Is it immoral to provide aid to the Horn of Africa?

[O.Chrysostomos]

This may be a controversial topic for debate and I'll probably be accused of racism or bigotry or being inhuman, however the fact remains that this area of the world has one of the largest growing populations; since the 60s the West has been providing aid for the region due to droughts occurring with alarming regularity. This aid has not been used to build infrastructure and to educate the population about birth control and agriculture but instead has just been used to create an ever burgeoning population. One is left feeling that perhaps they are having this many children to blackmail the West, in an ever escalating cycle.

The population in Ethiopia alone has doubled since 1990, Somalia's has tripled.

Therefore, would it be more moral to provide them with aid one last time but with the condition that they implement birth control such as China did in the 70s and 80s? If not, then more children will be born, another drought will invariably occur, and the ones to suffer most will be children.

If morality is based on, for the sake of argument, the greatest good for the greatest amount of people but giving aid to the Horn of Africa results directly in many children being born in an environment that can't support them and thus the overall amount of resources to be distributed amongst the people diminishes ever further, overall we can see that the net amount of misery to good has increased rather than decreased.

In light of that would it be logical or sound to say that giving aid to the Horn of Africa is immoral as rather than resulting in a boon to many it instead causes more misery?

[mw2xboxplayer]

Aid to locations such as those you mentioned in Africa should be focused on long term goals that will eventually allow the supported countries to provide for themselves. These aided countries obviously cannot support such large populations on their own, and Western aid only will continue to inflame the issue unless the aid is focused towards self-sustaining projects.

The problem is that the aid programs which focus on long-term projects often fail, and turn out to be a huge wate of time, effort and most importantly money.

[Visna]

This may be a controversial topic for debate and I'll probably be accused of racism or bigotry or being inhuman, however the fact remains that this area of the world has one of the largest growing populations; since the 60s the West has been providing aid for the region due to droughts occurring with alarming regularity. This aid has not been used to build infrastructure and to educate the population about birth control and agriculture but instead has just been used to create an ever burgeoning population. One is left feeling that perhaps they are having this many children to blackmail the West, in an ever escalating cycle.

The population in Ethiopia alone has doubled since 1990, Somalia's has tripled.

Therefore, would it be more moral to provide them with aid one last time but with the condition that they implement birth control such as China did in the 70s and 80s? If not, then more children will be born, another drought will invariably occur, and the ones to suffer most will be children.

If morality is based on, for the sake of argument, the greatest good for the greatest amount of people but giving aid to the Horn of Africa results directly in many children being born in an environment that can't support them and thus the overall amount of resources to be distributed amongst the people diminishes ever further, overall we can see that the net amount of misery to good has increased rather than decreased.

In light of that would it be logical or sound to say that giving aid to the Horn of Africa is immoral as rather than resulting in a boon to many it instead causes more misery?

I take it from your post you mean developmental assistance and such, and not, say, military aid or emergency food aid?
It's not so much the quantity that's the issue, although pretty much all industrialised nations fall short of the 0.7% of GNI mark they agreed on back in 1970, it's the quality. Emergency food aid has ironically proven the most effective in terms of helping people directly. With a few exceptions, such as Somalia where hunger has been used as a weapon by the various warlords, emergency food aid has on the whole lived up to it's name.
The developmental aid is a whole other issue for a number of reasons.
The money is often wasted on conditions that the recipient must use (overpriced) goods and services provided by the donors in the projects. The donors design aid to serve their own strategic and economic interests, not the interests of those who need it.
Protectionism and trade barriers dwarfs developmental assistance. The old phrase about teaching a man to fish etc is all good in theory, but in the practical world it's not applicable. The donors use one hand to "teach a man to fish", while the other hand is used to ensure that his newly learnt fishing skills will still keep him on a minimum existance because he can't sell his fish. And to make matters worse donors use aid as leverage to force the recipients to purchase goods.
Huge amounts of corruption and embezzlement etc often results in the money dwindling away before the funds reach those who need them the most.
With the end of the Cold War aid decreased dramatically because it was no longer as necessary as before for the donors to purchase, or at least lease, loyalty. With the "new" threat of terrorism interest has been sparked again, but still much below the 0.7% GNI mark.

