RUSSIAN ACADEMY OF SCIENCES INSTITUTE FOR AFRICAN STUDIES Editorial Board . A.M. VASILIEV (Editor-in-Chief) I.O. ABRAMOVA , D.M. BONDARENKO, An.N. IVANOV, N.A. KSENOFONTOVA, V.G. SHUBIN, G.M. SIDOROVA AFRICAN STUDIES Translation from Russian IN RUSSIA Yearbook 2003–2007 ISBN 978–5–91298–047–3 © ɂɧɫɬɢɬɭɬȺɮɪɢɤɢɊȺɇ, 2009 © Ʉɨɥɥɟɤɬɢɜɚɜɬɨɪɨɜ, 2009. MOSCOW 2009 Anatoly Savateyev. African Civilization in the Modern World ................................182 CONTENTS Natalia Ksenofontova. Gender and Power ................................................................190 SOCIAL AND POLITICAL PROBLEMS Dmitri Bondarenko. Visiting the Oba of Benin ................................................................203 Yury Potyomkin. Nepad, a Project of Hope? ................................................................5 Natalia Krylova. Russian Women and the Sharia: Drama in Women’s Quarters ................................................................................................209 Boris Runov. Intellectual Foundations for Development: Agenda for Sub-Saharan Africa ………………..………………… 22 Svetlana Prozhogina. Difficulties of Cultural Boundaries: “Break-Up”, “Border” or Inevitable “Transition”? Literary French Yury Skubko. South African Science after Apartheid Modern Language of the Arab World ................................................................222 Scientific and Technological Potential of the RSA ………………. 35 Nelli Gromova. The Ethno-Linguistic Situation in Tanzania ................................235 Veronika Usacheva. Mass Media in Policonfessional Tanzania ……. 44 Valentin Vydrin. Tonal systems of the Mande language: a survey ................................243 ECONOMICS CONFERENCE REPORT Leonid Fituni. The Ranking of States by Success of Their Socio-Economic Development ................................................................60 Anastasia Banshchikova, Oleg Kavykin. Fourth International Conference “Hierarchy and Power in the History Vladimir Baskin. Africa in World Trade ................................................................80 of Civilizations’” (Moscow, June 13–16, 2006) ................................264 Vladimir Kukushkin. Mineral Resources: a Threat to Security SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY ON AFRICAN STUDIES or an Economic Modernization Reserve (Algeria’s Experience) ................................85 PUBLISHED RUSSIA IN 2003–2007 AFRICA IN THE SYSTEM OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS (compiled by Anatoli Ivanov) ................................................................271 Irina Abramova. African Migration: a Regional Issue or a Global Problem?................................................................................................ 97 Alexei Vassiliev. The “North-South” Relations in the Context of the G8 Activity ................................................................................................115 Yevgeny Korendyasov, Vladimir Shubin. The African Union and Russia ................................................................................................125 Tatyana Deich. Politics as a Factor of Image of Russia in Africa ................................134 Vladimir Lopatov. Russia’s Image in Africa: Economic Aspects ................................145 Galina Sidorova. Foreign Policy of Russia and Russian-Congolese Relations ................................................................158 Mikhail Vishnevsky. The Development of Militaristic Tendencies in US Policy in Africa................................................................................................162 HISTORY, CULTURE, ETHNOGRAPHY, LINGUISTICS Vassily Solodovnikov. At the 15th Session of the UN General Assembly in 1960 ................................................................173 SOCIAL AND POLITICAL PROBLEMS Table 1 Basic Development Figures of Africa in 2002 * NEPAD, A PROJECT OF HOPE? Population, GDP, GDP Ratio to the millions $ million per capita, mean African Yury Potyomkin, $ GDP per capita, D.Sc.(Econ), Head of the Centre % for Sociological and Political Studies, All Africa 831.8 553,502 650 – Institute for African Studies % 100 100 North Africa 142.6 237,340 1,644 252.9 The opening years of the 21st century have been marked by the forma- % 17.1 42.9 tion of a new pan-continental institution, the African Union (AU), which Sub-Saharan superseded the Organization of African Unity. The AU founders regard it Africa (less as an instrument of comprehensive, sustainable development of its member the RSA) 643.9 216,344 307 47.2 countries, and their political, social, and economic integration for the % 77.4 39.1 common purpose of overcoming backwardness. This strategic mainstream RSA 45.3 104,242 2,600 400.0 acquired the shape of along-term program. The New Partnership for