In The News

A Rich Nation, a Poor Continent

Jeffrey D. Sachs July 9, 2003
The cure for Africa’s ills is the one thing the continent lacks: money. According to Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University, Africa’s health care problems could be effectively combated with an annual infusion of $25 billion dollars from the developed world, including $8 billion from the US. By bolstering the continent’s nearly non-existent health care programs,...

Bush, in Africa, Promises Aid but Offers No Troops for Liberia

Richard W. Stevenson July 9, 2003
As his first trip to Africa commences, US President Bush is promising to promote democracy, fight AIDS, and increase trade with the continent, but he is offering no immediate assistance in the current bloodbath in Liberia. This reluctance to commit troops to the war torn country belies the emphasis Bush will be placing on the problems plaguing failing states like Liberia over the course of his...

African Pundits Heckle Bush for ‘Safari’

Jefferson Morley July 8, 2003
Africa’s online media has been attacking US President Bush’s agenda even before his five-day trip around the continent got under way.. Journalists in each of the countries he is visiting – as well as in some that he’s not – doubt Bush’s sincerity and motivations vocally or tacitly. Concern over American hegemony figured prominently in the South African and Zambian press, which maintained Bush...

A Helping Hand from Bush to Africans?

Abdallah Abu-Younis July 8, 2003
US President Bush’s agenda for his upcoming trip to Africa is packed with high stakes issues. AIDS, poverty, corruption, and state failure run rampant across the continent, threatening US interests by providing the shroud of chaos for terrorist groups. However, as this editorial in The Arab News points out, Bush must be careful not to generalize about Africa’s problems and solutions. African...

Non-Globalized States Pose a Threat

Banning N. Garrett July 7, 2003
Liberia's raging civil war is bringing the issue of failing states in Africa dramatically to the fore as US President Bush begins his first ever trip to the continent. Amidst domestic bloodbath, the threat posed to the interconnected world by failing states like Liberia or other rogue or weak states may not be immediately apparent. However, as this article points out, the weakness of such...

Bush May Send Peace-Keeping Force to Liberia If Taylor Quits

Rupert Cornwell July 4, 2003
In a twist of international affairs, the United States is being pressured to send troops to a foreign nation. This time, however, the regime in need of change is in Africa. After several years of strife, Liberia's president, Charles Taylor, has been charged with war crimes and supporting rebel insurgencies in neighboring Sierra Leone. In the capital, Monrovia, local people are reported to...

President Bush's Visit to Africa Isn't All about Oil

Peter Fabricius June 30, 2003
US interests in Africa go well beyond oil, says this editorial in South Africa's Cape Times. Though oil is likely a factor prompting US President Bush’s upcoming trip to the continent, American national security interests are the definitive motivation for the visit – and for expanded US interest in general. Since September 11, the United States has been forced to realize the immense impact...