Trade Liberalization: De Facto Neocolonialsim in West Africa
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West Africa
SUSAN DEMSKE*
The emphatic marginalization of African economies continues apace into
the 1990s. Economic statistics speak dismal volumes. Africa's share of global
foreign investment dropped from 5.5% in 1960 to only 2% in 1992 while its
share of global trade has fallen to a mere 1.4%.' On the political and human
side, reported tragedy of biblical scale-be it genocide in Burundi or famine
in Zaire-has become trite from sheer frequency. Increasingly, we simply
intellectually disengage. This detachment is reflected economically, in turn, by
Western governments' aid fatigue. 2 For example, U.S. aid to Africa was
20% less in 1996 than in 1995.3 Official worldwide finance for African
development since the mid-1980s has been half of what it was in the early
1980s.4 This note hopes to contribute to the fight against the Western world's
intellectual and economic withdrawal from Africa by taking a critical look at
recent trade policy changes and their particular impact on West African
states.
INTRODUCTION
The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) has been the principal
international multilateral treaty for trade since 1947.5 Its basic purpose is to
* J.D., Georgetown University Law Center, 1998; B.S., University of Maryland at College Park,
1991. I am grateful to Professor Viet Dinh for his thoughtful comments, and to The Georgetown Law
Journal editors for their considered editorial assistance. I would like to dedicate this note to my parents,
Walter and Geraldine Demske, for their unflagging support, without which this effort would not have
been possible.
1. Winrich Kiihne, The Changing International Environment of African Politics, in AFRICA AND
EUROPE: RELATIONS OF Two CONTINENTs IN TRANSITION 3, 4 (Stefan Brune et al. eds., 1994). Kiihne
generally laments the growing rich-poor division of countries in the world. He identifies three factors
contributing to this gap: the explosion of productivity made possible by a breathtaking speed of
technological innovation in the western industrialized countries, wrong internal approaches and
models to development, and unfair and disfunctional world market structures. Id. at 16-17.
2. U.N. DEP'T FOR ECON. & SOC. INFO. & POLICY ANALYSIS, WORLD ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL SURVEY,
1995, at 5, U.N. Doc. ST/ESA/243 (1995) [hereinafter WORLD ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL SURVEY, 1995].
The United Nations report sums up donor countries' concerns: after 30 or more years of development
assistance, questions are increasingly being asked about the appropriate duration of aid: how long
should a country require ODA inflows before its development becomes self-sustaining? Id. at 131.
3. Holger Jensen, Genuine Democracy Eludes African Nations, DENV. ROCKY MOUNTAIN NEWS, Jan.
21, 1996, at 59A.
4. WORLD ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL SURVEY, 1995, supra note 2, at 129. Many industrialized countries
coordinate their aid through the Development Assistance Committee (DAC) of the Organisation for
Economic Co-operation and Development. While over the past 20 years DAC aid had remained fairly
stable, in 1993 it also dropped as part of a major reassessment of aid programmes, signaling a
long-feared stagnation and perhaps even decline in total ODA [official development assistance]. Id. at
130. The United Nations noted DAC members' concerns over the United States's withdrawal from a
leadership role. Id. at 131.
5. JOHN H. JACKSON ET AL., LEGAL PROBLEMS OF INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC RELATIONS: CASES,](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/glj86&div=16&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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Trade Liberalization: De Facto Neocolonialsim in West Africa
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