Reliance on aid is not a good idea on the long term, a financial crisis will often see donors become more cautious with their money for example, but for some countries there simply isn't a choice because even the short term is uncertain.

[Axeman]

I take it from your post you mean developmental assistance and such, and not, say, military aid or emergency food aid?
It's not so much the quantity that's the issue, although pretty much all industrialised nations fall short of the 0.7% of GNI mark they agreed on back in 1970, it's the quality. Emergency food aid has ironically proven the most effective in terms of helping people directly. With a few exceptions, such as Somalia where hunger has been used as a weapon by the various warlords, emergency food aid has on the whole lived up to it's name.
The developmental aid is a whole other issue for a number of reasons.
The money is often wasted on conditions that the recipient must use (overpriced) goods and services provided by the donors in the projects. The donors design aid to serve their own strategic and economic interests, not the interests of those who need it.
Protectionism and trade barriers dwarfs developmental assistance. The old phrase about teaching a man to fish etc is all good in theory, but in the practical world it's not applicable. The donors use one hand to "teach a man to fish", while the other hand is used to ensure that his newly learnt fishing skills will still keep him on a minimum existance because he can't sell his fish. And to make matters worse donors use aid as leverage to force the recipients to purchase goods.
Huge amounts of corruption and embezzlement etc often results in the money dwindling away before the funds reach those who need them the most.
With the end of the Cold War aid decreased dramatically because it was no longer as necessary as before for the donors to purchase, or at least lease, loyalty. With the "new" threat of terrorism interest has been sparked again, but still much below the 0.7% GNI mark.

Reliance on aid is not a good idea on the long term, a financial crisis will often see donors become more cautious with their money for example, but for some countries there simply isn't a choice because even the short term is uncertain.

As the resident African *Afrikaaner* I was going to say something along these lines, now I just feel that there is no point in me typing anything else because you hit pretty much every main point I wanted to. Spot on.

[Justice and Mercy]

Not for that reason, no! That is absolutely monstrous. It is not YOUR place to decide who's life will be worth living and who's won't, it's not ANYONE'S place.

It is immoral for another reason entirely: Those regions are able to live the way they do ONLY because of the aid we give to them.

[Ancient Aliens]

While I agree with your premise (aid should be directed at infrastructure, agriculture, and education), I disagree with some of your thoughts. Increases in population growth rate in Africa correlate with the influx of modern medicines and agricultural techniques, not with Western aid.

[Justice and Mercy]

One is left feeling that perhaps they are having this many children to blackmail the West, in an ever escalating cycle.

I missed this, but it deserves special comment: Really? You think they're having kids to "blackmail" the West? How is this being organized, and what exactly does this "blackmail" entail?

Do you even know what "blackmail" means?

[O.Chrysostomos]

While I agree with your premise (aid should be directed at infrastructure, agriculture, and education), I disagree with some of your thoughts. Increases in population growth rate in Africa correlate with the influx of modern medicines and agricultural techniques, not with Western aid.

So you think that without the billions in aid we've poured into that area the population would still be as high as it currently is and growing? Wasn't the influx in modern medicine paid for with aid?

I missed this, but it deserves special comment: Really? You think they're having kids to "blackmail" the West? How is this being organized, and what exactly does this "blackmail" entail?

Do you even know what "blackmail" means?

Yes I do thanks, do you know what emotional blackmail means?. Children work better at the pulling of heart strings, they make for more poignant photo-ops for charities. Tell me, why do they have so many children if they can't support them?

Those regions are able to live the way they do ONLY because of the aid we give to them.

