Learning to Learn in Africa

I have often been asked why Africa, after finding a few good leaders in the mid Twentieth Century, has been subjected to a list of terrible leaders. Africa is accused of being the cause of its misery often, with varying degrees of subtlety. But one accusation within this family of accusations that is not made loudly or frequently enough, in my opinion, is that Africa is a continent not of dicators and thieves, but merely of bad managers.

Two things happened today that prompted this blog post, neither of them revolutionary, but each of them contributory.

The first contributory thing: I recently finished re-reading Howard W. French’s excellent book on Africa, which is also (though unintentionally) a wonderful treatise on how (and how not) to be a correspondent in a remote place. French’s eye (and, often, ear) for a story is Hemingwayesque and one can immediately see how his career got fast-tracked at the New York Times. In his book, A Continent for the Taking, he reviews some of his favourite stories from his time on the Continent, often with new twists or a nod to aspects that may not have made it into the Times.

The last time I’d read French’s book was near the tripoint that joins Uganda, South Sudan, and Kenya. At the time, that part of South Sudan was still united with its geographically contiguous but culturally alien neighbours to the north. As someone about to move to Africa as a full-time resident of Uganda, the stories of Idi Amin’s reign and Museveni’s savvy were captivating warnings. Flipping the pages of the book felt like climbing into a cinematic time machine, one that somehow displayed Africa’s future by displaying its past – the two often being depressingly similar. I highly recommend it, and doubly so for those who have lived in Africa.

The other contributory thing: I spoke recently with Guy Pfefferman, who is one of the people leading the push toward better business education in Africa. Pfefferman may seem a strange foil for French in this blog post, as he’s very far from the New York Times’s legendary foreign correspondent desk. But Pfefferman and French are connected by a strong tie. For fifteen years, Pfefferman, as Chief Economist at the IFC (a captive for-profit company within the World Bank Group), helped create and implement the policies that, in ripples and crashing waves, hit the shores from which French reported.

The thesis upon which Pfefferman’s work today – improving the business education of those in the developing world – depends is itself fascinating, if true: That people in developing countries with business education tend to outperform those without business education. This is interesting for three reasons.

First, it is interesting because it suggests that, contrary to much of the anthropological literature on entrepreneurs in muddy villages, local knowledge is not the only needed ingredient to be a successful entrepreneur in a developing country. Second, it may mean that business school components (let’s call this “MBA Lite”) may be able to be packaged in a way that is more affordable, more digestible, and more relevant to such businesspeople, hence further increasing the advantages available by obtaining this type of education. Third, and perhaps most exciting, it suggests that basic business skills like drafting and consuming standardised financial statements or understanding the basics of accounting are things that not only improve business literacy but actually improve business performance. If true, there are serious governance implications, as these things are the primordial ooze from which things like modern audit functions evolve.

That State governance and business governance in Africa are both poor is not a coincidence. Often in Africa, the State is simply the largest poorly-managed business in a given area.

However, the corruption, the coups, the violence that characterise why Western businesspeople don’t want to do business in Africa are not culturally-embedded in Africa. People do not embezzle from the treasury, kill their leaders, or participate in riots on the street because they are Africans. They participate in these activities for a far simpler reason: because they can. Every problem in Africa, including the collapse of governments, begins with a crime of opportunity. And bad management, bad governance, bad incentives create opportunities for bad things to happen.

Only with good governance can people feel they operate within a set of rules that others will respect, obey, and enforce. We learn from French’s writings that, time and again, no quantity of good intentions from the many can overcome the temptation to do wrong among the few. We learn from Pfefferman’s thesis that people can be taught things that not only improve their understanding of the world, but also improve their standing in it and the opportunities they enjoy.

I do not claim that one can build a society based on an “MBA Lite” business school curriculum; however, I do think that improving the business literacy of the many helps police the behaviour of the few. It is immensely more difficult to commit large-scale fraud in a culture where at least one or two people at every important conference room in the country can decipher financial statements quickly and accurately. It is very hard to commit large-scale embezzlement when basic checks exist from a governance and budget perspective. Meanwhile, is much easier to raise capital, build partnerships, or explain one’s business plan when financial literacy is appreciated, widespread, and expected.

Much work in Africa has been frustrated, many good political candidates lost, and many otherwise-robust development plans thwarted because of something both French and Pfefferman observe: the lack of the basic skills needed to understand, analyse, and ask the right questions before things get out of hand. I once heard a friend who had lived in Johannesburg say, “People don’t ask those questions in Africa because questions like that get you killed.” That is, indeed, true… but especially so if you ask them much too late.