Provocations for Africa inspired by Arunma Oteh's book launch at Saïd Business School
In many circles, a dominant narrative of Africa still persists. A rich vibrant continent made of 54 diverse countries is perceived as a homogenous, impoverished, underdeveloped and technologically behind monolith. Yes Africa, like many areas, has important and persistent challenges. However, this continued narrative of deficiency that has persisted over the past three decades breeds dependency [i] [ii], whereby the assumption becomes that the solutions must come from outside Africa and not from within.
In the hopes of flipping the script on this prevailing narrative, so we can reimagine continent’s possibilities, I recently presented three provocations for a hopeful and innovative Africa at a summit in celebration of our Executive in Residence, Arunma Oteh’s, new book All Hands on Deck. As my mentor once told me, ‘I try to be clear enough to be wrong.’ Therefore, I see these provocations not as the final word but as my opening salvo to reorient the debate around the continent.
Provocation 1: Africa can lead if focused on transition science over sustainability science.
We are too focused on debating what sustainability goals we should reach and not studying the large-scale initiatives (major programmes) that will deliver it. To do that, we need to work backwards and tie goals to specific transition milestones and simulate infrastructure operations (and not just climate data) to see which transition stages and policies most closely deliver to those goals, and then have empirical data verify such staging. We need to think more in terms of pathways and less in terms of destinations.
By pathways, I do not mean forecasted scenarios. As do other scholars, we have looked at different transportation alternatives amidst scenarios of more aggressive versus more lax adoption of clean technology. [iii] Nor is this studying retrospective transitions and extrapolating them into the future [iv]. In fact, we inherently need transitions that ostensibly depart from past trajectories. Otherwise, we will not achieve our goals fast enough.
What I mean is a clear tangible, future-facing roadmap. For instance, we know we want to end hydrocarbons. The question is how we specifically plan, structure, and sequence large-scale infrastructure programmes that can deliver which cleaner technology replacements and when. We then map those operational possibilities and constraints and their potential outcomes onto actual carbon reductions to trace out the trajectory and whether we reach net zero by 2050 under those paths. This may take the form of a distributed stitch of 'wedges' that rethink portfolios of energy supplies [v], or a portfolio of 'drawdowns' that develop doable changes in consumption [vi]. If our infrastructure portfolios cannot meet targets, then we then need to decide what is the time window and steps needed for a jolt upward in cleaner technology or a downward shift in consumption (or both). In so doing, we shift from a narrative of sustainability that is goal-driven to a narrative of transition that is action-driven - a world of tangible roadmaps and not just foggy destinations 'out there'.
If we can be serious about transition, then fair compensation and inclusivity will come to Africa. In fact, the infrastructure challenges within and between African countries would precisely be its strength. The lack of development precisely allows the continent more agility and flexibility to think outside typical development rungs. With milestones tied to action and institutions that can support such action, funding can be more easily attached to them and that can increase pressure for fair compensation for Africa because it’s tied to tangible agreed upon actions rather than ambiguous ambitions. Moreover, such an approach is more likely to be inclusive.
In my own studies of rural water systems in North Africa, I found better sustainability outcomes were often associated with those projects where women were their champions and orchestrated clear action plans using locals skills and know-how [vii], and this mirrors findings from other colleagues.
Simply put in shifting from sustainability to transition, this becomes a much more action-oriented tangible discussion of delivery through large major programmes or megaprojects and not what our goals are and how to forecast devoid of such granular delivery pathways. To do that, we need much more rigorous and informed study of what works and what does not across Africa, and we can obtain that if we are empirically and action driven rather than policy and assumption driven.
Provocation 2: We need to chronicle indigenous African innovation from within rather than presume the answers are from outside - think more FABA (for Africa, by Africa).
Technological Innovation and Africa have a fascinating juxtaposition. Our understanding of technological innovation and entrepreneurship suffers from 'success bias', whereby we more easily observe those who grow and succeed. When in fact those who failed, may have tried to similar things and did not succeed for unobservable other reasons. [viii]
However when it comes to Africa, that bias is inverted and we see a 'failure bias' that focuses on the cases where people are struggling and not those where people are succeeding. Those who succeed do not need to seek out help, and so naturally then, their innovative actions are often obscured or hidden. In fact, this is so difficult to overcome that I have had to dig up old archaeological field notes to find such cases for my own academic studies. [ix]
This leads to an empirically biased view that the main answers for African growth lie outside and not from within, whereby the guiding assumption is that all what is happening inside Africa does not work. Yes, there are facets that don’t work, but such biases indicate we need to at least search harder for local indigenous innovation and creativity before drawing this prevailing conclusion.
We need to stop presuming that only Global North theories for how to improve leadership, gender, innovation, and other such factors will solve Africa’s ills. If they worked, we would have surely solved our challenges and, again, this is at least tinged with failure biased data. We need to think more broadly, indigenously, imaginatively and optimistically.
As a potential provocation in this direction, we often focus on formal institutions and those are important, but formal institutions, when placed in historical context, are a very young phenomenon, especially in comparison to Africa’s tribal and other indigenous institutions. [x, xi] This presents enormous opportunity for Africa to lead if we think about innovation and leadership more broadly and in a more distributed way, especially given the persistence of its informal institutions. For example, the advancement of Nollywood (Nigeria’s movie industry) was not won by firms with formal structures (ie skyrises and formal articles of incorporation) but the organic and informal ones who would record in the local car shop, edit in their friend’s garage, while filming using their sister’s camcorder from the internet café. [xii] The success and scaling of entire car repair communities, social enterprises, and even manufacturing and service firms in Kenya, South Africa, and Ghana all follow a similar informal and organic path. [xiii, xiv, xv, xvi] Even the global phenomena of mobile money started with M-Pesa, which used indigenous techniques to solve common security challenges, and from that, transformed and identified new forms of value for the unbanked. [xvii] This has even led to indigenous practices becoming formalised into law such as local customary practices around extradition since the times of the Egyptians [xviii], Gacaca courts in Rwanda as part of truth and reconciliation best practice after conflict [xix], and even the formalisation of merchant collectives in the Maghreb [xx].
