Africa for Africa

And for Americans, too | Mindy Belz

Illustration by Krieg Barrie

A Dutchman working for an American firm in Khartoum once told me, "The United States will one day regret that it stood by while everyone else got their foothold in Africa." At the time we were standing by big windows surveying bridges then being built across the White and Blue Niles by the Chinese, the Germans, and a skyscraper under construction by the Libyans: I disagreed that U.S. sanctions against Sudan had been a bad thing, but he insisted, "The United States has stood on its principles, but the economic effect is not only to lose business opportunities but to let others dictate ethical standards. And it's the United States whose ethical standards are needed."

It's hard for the U.S. government to get it right on Africa. When Washington engages, it's often accused of being heavy-handed and neocolonialist. When it disengages, it's accused of letting the world's second largest and second most populous continent suffer. The reality, of course, is somewhere in between.