That's my point, they are able to reproduce so much only because of the aid we give them; without this aid fewer children would have been born, the population wouldn't be as high and so there would be less misery in that part of the world. Instead aid has created an artificial ecosystem for these people where they can't survive now without it.

The money is often wasted on conditions that the recipient must use (overpriced) goods and services provided by the donors in the projects. The donors design aid to serve their own strategic and economic interests, not the interests of those who need it.

Interesting, so you're saying in some cases the aid is merely a round-about backhander to the organisation giving the aid, a kind of convoluted embezzlement? Or am I misunderstanding?

[Ancient Aliens]

So you think that without the billions in aid we've poured into that area the population would still be as high as it currently is and growing? Wasn't the influx in modern medicine paid for with aid?

Not necessarily, a majority of the developments in Africa have come about directly because of the process of globalization.

[Justice and Mercy]

Yes I do thanks, do you know what emotional blackmail means?.

I don't communicate so imprecisely.

Children work better at the pulling of heart strings, they make for more poignant photo-ops for charities. Tell me, why do they have so many children if they can't support them?

Why? You think there's a rational reason for it?

They don't exactly plan it. They want to have sex but don't care enough to plan appropriately.

They're psychologically broken. It takes an incredible individual to come out of such a culture otherwise.

That's my point, they are able to reproduce so much only because of the aid we give them; without this aid fewer children would have been born, the population wouldn't be as high and so there would be less misery in that part of the world. Instead aid has created an artificial ecosystem for these people where they can't survive now without it.

That's not the point I'm making, so no, it's not "your point."

Stopping the reproduction is not a goal of mine at all. I want their society to collapse. I want their culture to change.

Otherwise, the rest is meaningless.

[mw2xboxplayer]

Stopping the reproduction is not a goal of mine at all. I want their society to collapse. I want their culture to change.

Cutting the aid now would be a huge waste of time and effort. Instead of letting their society fall apart to internal violence and war (eliminating all benefits gained through previous aid); aid should be sent to fund long-term projects that will increase the counties' own productivity and self-sufficiency.

This way the African counties will eventually be able to come off foreign aid, and the population will be able to survive by their own means.

[Justice and Mercy]

Cutting the aid now would be a huge waste of time and effort.

Continuing the aid now would be an ever larger waste of time and effort.

Instead of letting their society fall apart to internal violence and war (eliminating all benefits gained through previous aid); aid should be sent to fund long-term projects that will increase the counties' own productivity and self-sufficiency.

Can't work. Self-sufficiency isn't a product of material possessions, but of the individuals mind. When one is taking a large number of individuals into account, the culmination of their individual beliefs and ideas are their "culture", and it's THIS which must change.

In both one man's life and the lives of millions, philosophy is the determining force.

[Visna]

Interesting, so you're saying in some cases the aid is merely a round-about backhander to the organisation giving the aid, a kind of convoluted embezzlement? Or am I misunderstanding?

Instead of thinking of it as aid, think of it as a sponsorship. The answer to the eternal question "who gets the most out of aid, the donors or the recipients?" is a mighty blurred affair. The donors want something for their money, and they'll go to varying lengths to ensure their return.
Let's say you have company A which specializes in fertilising soil. They want to sponsor a new corn field in Sudan, run by modern methods of production. Arguably a fine goal, modern production methods can greatly increase the number of people a corn field can support. Not only does it provide food for both humans and animals, but also jobs. But company A is not acting out of altruism, so they want the recipients to use it's daughter companies, B and C, to provide the GMO crops and water sprinklers. Companies B and C eye an opportunity for certain profit and increase the price of their products.
Both private cooperations and government developmental assistance projects operate in the same way. The search for profit drives capitalism and that's all well and good, but it annoys me when they call it something it's not. It's not "aid", it's sponsorships, it's not "a social profile", it's a way to make money. Real developmental aid would require some fundamental changes, after all what good is a corn field run by modern methods of production if the local workers still have to walk 20 miles to the nearest town with a processing plant (also sponsored by someone else) because of a lack of proper transport and a lousy infrastructure.
And that's not even beginning to touch upon the great scourge in the vast majority of the sub-Saharan states, the vast corruption. Or the trade barriers by the donor states for that matter.

