Shorbe, can't argue with any of that. Re Yugoslavia, I think that the disaster there had a lot to do with the repression under Tito. With the lifting of centralised control the incompatible parts sprang apart, a little like what is currently happening in Iraq. I worked with a Bosnian Serb, a journalist, who had narrowly escaped death (had his throat cut but survived). Albeit that his English was limited, he couldn't explain what had happened in the Balkans, just shook his head and said "for me Bosnia is finish, I'm Australian now".

I don't argue that all Africa's problems are colonial borders, nor can all blame be laid at the feet of colonial powers or the IMF. Free trade certainly might help, but unfortunately multilateral agreement recedes ever further into the future. The whole notion of globalism rings rather hollow when capital is free to travel about, but goods and people are caught in an intricate web of restrictions.

In response to Proud to be Indonesian (PTBI):
Most discussions which involve slavery & colonialism can be summarized as ‘Westerners bad – others good’ The reality is rather different, African slavery was not confined to western societies. Black African societies also enslaved & massacred other Africans, on a major scale. The Arabs & Turks also made much use of African slaves. Arab slave trading began in the 7th Century (long before western slavery) and ended around 1911 (more than a century after western slave trading was abolished ) it accounted for an estimated 14 million Africans.

I suspect the reason why activists like to portray slavery as an exclusively a western crime is because they perceive that they are more likely to successfully run the ‘you owe us’ scam on western liberal democracies.

If the rationale for giving aid was to recompense for our past crimes( as PTBI implies) I would have thought that all the trillions of dollars we have since pumped into Africa in infrastructure ,machinery ,food etc would have more than paid off our crime by now ( we must be serving one of those “never to be released sentences” )

The poverty in Africa has little to do with slavery or colonialism and more to do with mis-management (which encompasses over-spending/mis-spending , overpopulation. & inappropriate values).

Many of these countries had great success in doubling, tripling & even quadrupling their populations since independence, but have not given the same commitment to supporting themselves.

If nations want to stay “proud” & “sovereign” they need to take responsibility & they need to take initiatives, and they can start by ditching archaic values which tell them they can ‘go forth & multiply” and the rest of the world will pick-up the bill.

Incidentally PTBI, (following-on from your line of reasoning re Australia)since the Arabs on the back of the slave trade, prospered & spread their values far & wide
, and Indonesia inherited much of its religious & cultural foundations (either directly or indirectly ) from the Arabs, would not Indonesia owe a “debt to Africans” as well?