NAME: LAWAL BUKOLA MUTIAT

MATRIC: 134072037
DEPT: MASS COMMUNICATION
LEVEL: HND I
COURSE: INTERNATIONAL COMMUNICATIONS AND WORLD PRESS
(MAC 342)
DEPENDENCY THEORY DETERMINES THE SUCCESS OR FAILURE OF AFRICA
NATIONS. DISCUSS
Introduction
Discontentment with the modernization theory in the 1950s precipitated new strands of thinking
which resulted in the dependency theory. The theory came as a critical reaction to the
conventional approaches to economic development that emerged in the aftermath of World War
II. Andre Gunder Frank (1967), in his analysis of the post-colonial state, has argued that classical
development theories such as modernity are misleading in that they fail to articulate the true
relationship between the developed world and the poor regions of the world. For Frank,
modernity distorts the truth about the motive of the developed countries on their former colonies.
In the same vein, the Brandt Commission (1980), made up of elder statesmen, men and women
of statue, set up by the United Nations in 1977 reported that development based on modernity
had failed. Accordingly, Reid (1995:47-48) reports,
The hope that faster economic growth modernisation in developing countries by itself would
benefit the broad masses of poor people has not been fulfilled and no concept of development
can be accepted which continues to condemn hundreds of millions of people to starvation and
despair.
The above view gave impetus to the dependency theory. Social anthropologists consider the
dependency theory to be both pessimistic and structural. At macro level, the main premise of the
structural dependency theory is that it would be impossible to understand the processes and
problems of Africa without considering the wider socio-historical context of Western European
expansion (industrial and mercantile capitalism) and the colonization of these places by the
Western economies (Frank, 1969). According to Rodney (1972), colonialism was not merely a
system of exploitation, but one whose essential purpose was to repatriate the profits made in
Africa to the so called home land. From a dependency perspective repatriation of profits
represents a systematic expatriation of the surplus values that was created by African labour
using African resources.
Effect on African countries
Hence the development of Europe can be viewed as part of the same dialectical processes that
underdeveloped Africa. In other words, the domination of Europe over Africa retarded the
economic development of the continent. For five running centuries, Europe capitalized on its
encounter with Africa. The above situation is succinctly expressed by Rodney (1972:149) whose
analysis of the relationship between Europe and Africa is that during colonialism, Europe
organized herself, accumulated capital gained from her colonies in Africa, shrewdly invested
the surplus in productive economy, steadfastly increasing national wealth and riches for its
people.
Africa was and continues to be dominated economically as well as politically by external centres
of power. Most noticeable here is the economic, political and cultural dependence of the
continent upon America and Europe. The dependence is also noticeable between rural areas and
urban areas. Writing about the situation in Southern Africa, Samir et al (1987) noted:
Imperialists partitioned the countries in Africa and then forced the African peasantry into
reserves, deliberately planned to be inadequate for the purposes of ensuring the failure of
subsistence in earlier traditional forms. The discovery of the mineral riches of Southern Africa
(such as gold and diamonds in South Africa, copper in Katanga in Zambia) just when capitalism
was entering a new stage of monopolistic expansion inspired a particular form of colonization of
the economy of the reserves.
The above contribution shows that while Europe and America are busy exploiting Africa; the
urban areas are also busy exploiting their rural areas. Within those rural areas one finds rich
people exploiting poor individuals and the chain goes on and on. Therefore dependency may
loosely be viewed as linear and multi-staged. The economic development of rural areas signifies
the establishment of metropolitan-satellite relationship at different levels in the socio-economic
structure of the economy. The relationship is based upon regional control of economic and
political resources between regions, sectors of the economy and different social groups (Nyerere,
1973; Gabriel, 1991). In the same vein, the poverty of an individual worker is a result of the
exploitation of that particular individual by the system or the employer. Thus poverty at all levels
is attributable to inhibiting relationships (internal colonialism) between the developed
communities (urban areas) and their satellites (rural areas) and also between individuals with
different economic powers.