[The Holy Pilgrim]

Tell me, why do they have so many children if they can't support them?

Lack of safe sex practices? Ignorance towards safe sex (aka they don't know about it)?

And besides, isn't it the charities themselves offering aid to the orphaned children over in Africa? I don't think that they are forcing children to force more developed countries to send them food. Some of those kids lost their parents to either disease or somebody else trying to take what they have. Why would they use up precious time trying to come up with some master-plan that you believe is in place when they are too busy trying to keep their siblings fed and alive? I mean, jeepers. That's a really terrible thing to think that they are doing that over there in Africa.

[basics]

" In light of that would it be logical or sound to say that giving aid to the Horn of Africa is immoral as rather than resulting in a boon to many it instead causes more misery? "

O.Chrysostomos,

An African economics expert said recently that the EU alone has given 3 trillion pounds in aid over a decade to African countries yet no significant improvement has been made where aid has become expected. He said that in countries where very little aid if any is given there is improvement meaning that them who sit back expecting aid do very little for themselves.

It is very strange that we saw a new country being instituted yesterday with a lot of ceremony and cost yet not a few miles from where that was taking place people were dying of hunger and this new country has oil. I am speaking of South Sudan which just happens to be part of the Horn of Africa. So what is going on here?

That said, it is very hard not to be affected by the pictures of starving people especially babies so we do have a responsibility to help, but surely that help must not be so that they can have more babies in an environment which cannot possibly support them. If the Arabs and Jews can turn deserts into gardens why not the African? So help yes, but that help must come with responsibilities and that from their leaders especially their religious leaders.

[Tankbuster]

This overpopulation problem has been noticed by many people, because it's just a fact that -international aid or not- it will prove incredibly difficult to sustain such a gigantic population with such an abysmal infrastructure.

One of the solutions that have been offered that I feel should at least be on the table, is Peter Singer's idea that we should be offering large monetary rewards to those who are willing to sterilise themselves after their first or second child.

This suggestion obviously needs to be fleshed out more (and culture and specific circumstances need to be taken into account) but overall it seems that this idea would be one of the more effective ways of actually helping Africa -provided it could be practically implemented. As Visna points out though, there are other more fundamental problems that need to be addressed as well.

[Denny Crane!]

This overpopulation problem has been noticed by many people, because it's just a fact that -international aid or not- it will prove incredibly difficult to sustain such a gigantic population with such an abysmal infrastructure.

One of the solutions that have been offered that I feel should at least be on the table, is Peter Singer's idea that we should be offering large monetary rewards to those who are willing to sterilise themselves after their first or second child.

This suggestion obviously needs to be fleshed out more (and culture and specific circumstances need to be taken into account) but overall it seems that this idea would be one of the more effective ways of actually helping Africa -provided it could be practically implemented. As Visna points out though, there are other more fundamental problems that need to be addressed as well.

Absolutely. I mean there is precedent for this actually and if you want to know more about it check out the stuff you should know podcast that details this and some of the more questionable moral implications of a woman that pays drug addicts to be sterilised rather than having them have 3=5 children they are hopelessly incapable of taking care of and quite likely to abuse.

The same thing could be set up in Africa though the moral and ethical outrage would be heard from London to Argentina. I am quite certain that it is actually moral if approached in the right way.

[Visna]

Absolutely. I mean there is precedent for this actually and if you want to know more about it check out the stuff you should know podcast that details this and some of the more questionable moral implications of a woman that pays drug addicts to be sterilised rather than having them have 3=5 children they are hopelessly incapable of taking care of and quite likely to abuse.