The charge here is not to say Global North theories and formality does not matter. I am simply saying they should share the platform with more locally and indigenously-driven thinking as well. We need much more North-South academic and practitioner collaboration where relationships are more symmetric in both power and intellectual exchange and are armed with a broader conception of innovation and entrepreneurship. We need to view Africa as a place to create the mold and not to fit it.
Provocation 3: Africa could lead the AI “Third Sector”.
As a means of elaborating where a FABA approach could generate significant value for the continent while also precisely avoiding the danger of being externally prescriptive, let’s ponder the post-AI world and what Africa’s role could be within this emerging sector. Right now, nation states and big tech are driving the AI discussion, and the fight is on the algorithms and what powers them. Once the Internet corpus of data gets tapped out, the competition will move to a wider set of sociolinguistic offline community data. Currently, much of our training data is in English or Mandarin. This leaves large linguistic groups largely untrained by existing models. From that vantage point, communities could become what I call the AI 'third sector'. This is a huge opportunity for Africa. For example, Swahili is estimated to have around 150-200 million speakers, and Arabic has an estimated 150 million speakers in Africa. This does not even include Yoruba (45 million speakers), Fula (35 million speakers), and Igbo (30 million speakers), amongst others. If indigenous approaches can be formulated to help communities organise into data trusts and collectives that protect access to their local data through enforceable data benefits agreements to ensure algorithmic insights and benefits are shared, we could see a world where these cooperatives become the AI 'Third Sector'. This will especially be the case when the competition shifts from the algorithms to the training data of large untapped linguistic groups. This is another huge opportunity to place Africa at the cutting edge of where AI is going and in a way that reflects the indigenous creativity and spirit of the continent.
Overall, there’s amazing opportunity across the continent of Africa if we allow ourselves to be driven more by hope than dismay. We can reimagine the possible when we shift our thinking from sustainability to transition, from external prescription to indigenous innovation and action, and from compute and algorithms to collectives and data. This invites a more distributed, more inclusive, and more imaginary leadership that is deeply rooted in the psyche and ethos of the continent. I’m excited what the continent can do when the focus is on the dreams of the possible rather than the shackles of the improbable.
References
[i] Kretzmann, J. P. & McKnight, J. L. 1993. Building Communities from the Inside Out: A Path toward Finding and Mobilizing a Community's Assets: The Asset-Based Community Development Institute, Institute for Policy Research, Northwestern University
[ii] Sen, A. K. 1999. Development as freedom. Oxford: Oxford University Press
[iii] Nkiriki, J., Jaramillo, P., Williams, N., Davis, A., & Armanios, D. E. 2022. Estimating global demand for land-based transportation services using the shared socioeconomic pathways scenario framework. Environmental Research: Infrastructure and Sustainability, 2(3): 035009
[iv] Geels, F. W. 2011. The multi-level perspective on sustainability transitions: Responses to seven criticisms. Environmental Innovation and Societal Transitions, 1: 24-40
[v] Pacala, S. & Socolow, R. 2004. Stabilization wedges: solving the climate problem for the next 50 years with current technologies. science, 305(5686): 968-972
[vi] Hawken, P. 2017. Drawdown: The most comprehensive plan ever proposed to reverse global warming: Penguin
[vii] Armanios, D. 2012. Sustainable development as a community of practice: insights from rural water projects in Egypt. Sustainable Development, 20(1): 42-57.
[viii] March, J. G. 2010. The ambiguities of experience. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press
[ix] Armanios, D. 2012. Sustainable development as a community of practice: insights from rural water projects in Egypt. Sustainable Development, 20(1): 42-57
[x] Malinowski, B. 1922. Argonauts of the western Pacific : an account of native enterprise and adventure in the archipelagoes of Melanesian New Guinea. London: George Routledge & Sons
[xi] Polanyi, K. 1944. The great transformation. New York, Toronto,: Farrar & Rinehart
[xii] Uzo, U. & Mair, J. 2014. Source and Patterns of Organizational Defiance of Formal Institutions: Insights from Nollywood, the Nigerian Movie Industry. Strategic Entrepreneurship Journal, 8(1): 56-74.
[xiii] Acquaah, M. 2007. Managerial social capital, strategic orientation, and organizational performance in an emerging economy. Strategic Management Journal, 28(12): 1235-1255
[xiv] Busch, C. & Barkema, H. 2021. From necessity to opportunity: Scaling bricolage across resource‐constrained environments. Strategic Management Journal, 42(4): 741-773
[xv] Kim, A. 2024. Harambee! A Triadic Perspective on Social Impact: Organizations, Evaluators, and Target Beneficiaries in Kenya. Administrative Science Quarterly: 00018392241303580.
[xvi] Weiss, T., Lounsbury, M., & Bruton, G. 2024. Survivalist Organizing in Urban Poverty Contexts. Organization Science.
[xvii] Maurer, B. 2012. Mobile money: Communication, consumption and change in the payments space. Journal of Development Studies, 48(5): 589-604.
[xviii] Lowe, V. 2007. International law. Oxford: Oxford University Press
[xix] Clark, P. 2010. The Gacaca courts, post-genocide justice and reconciliation in Rwanda: Justice without lawyers: Cambridge University Press
[xx] Greif, A. 1993. Contract enforceability and economic institutions in early trade: The Maghribi traders' coalition. The American economic review: 525-548
