AHC: Industrialized and Prosperous Africa

JJohnson

Banned
The challenge is, to have at least a quarter to a third of the African continent with a stable, prosperous, first/second-world country or set of countries with: paved roads, electricity, sewage, A/C, modern sanitary health care, relatively modern cars, safe drinking water across the country, people with a per capita income enough to let them purchase cars, TVs, video games and the like, at any point after 1800, using the colonial powers (UK, France, Spain, Germany). People from those countries would be able to afford to take vacations and fly to Europe or America. The environment would be safe/clean and have a moderate environmental policy to prevent pollution and exhausting resources. This should preferrably come with as little change to other countries' development as possible.

Which countries have the best chance for this, and which kind of timeline would you see leading to this?
 
its been said many times but, if the original plans for decolonization went through, the last african countries would gain independents around 2003 and they would have western standards.

Of course the neo-colonial superpowers prevented this from happening.
 
And the paleo-colonial powers actually improving things to that level is almost as believable as that the White Man's Burden was taken seriously while they were profiting from those colonies.

Almost.
 
its been said many times but, if the original plans for decolonization went through, the last african countries would gain independents around 2003 and they would have western standards.

Of course the neo-colonial superpowers prevented this from happening.

Oh for Christ's sake, are you serious? It has been said many times, but it is as wrong an assumption as the Nazis landing on the moon, let alone the cliffs of Dover. Do you realize how broke Britain and France were after the war, or how expensive the colonies were? They weren't in any sort of position to fund such a massive empire.

Economically imagine what they would be trying to do: develop agriculture in Africa to compete with farmers in the US, Canada, and Argentina; at the same time paying them wages high enough to live first world life styles. It doesn't make any sense.
 
You're going to need a POD, several of them in fact, well before the Scramble begins in earnest, and each of them will likely have to be in Africa itself, involving Africans. I mean its not impossible, but we're talking about feudal states pulling themselves up by their own bootstraps to at least a proton-industrial level before the imperial/colonial powers can step in and break everything.

Its certainly possible, there were glimmers of what would be needed to meet such an AHC in some of the West African states in the early 19th century, and in Egypt well up until the British Intervention; again though its just not likely without the exact set of circumstances coming together just right.

Jonathan Edelstein's Malê Rising is probably right up your alley if this is something you're interested in.
 
You're going to need a POD, several of them in fact, well before the Scramble begins in earnest, and each of them will likely have to be in Africa itself, involving Africans. I mean its not impossible, but we're talking about feudal states pulling themselves up by their own bootstraps to at least a proton-industrial level before the imperial/colonial powers can step in and break everything.

Its certainly possible, there were glimmers of what would be needed to meet such an AHC in some of the West African states in the early 19th century, and in Egypt well up until the British Intervention; again though its just not likely without the exact set of circumstances coming together just right.

Jonathan Edelstein's Malê Rising is probably right up your alley if this is something you're interested in.

Completely agreed. Everything wolf_brother said is correct.

There's another scenario which is a little more out there. This one's post-colonial.

A properly chosen POD in the Eastern Front of World War II would lead to a scenario which includes both the defeat of Nazi Germany and the collapse of the Soviet Union, and thus the general decline of international communism.

Without the Cold War, the US is much less likely to support tinpot dictators in Africa, and there'll be fewer rebellions, coups, civil wars, and militants sponsored by either the US or the Soviet Union across the continent.

Without that negative interference, some parts of Western, Southern and Eastern Africa could easily become prosperous first world nations by today. A look at South Korea, Taiwan, or Italy shows how possible it is to pull a country up from grinding poverty. It wouldn't be a universal renaissance, but you'd have a much more stable and prosperous Africa.

Cheers,
Ganesha
 
Without the Cold War, the US is much less likely to support tinpot dictators in Africa, and there'll be fewer rebellions, coups, civil wars, and militants sponsored by either the US or the Soviet Union across the continent.

There may be fewer wars, coups, rebellions sponsored by the superpowers, but I greatly question whether there'd be fewer wars, coups, and rebellions than IOTL.

Much of the political disturbances in Africa were/are local in origin. The various sides simply found it expedient to cover themselves in various rhetoric to get backing and support from one side or the other. Certainly the fact that people felt they could get support from one of the superpowers may have encouraged them to go through their plans, but I don't think there'd be noticeably fewer of them. Ethnic tensions, immaturity of political institutions, low numbers of the middle class, low levels of education and literacy, and other indigenous factors of political stability are the real root causes of problems in Africa, not superpower rivalry.
 
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