The basic message of dependency school is that the development of the metropolis was a result
of the active underdevelopment of the non metropolis communities. Put differently, the
metropolis is dependent for its development on the underdevelopment of its satellite. For
instance, human capital has flowed and continues to move away from Africa to the developed
world. Rodney (1972) rightly noted that during the pre-colonial period; from mid fifteenth
century to the end of the nineteenth century, Africa was cornered into the selling human beings
(shipped as slaves to toil on European cotton and sugar cane plantations in America) in exchange
for rubbish such as overpriced bottled alcohol. The extraction of human resources out of Africa
did not end with the end of slavery. According to Ndulu (2004), since 1994, about 1.6 million
South African people in skilled, professional and managerial occupations have emigrated and the
country lost 25% of its graduates to the USA alone and accounts for 9.7% of all international
medical graduates practicing in Canada.
Applying this view to local settings, the white community achieved self- sustaining economic
growth, while the black community grew only as a reflection of changes in the dominating
economy. For instance in South Africa the enclave economy (affluent and connected to the
global economy) determines the countrys development path while the second economy (largely
underdeveloped and disconnected from the global economy) is marginalised. The development
of the second economy is constrained by human capital flight to the enclave economy.
Notably, the origin of the concept underdevelopment is questioned by Frank who
conceptualizes the term development of the underdeveloped as meaning that,
underdevelopment is not an original state rather its a result of economic capture and control of
backward regions by advanced metropolitan capitalism (Frank, 1967:25). Writing about the
situation in Southern Africa, Samira Amin, Chitala and Mandaza (1987:2) noted, For a century,
imperialism had established a system of total domination of Southern African region in which
the white settler colony of South Africa played a key role. The apartheid regime in South Africa
was thus always an intrinsic part of this form of the expansion of periphery capitalism.
Therefore Africas poverty is not natural but an engineered position. It was a result of a
protracted capitalistic dominance by the metropolis. Similarly, the poverty and
underdevelopment in most rural areas in Africa is a result of the inhibiting relationship between
them and the urban areas. The above view is endorsed by Immanuel Wallersteins World System
Theory which in turn borrowed heavily from Gunder Franks studies of Latin America.
To succeed in the impoverishment operation, the metropolis destroyed the traditional, pre-
capitalist structures of Africa in order to pave the way for super expropriation and appropriation
of surplus value. Missionary education curriculum was the main instrument used to destroy the
pre-capitalist social structures in Africa. The education system brought about mental
impoverishment of Africans by deemphasizing the importance of African values and culture at
the same time glorifying that of the whites. The basic idea was to disorient the minds and identity
of the blacks. The process of brain washing the Africans created a fertile ground for the
exploitation of the continents human and non human resources. There cannot be an argument
over the fact that the dependency theory is exploitative hence impoverishing. In this regard,
Gabriel (1991) argues that the amount of surplus value appropriable by the metropolis from
Africa depended and continues to depend not on the underdevelopment of the satellite, but on the
development of the metropolis.
In an analysis of the metropolis satellite relationship, Le Roux in Tedros (1992), and Samir
(1977) argued that since the development of the satellite (Africa) could lead to the emergence of
new dominant groups capable of appropriating the surplus for themselves, there was an obvious
need for the metropolis to determine the optimum rate of development of its satellite. Thus, the
metropolis determined the level and pace at which Africa was to develop through the adoption
and implementation of ineffective development policies and strategies. This window facilitated
the impoverishment of the satellite by the richer and more influential parts of the whole
economic cosmos. Efforts by Africa to resist the interference of the North often trigger economic
sanctions, example, the smart sanctions in Zimbabwe or the elimination of powerful leaders like
Patrice Lumumba and Kwame Nkrumah.
