatisation and liberalisation were carried out after demobilisation of opposition groups (Noll &Shirley, 2001, p.47). At the other end of the spectrum are countries like Ethiopia and Algeria, whose leaders have been the spokespersons of NEPAD to the outside world. Here the state is a tyranny of cousins and politics is synonymous with armed struggle or urban riots. In Algeria, telecommunication reform was carried out in disregard of opposition by labour unions and political parties (Um, 2004). In Ethiopia, telecommunication reforms have been muted until the recent push by international organisations to kick-start the country s accession to the WTO Agreement. These are, indeed, good examples of passive revolution where a new form of capitalist accumulation is introduced without altering the existing social divisions whether based on tradition, ethnicity, or class. Telecommunication reforms or introduction of information society policies in such social formations are means to access foreign debt or aid that will ensure the continuity of the existing system. 55 These are leaders of Muslim Brotherhoods in Senegal with strong following. They have been able to influence the votes of their followers and negotiate with political candidates for the presidency (Azam et al., 2002). 158