Af- % 5.4 18.8 rica’s Development (NEPAD), which is designed to give the region a sus- tainable economic growth by drawing upon its own forces and opportuni- Source: African Development Indicators.., 2004, Tables 1-1 and 2-5. ties and an expanded effective assistance of North countries. Above any- thing else, NEPAD has identified a significant major conceptual turn- In socioeconomic term, Sub-Saharan Africa has over three-quarters of around among African leaders in their approaches to development prob- the continent’s population and less than 40% of GDP against respectively lems. It has been a turnaround toward the recognition, in the first place, of 17% and 43% in North Africa, and 5% and 19% in the RSA. An average their primary own responsibility for the results and promises of Africa’s income per capita in Tropical Africa is more than five times smaller than in development. Secondly, toward their inability, which actually everybody North Africa, and 8.5 times in the RSA. To translate into dollar terms, the was silent about in the past, to stop independently persistent marginaliza- majority of Africans have to manage on less than one dollar a day per head, tion of a majority of the continent’s countries in the globalizing world far below the so-called poverty line, and the region’s population as a whole economy. Meanwhile, in the real circumstances, the original euphoria survives on less than two dollars a day. Considering social inequality, the among the African political class attending the birth of the AU-NEPAD life of an overwhelming majority of the African population appears in still rapidly gave way to a more conservative assessment of their opportunities darker light. and prospects. This article looks at some of the basic components of the Averages do not, of course, smooth out differences between countries situation that preceded the adoption of the “new partnership” and that in that, at times, may be vast. And yet, the general picture stands out in a fairly which NEPAD has found itself at the end of its fifth year of existence. clear outline. How has it changed over the last few decades in comparison with other regions of the South? According to UN figures (Human Devel- The Poverty Trap opment…, 2001, p. 10), in the last quarter of the past century, the gross product per capita grew at an average annual rate of (–) 1% in Sub-Saharan Africa is known to be diverse economically. A majority of its countries Africa, 0.3% in Arab countries, 0.7% in Latin America and the Caribbean, lies in the least developed part of the continent southerly of the Sahara Desert 2.3% in South Asia, and 6% in East Asia and the Pacific Region. Thus an (Sub-Saharan Africa, SSA). In the south, this part abuts the Republic of South income per capita dropped in SSA while it grew in other developing coun- Africa (RSA), the most advanced country on the continent. The northern, tries. This pattern has held in the new century as well. In 2001 merely Arab-populated subregion of Africa, is relatively affluent. The socioeconomic 16 out of 39 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa showed a scanty growth of in- positions of these three parts of Africa are given below (Table 1). come per capita, while it stagnated or declined in the others. The greatest retreat was registered in Congo (Kinshasa), Angola, Sierra Leone, Zim- * First published in Vostok (Oriens), 2006, No. 2, pp. 79-82. babwe, the Comoros, Burundi, and Togo [Marchɣs tropicaux, 2004, 5 6 No. 3038, p. 194]. In 2002, 29 out of 36 worst performers according to the OPEC) inflict enormous damage on Africa. According to World Bank esti- human development index (HDI) drawn up by the UN every year on the ba- mates, between 1970 and 1997, export revenues per capita in Africa sis of life expectancy, adult literacy, education systems characteristics, and plunged, while increasing by a factor of 3.6 in South Asia, 8.7 in East Asia, GDP per capita, were in Africa. and 2.9 in Latin America. The African countries’ total losses through wors- It is appropriate to remember here that the Millennium Declaration ening trade terms in that period ran up to nearly 120% of their aggregate passed by the UN in 2000 named the reducing to half the number of people GDP [Can Africa …, 2002, pp. 8 and 21]. The UNCTAD report for 2004 living on less than one dollar a day and by two-thirds the number of chil- gives a characteristic reason – with the worsening of trade terms, maintain- dren who die before the age of five years among the chief objectives of the ing their export revenues at the 1997 level in 2001 would require African international community by 2015. Applied to Africa, these objectives figure countries to double the export of their basic products [Marchɣs tropicaux, prominently in the AU-NEPAD documents. As the situation is