Scottish "Independence" manifesto

[Hauldren Collider]

Perhaps HC was thinking about buyers of US bonds?

Yes. More specifically, US bonds + direct investment. Though I actually didn't realize UK direct investment was so high, and China's was so low. UK may actually still win. I don't feel like looking up the exact numbers.

[Dauphin]

Ken, he could've meant that China invests more in the U.S. than it (China) does in any other country.

[Dr Strangelove]

Perhaps HC was thinking about buyers of US bonds?

[kentonio]

I mean, for ****'s sake, China invests in the US more than any other country.

The UK is your largest foreign direct investor, not China.

With over $441 billion invested in the United States, the United Kingdom is the largest foreign direct investor. Japan is the second-largest foreign direct investor in the U.S. economy with about $289 billion in investments. Following the Japanese are the Dutch ($240 billion), the Germans ($215 billion), the Swiss ($212), the Canadians ($211 billion), the French ($199 billion) and Luxembourg ($190)

http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/RS21857.pdf

[Dauphin]

You can't have working democracy in places where large swathes of the population can't read (at least not if those people can vote).

Are you taking a dig at the South, or just being wistful?

[regexcellent]

At no point did Britain ever have any real influence over "most" of Africa, so that's a lofty claim.

The French and British empires did have real influence over the parts where they built railroads.

If anything is going to fix Africa it's investment and people buying their goods. If China fills that role, well, fine.

Not having ****ty tinpot dictator governments would help too but that's probably too much to ask for in places where literacy is sub-60% and education is generally minimal. You can't have working democracy in places where large swathes of the population can't read (at least not if those people can vote).

[molly bloom]

Such ungrateful savages!

Now now. You'll say that the Philippines, the Dominican Republic and Cuba and Haiti aren't the economic power houses they are today because of American 'involvement' with their history.

After all, as Woodrow Wilson said :

(the U.S.A.) will devote herself to showing that she knows how to make honourable and faithful use of the territory she has, and she must regard it as one of the duties of friendship to see that from no quarter are material interests made superior to human liberty and national opportunities.

Just two years later the American Marines had a little holiday in Haiti that lasted until 1934. The U.S. had control over Haiti's custom houses, finances and military.

Three years after Wilson's jolly little jape, the U.S. did the same favour to the Dominican Republic, taking over its finances and customs' revenues from 1916 until 1924.

In Honduras, United Fruit and Standard Fruit controlled the majority of the country's revenues. In Cuba, American business interests controlled two thirds of the sugar production. In Venezuela it was half of the country's oil production. 90% of Nicaragua's exports were heading north to the U.S. .

Mind you, the U.S. did at least pull out the marines in the Dominican Republic, but as a souvenir held on to customs control.

Those Marines weren't idle for too long- clearly they missed Caribbean sun and fun and headed two years later to Nicaragua, where the caring, sharing, U.S. -friendly, democracy- hating Somoza dictatorship was installed from 1936 to 1978.

And of course the Dominican Republic couldn't be left out of these glorious 'national opportunities' and celebrations of 'human liberty'- it had its own dictatorship from 1930-1961, with the armed forces being given expert American guidance.

Still, the U.S. did relinquish control of Haiti's finances.

In 1947.

[Aeson]

Adorable that some people think foreign investment could be imperialism.

Golly gee... we send our businesses out there to extract wealth and enslave people for centuries ... grab up all their good land, ship all their resources away to places we won't let them go, and let them live in shanties ... and how do they repay us? Distrust! Such ungrateful savages!

[Hauldren Collider]

Adorable that some people think foreign investment could be imperialism. Well, it would be, if it wasn't responsible for keeping much of Africa in poverty...

I mean, for ****'s sake, China invests in the US more than any other country. It's just like any other trade, except the goods stay in the US so we can continue to benefit from them.

[molly bloom]

Of course. We don't have a history of screwing them over....

YET

The Chinese have of course (in one guise, dynasty or another) been trading with East/Central Africa for a very long time. The complex at Kilwa was decorated with shards of Chinese pottery and Chinese goods eventually reached even West Africa through the trade networks.

These broken pieces of pots were found on the shores of Kilwa Kiswani, an island off Tanzania, which was once home to a major medieval African port. The pale green porcelain pieces are from China, the dark green and blue pieces come from the Persian Gulf and the brown unglazed pieces were made in East Africa. This rubbish reveals a complex trade network that spread across the Indian Ocean, centuries before the European maritime empires of Spain, Portugal and Britain.

Who brought these pots to Kilwa?

From around AD 800 merchants from Africa, the Middle East, India, and later even China flocked to the East African ports of Kilwa and Mombasa, which quickly grew into wealthy cities. These merchants traded in pots, spices, ivory, gems, wood, metal and slaves. A new language, Swahili, developed in this multi-cultural environment, combining existing African languages with Arabic. Islam was adopted as the religion in these ports, perhaps to aid in trade relations with the Middle East and also to protect African merchants from being enslaved by other Muslims.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/ahistoryoftheworld/objects/1HzhZH2YTMWUgqXXFvhAeQ

and :

http://www.worldheritagesite.org/sites/kilwakisiwanisongomnara.html

Felipe Fernandez Armesto's 'Civilization' contains a good account of the trading networks disrupted by the European interlopers.

[pchang]

Of course. We don't have a history of screwing them over....

YET

[Dinner]

It is now being provided by the loving guidance of the Chinese.

This is actually true. The very first new railroad to be built in Kenya since independence is being built by... A mainland Chinese state owned company. It was actually an idea that British companies had been pushing for 40 years but Kenyans had been resisting because it supposedly represented a new form of imperialism. But I guess everything is ok if a Chinese state owned company builds it instead of a British one.

[molly bloom]

molly, don't let facts get in the way of their racism.

It's well known Africans can't build anything. Or use metal. Just think of Ancient Egypt, Nubia, Abyssinia, the Empire of Mali, the Empire of Benin, Great Zimbabwe, Kilwa, the Empire of Songhai...

...all built by Roman colonists or their descendants.

[MikeH]

molly, don't let facts get in the way of their racism.

[molly bloom]

Most of Africa wouldn't have any railroads or infrastructure whatsoever if it weren't for the British Empire .

The British Empire did not rule or colonise 'most of Africa'.

Egypt's modernisation (for instance) began under a forward looking ruler of Albanian origins in the 19th Century. Sudan had a railway built under Kitchener's inspiration/supervision because the Mahdi and his forces created the world's first Islamic republic in a rebellion against corrupt Egyptians, and Kitchener came to avenge the death of Gordon at Khartoum.