Ghanaian entrepreneur: growth hindered by foreign aid [PovertyCure DVD Series]

In this clip from the PovertyCure DVD Series (see http://www.povertycure.org/dvd-series/), Ghanaian software entrepreneur Herman Chinery-Hesse describes how foreign aid can often inhibit growth for local businesses.

"When elephants fight, the grass suffers... political parties rely on foreign aid more than tax revenue so they are more interested in a smile on the World Bank country director's face than the success of my business." — Herman Chinery Hesse, Ghanaian Software Entrepreneur

Capitalism. It is divisive word weighed down with ideological baggage and one that appears primarily in caricatures drawn by its proponents and critics alike.

It is safe to say that many in the poverty and social justice realm look upon capitalism with heavy skepticism bordering on disdain, which explains why Bono's admission of capitalism's unrivaled benefits for the world's poor at a Georgetown University address has had such significant long-tail staying power on the web. "Aid is just a stop-gap," admitted Bono. "Commerce [and] entrepreneurial capitalism takes more people out of poverty than aid."

In 2007, renowned Ugandan journalist Andrew Mwenda articulated the exact same point during his TED presentation, only to be heckled and even cursed at by Bono. Then just over one year ago in a 2012 speech on the European debt crisis, Bono again doubled down on aid saying, "Of course we still need aid ... Does anyone disagree? Anyone apart from brain-dead, heart-dead ideologues or professional controversialists? Come on. Every sensible person knows that." Just a few months later in an interview with Forbes preceding his Georgetown address, he was back on the pro-business side Bono describing his learning the role of commerce as "humbling" as someone who "got into this as a righteous anger activist with all the cliches." Aid proponents defend the coherency of these statements based on the belief that the recipe for prosperity must necessarily involve partnerships between aid organizations and the private sector. Yet there exists no empirical evidence nor historical precedent to support this ideology. On the contrary, such "collaboration" has often turned into "collusion" where politically powerful corporate elites (some of whom are "public servants" themselves") use the mechanisms of aid to enrich themselves and produce lucrative returns for their political benefactors. More than being a catalyst for development, aid has often been a conduit for crony capitalism. Just step into the shoes of Ghanaian software entrepreneur Herman Chinery-Hesse.

History is instructive. In his interview with us, Chinery-Hesse continued his criticism saying, "I have never heard of a country that developed on aid; if you know of one, let me know. I know countries that developed on trade, and innovation and business. I don't know of any country in the world where a bunch of foreigners came in and developed the country." What's dangerous about Bono's twin endorsements of aid and capitalism is that has consistently shouted down the Andrew Mwenda's of the world, who are neither brain-dead nor heart-dead, who try to explain how these two might be in conflict with one another and how his strain of top-down foreign aid can have and has had deleterious effects on the economies, political climates, and cultures of recipient nations. If Bono is sincere, I would encourage him to issue a formal public apology to Mr. Mwenda.

http://www.PovertyCure.org
  / povertycure  
  / povertycure  
  / povertycure  

PovertyCure is an international coalition of organizations and individuals committed to entrepreneurial solutions to poverty that challenge the status quo and champion the creative potential of the human person.