AFRO-NETS> The missionary position: NGOs and development in Africa (2)

[Claudio Schuftan <aviva@netnam.vn>]

The missionary position: NGOs and development in Africa (2)
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Development NGOs operating in Africa have inadvertently become part 
of the neo-liberal global agenda, serving to undermine the battle for 
social justice and human rights in much the same way as their mis-
sionary predecessors, argues a paper in the July issue of Interna-
tional Affairs. The paper says that the contribution of NGOs to re-
lieving poverty is minimal, while they play a ?significant role? in 
undermining the struggle of African people to emancipate themselves 
from economic, social and political oppression. In this compromised 
position, NGOs face a stark choice: They can move into the political 
domain and support social movements that seek to challenge a social 
system that benefits a few and impoverishes the majority; or they can 
continue unchanged and thus become complicit in a system that leaves 
the majority in misery. 

Entitled ?The Missionary Position: NGOs and Development in Africa?, 
and co- authored by Firoze Manji and Carl O?Coill, the paper traces 
the emergence and role of NGOs on the continent from their missionary 
beginnings through to the discourse of ?development? that emerged in 
the post-independence period and the later influence of structural 
adjustment programmes and globalisation. 

Beginning in colonial Africa, the paper argues that missionary or-
ganisations played a key role in winning the ideological war that 
supported the colonial apparatus. ?While colonial philanthropy may 
have been motivated by religious conviction, status, compassion or 
guilt, it was also motivated by fear. In Britain and the colonies 
alike, politicians frequently alluded to the threat of revolution and 
actively encouraged greater interest in works of benevolence as a so-
lution to social unrest. In short, charity was not only designed to 
help the poor, it also served to protect the rich.? 

In some cases, charitable organisations ?actively? helped to suppress 
anti- colonial struggles, as was the case in Kenya, where the Women?s 
Association, Maendeleo Ya Wanawake (MYWO) and the Christian Council 
of Kenya (CCK) were both involved in government-funded schemes de-
signed to subvert black resistance during the ?Mau Mau? uprising. 

But independence created a crisis for these organisations because 
they had in many cases opposed nationalistic tendencies. However, in-
stead of dying a natural death they were in fact able to prosper ­ a 
result Manji and O?Coill argue was due to the emergence of the ?de-
velopment NGO? on the national and international stage. 

Independence, they argue, had forced missionary societies and chari-
table organisations to reinvent their attitude of ?trusteeship? asso-
ciated with colonial oppression. They did this by replacing white 
staff with black and revamping their ideological outlook by appropri-
ating the new discourse on ?development? in place of overt racism. 

The difference was in name only, say the authors. Development dis-
course was flawed from the beginning because non-Western people were 
defined by their divergence from Western cultural standards. ?While 
the vision of ?development? appeared to offer a more inclusive path 
to ?progress? than had previously been the case, in fact the dis-
course was little more than a superficial reformulation of old colo-
nial prejudices.? 

However, during this time period NGOs were regarded by development 
agencies as playing a peripheral role in development, with the state 
assuming overarching responsibility for this role. This meant that 
the role of NGOs in the post- independent period remained marginal. 

This was set to change with a new set of political circumstances that 
led to a boom in NGOs on the continent. The late 1970s saw the rise 
to power of Margaret Thatcher in the UK and Ronald Reagan in the US, 
with both leaders championing the concept of the minimalist state. 
According to this outlook the state had to take a backseat in devel-
opment and create the economic conditions for the accumulation of 
wealth by a minority. The rest of society would begin to benefit when 
growth ?trickled down? from the wealthy. This neo-liberal agenda 
?radically? altered the landscape of development practice say Manji 
and O?Coill. 

African countries were at this time heavily in debt and this gave the 
multilateral lending agencies the leverage they needed to impose 
their neo-liberal policy demands, something that was not always 
popular with African people. Manji and O?Coill argue that unhappiness 
with economic adjustment and its policies was often widespread and 
led to demonstrations that were sometimes violently suppressed. The 
protests in turn led to an attempt by lending agencies to present a 
?human face? to their policies. What emerged was the ?good govern-
ance? agenda of the 1990s and the decision to co-opt NGOs and other 
civil society organisations to a repackaged programme of welfare pro-
vision. 

NGOs suddenly found themselves in the situation where they usurped 
the state as the provider of social services to the ?vulnerable? and 
became the beneficiaries of funds intended to mitigate the inequali-
ties of adjustment policies. This had a ?profound? impact on the sec-
tor and together with an increase in their function as a conduit for 
government aid led to dramatic growth in the number of NGOs in Af-
rica. 

Globalisation therefore led to a ?loss of authority? by African 
states over social development and policy. At the same time, Manji 
and O?Coill point out, social conditions worsened because of external 
controls over areas such as health, education and welfare measures 
and social programmes, tax concessions on profits, liberalisation of 
price controls, and dismantling of state owned enterprises. 

In fact, development appears to have failed, says the paper, with 
real per capita GDP falling and welfare gains achieved after inde-
pendence reversed. Per-capita incomes in Sub-Saharan Africa fell by 
21 percent in real terms between 1981 and 1989. In 16 other Sub-
Saharan countries per capita incomes were lower in 1999 than in 1975. 

The situation in which NGOs thrived, was therefore one of continued 
poverty and an increase in armed conflict. ?As African governments 
increasingly become pushed into becoming caretakers of what might be 
described as the peripheral Bantustans of globalisation, are we see-
ing a return to the colonial paradigm in which social services are 
delivered on the basis of favour or charity and their power to pla-
cate?? 

Manji and O?Coill state that NGOs have come to be preferred to the 
state as providers of services. ?Development NGOs have become an in-
tegral, and necessary, part of a system that sacrifices respect for 
justice and rights. They have taken the ?missionary position? ­ ser-
vice delivery, running projects that are motivated by charity, pity 
and doing things for people (implicitly who can?t do it for them-
selves), albeit with the verbiage of participatory approaches.? 

Manji and O?Coill use the example of apartheid South Africa to illus-
trate the choice open to NGOs. NGOs either supported the emerging 
movements that aimed to topple the Nationalist regime or they kept 
quiet ­ a position tantamount to complicity with a system of exploi-
tation. 

?The challenge that both local and Western NGOs face in making this 
choice will be that funding ­ at least from the bilateral and multi-
lateral agencies ­ will not necessarily be forthcoming to support the 
struggle for emancipation. But then, one would hardly have expected 
the apartheid regime in South Africa to have funded the movement that 
brought about the downfall of the regime,? the paper concludes. 

Published in International Affairs, 78:3 (2002) 567-83. 

--
Claudio Schuftan
Hanoi, Vietnam
mailto:aviva@netnam.vn

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