Geography Lessons: Correcting Sachs on African Economic Development

Professor Jeffrey Sachs continues the debate on aid to Africa originally prompted by Dambisa Moyo's book Dead Aid. As usual, I will of course let Dr. Moyo defend herself against specific criticisms made by Sachs and his co-author John McArthur. But Sachs unveils such a strange geographic theory of Africa's poverty, with strong implications for aid policy, that I am forced to respond.

It's nice to move back to doing what professors are supposed to do -- examine other professors' ideas on their own merits, not attack their persons. Sachs is an inspirational and hard-working intellectual, just one whose ideas on Africa happen to be sometimes totally wrong, and other times only seriously wrong.

A good rule for all theories, including theories of global poverty, is Occam's Razor -- make the theory as simple as possible, but no simpler. Another way to put it is beware of explanations with too many Ifs, Buts and Excepts in them. Sachs' geographic theory of Africa's poverty has gotten few takers among other economists, perhaps because it fails Occam's Razor. Sachs starts off by saying that being in the tropics is bad for development (he gave a very terse summary here, I am drawing from his articles to articulate more fully his geographic story). Isn't rapidly growing India also in the tropics? Yes, but they have snowmelt-fed irrigation instead of rain-fed agriculture. Isn't rich Singapore also in the tropics? Yes, but they are coastal instead of landlocked. Don't Latin America and Asia also have tropical diseases like malaria, just like Africa? Yes, but they have a better kind of mosquito. So a region will be poor if they are tropical, if rainfed, if landlocked, and if they have the wrong mosquitoes -- which, yes, fits many African countries. The reason for Occam's Razor is that with enough Ifs, Buts, and Excepts you can fit any theory to any set of facts. If I am a balding, grey-bearded, bespectacled, white male economic development professor residing in Greenwich Village, I will write a post on Occam's Razor -- yes, that theory also fits the facts.

The consensus among most academic economists is that destructive governments rather than destructive geography explains the poverty of nations. Robert Mugabe was a lot worse for Zimbabwe than Anopheles mosquito. Corruption is more fatal for oil-rich Nigeria and Angola than latitude. Health is determined more by public actions against disease than by species of parasite. Other factors that Sachs mentions such as illiteracy and poor infrastructure are also symptoms of bad government services. Geography may have had some influence on history, but through institutions -- good government spread along lines of migration and communication through most temperate regions more easily than it did to tropical regions. The latter were also victims of colonialism (and in Africa's case, the slave trade as well, which goes some way to explain bad government in Africa today).

Of course, it is a lot easier to justify giving a lot of aid to African governments if they are helpless victims of geography rather than (mostly) just being -- bad governments. Is this why Sachs offers a bizarre geographic theory of Africa's poverty and is oblivious to the bad governments that many courageous African dissenters have fought at great sacrifice? I don't have enough evidence to test any one theory of Sachs, but I know it makes for bad aid policy. Make sure that aid reaches poor people, which usually means it should not go to poor governments.

Comments

[Joel Ng]

This has been a fascinating exchange despite Sachs' initial diatribe. However, a lot of the issues here are too complex to be settled by the blog format of debate. There's a lot of things that Sachs would rightly argue are not taken into account in focusing on just the geographical aspect and that the factors he cited weren't meant to be treated purely in isolation - rather the blogging style tends to do limit what can be said and how much can be qualified.

On the initial issue of the trade-aid debate I do think however that Moyo and Easterly are right that the balance of foreign inflows should tilt far more in the direction of trade than aid, and aid too often does not play the right part in building a country's economic base in anticipation of entry into the global economy.

[natturnerx]

the blogger asserts that the issue of african development problems is a debate between 2 theories : a)the bad african geography theory, or b)the bad african governments theory. of course a debate btween non-africans would be expected to limit itself to things like that. but an actual african (or african descendant) might present other theories for consideration : like perhaps meddling neo-colonialists imposing their neo-liberal economic ideology, imf "austerity" programs, usurous debts (but no reparations), and discriminatory trade policies (like western countries protecting & subsidizing their agricultural sectors while punishing africa for doing the same) might have something to do with it. just a theory...

[philhein]

The Sacks/Easterly debate should be seriously pursued. Leaving aside the long standing geogaphy/climate controversy , could all not agree that , form a development perspective

- throwing away aid at governments (or NGOs, or private sector entities) without agreement on objectives and proper monitoring is not desirable.
-conditionality by IMF/WB has often been misguided and counterproductive
-support to areas such as Global Health Partnerships, education of girls, aid for trade should be pursued
-donor concentrations should be more poverty oriented ( rather than say foussed on Isreal and Egypt for the US)

Could we not all commend FC Barcelona for turning down lucrative contracts for advertizing on their shirts in favour of UNICEF to whom they are PAYING OUT substantial sums for AID in Africa?

[IGNSTHMD]

with more people on he ground something like you suggest should be plausible. What are the centers of infrastruture growth is it mostly aid?

[William Easterly - Huffpost Blogger]

If there is a demand for infrastructure from the private sector, it will usually attract private and public financing. When aid tries the "build it first, and they will come," it usually doesn't work.

[cktirumalai]

About a century ago, climate was thought to be crucial in history, an idea which was then questioned or discredited. Singapore would, instead, almost fit the great or exceptional man theory of history: Lee Kuan Yew.
Large sums of money sent from outside find their way to secretive bank accounts abroad through Africa. First there was colonial exploitation, and then the oppression of nations by its own indigenous "leaders," elected and imposed.

[William Easterly - Huffpost Blogger]

Not a big fan of the "great man" theory. How do we know it wasn't the anonymous but very dynamic Chinese diaspora in Singapore?

[Joel Ng]

LKY did many things right, but to credit him solely for Singapore's success would be to ignore Singapore's historical position as a conduit for Southeast Asian trade (indeed that was the reason the port was founded by the British in the first place), and possibly more importantly (if less documented), its role as a financial hub for Chinese businesses in the region.

[joko]

I agree with you. If Singapore was led by Suharto instead of Lee Kuan Yew, the story will be different.