The illuminating idea in the exploitation of Africa is that too little development limits the amount
of surplus value produced in the satellite while too much of it could threaten the dominant
position of the metropolis. The dependency theory is also top-down in that it assumes that the
locals do not have the expertise and ability to fight their poverty and yet Max-Neef (1991:38)
argues: Development geared to the satisfaction of fundamental human needs cannot, by
definition, be structured from the top downwards. It cannot be imposed either by law or decree.
It can only emanate directly from the actions, expectations, and creative and critical awareness of
the protagonists themselves. Instead of being the traditional objects of development, people must
take a leading role in development.
Globalization and technological breakthrough have made migration easier and safer as well as
creating a dependency syndrome on the receiving countries. This is why most African countries
will largely rely on the expertise and advice of the same countries that exploit them. What good
is likely to come out of Britain to Zimbabwe considering that the independence of Zimbabwe
came as a result of a protracted war of liberation against the British rule? According to Rodney
(1972), the political independence of Africa from colonialism did not alter the dependency
arrangement; in fact it deepened it. One is forgiven to assume that the situation has remained
unabated as the continent entered the new millennium. An analysis of the trade patterns between
Africa and the developed world will show how the continent is robbed by the West and the East.
It is even more evident as we implement the Look East economic policy. As pointed out earlier
on, the dependency theory continues to affect Africas development as multitudes of doctors,
nurses, engineers, and architects join the bandwagon to Africas former colonisers. This pillage
of human resources is made easier by the advancement in the World Wide Web (www) sector,
often referred to as the internet. The seriousness of the pillage is expressed by Daly and Cobb
(1990:49) who point out, last years winners find it easy to be this years winners. Winners tend
to grow and losers disappear.
Conclusion
Even in the early stages of market economy, one reads forces at work that enrich some through
impoverishing others, as Ruskin pointed out in 1860: the art of making yourself rich, in the
ordinary mercantile economists sense, is therefore equally necessarily the art of keeping your
neighbour poor (Reid, 1995:137). The large commercial farms in Zambia, Malawi, Botswana,
Kenya and other parts of Africa extracted human and non human resources and used them to
develop white comercial farms at the expense of the rural areas. To make matters worse the
labour from the rural areas was marginally paid and the working conditions were deplorable.
Consequently, rural poverty was exacerbated. The critiques of the dependency theory view
Africa in general and the rural areas in particular as having been strategically positioned by the
centre as recipients of poor services as well as ill-advice from the metropolis. According to
Rodney (1972), from the last years of the nineteenth century, up to the 1960s, Africa was the
major supplier of underpriced raw materials to Europe and buyer of overpriced manufactured
goods from the West.
At national level, the metropolis areas (urban) grew at the expense of rural communities. At
continental level one may be interested in finding out why Zambia, Angola, Botswana, the DRC,
Libya and many more nations in Africa are poor given their richness in natural resources.
Seemingly, the impoverishing dependency relationship is maintained through the promulgation
of development initiatives that are deeply alien but chanted as in the interest of Africa. The
dependency theory operates both in sovereign and colonial states. The only difference is that in
the later, the theory was applied with harsh measures than one expects in the former state. It is
also necessary to point out that due to corruption and bad governance, the dependency theory
may be applied ruthlessly even in a sovereign state.
The end of colonialism has not deterred the imperialists from dominating Africa. In Zimbabwe,
the independence negotiated by the Lancaster House Agreement prolonged the survival of
exploitative economic order. According to Samir et al. (1987), the Lancaster House Agreement
left the previous economic system practically intact in both the rural areas (no agrarian reform
liquidating the settler lands in favour of the peasantry) and in the industrial arena (respect for the
predominance of the interests of local private-capital in partnership with globalised capital).
To conclude, the dependency theory stemmed from the modernization ideology. The
metropolitan states have also used some states in Africa to destabilize other African economies.
For instance, South Africa has been tasked to help foster a regime change in Zimbabwe.

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