The same thing could be set up in Africa though the moral and ethical outrage would be heard from London to Argentina. I am quite certain that it is actually moral if approached in the right way.

It's certainly a more moral way of regulating population growth than leaning back and letting X-hundred thousand people starve to death. But it runs into some fundamental issues, the lack of social system, a weak central government (I know you're an anarchist so you probably won't agree on that last one <3) etc. But as long as it's voluentary it could be a way to go about it. But for someone whose primary concern is to avoid starvation, terms such as 'voluentary' become a bit hollow I think.

[Denny Crane!]

It's certainly a more moral way of regulating population growth than leaning back and letting X-hundred thousand people starve to death. But it runs into some fundamental issues, the lack of social system, a weak central government (I know you're an anarchist so you probably won't agree on that last one <3) etc. But as long as it's voluentary it could be a way to go about it. But for someone whose primary concern is to avoid starvation, terms such as 'voluentary' become a bit hollow I think.

Hey I certainly have no problems with a decent central government at some stage and since I'm not spitting out answers for how an anarchist system would work I'll happily work within the system to improve it and that includes Africa which as a topic I'm quite passionate about. I'm not sure how the lack of a social system applies in this case since this could be done without that. If you mean that is part of what the problem is...well yes perhaps since I'm assuming education and contraception aren't readily available, well I know they aren't.

The line between coercion and voluntary gets very thin and hard to see in this case but there are to many compelling points in its favour that exponential growth is unsustainable and damaging. It is a part of the problem and would help reduce poverty in these areas. I would say the many concerns and the fact that it is voluntary (just) outweigh the concerns. Though I suspect volunteers wouldn't be to numerous as I've heard one reason to have many children is mortality rates and it helps guarantee someone to look after you if your health declines.

[O.Chrysostomos]

It is very strange that we saw a new country being instituted yesterday with a lot of ceremony and cost yet not a few miles from where that was taking place people were dying of hunger and this new country has oil. I am speaking of South Sudan which just happens to be part of the Horn of Africa. So what is going on here?

That said, it is very hard not to be affected by the pictures of starving people especially babies so we do have a responsibility to help...

I wonder if the West would have made such a song and dance about Sudanese Blacks'/Christians' persecution if they didn't have oil there.

As I said elsewhere, they seem to be using their babies and children as a means to extort money from the guilt-prone West.

I don't communicate so imprecisely.

No, you just comprehend imprecisely and express yourself imprecisely.

Why? You think there's a rational reason for it?

They don't exactly plan it. They want to have sex but don't care enough to plan appropriately.

They're psychologically broken. It takes an incredible individual to come out of such a culture otherwise.

That's rather presumptuous of you to call not only for cultural genocide but also to accuse them of being psychologically broken.

They know the consequence of having sex, they know they're in a drought with famine, they know Westerners love feeling good about themselves when they help starving African babies...

That's not the point I'm making, so no, it's not "your point."

Stopping the reproduction is not a goal of mine at all. I want their society to collapse. I want their culture to change.

Otherwise, the rest is meaningless.

You said:

Those regions are able to live the way they do ONLY because of the aid we give to them.

My point was that

they are able to reproduce so much only because of the aid we give them; without this aid fewer children would have been born, the population wouldn't be as high and so there would be less misery in that part of the world. Instead aid has created an artificial ecosystem for these people where they can't survive now without it

You seem incapable of following a line of reason. What a pity.

Absolutely. I mean there is precedent for this actually and if you want to know more about it check out the stuff you should know podcast that details this and some of the more questionable moral implications of a woman that pays drug addicts to be sterilised rather than having them have 3=5 children they are hopelessly incapable of taking care of and quite likely to abuse.

The same thing could be set up in Africa though the moral and ethical outrage would be heard from London to Argentina. I am quite certain that it is actually moral if approached in the right way.

Are you proposing that women or men be paid to become sterile?