Revitalizing Africa for the Twenty-first Century: an agenda for renewal

摘要

International attention has focused largely on the multiple crises besetting the African continent. This perspective is both excessive and one-sided. There are, in truth, significant signs of hope and opportunity in Africa. Since the North South Roundtable (NSRT) last met on the continent seven years ago, racist rule in South Africa has been brought to an end. The entire southern African region is at peace for the first time in thirty years. In some thirty countries since 1990, multi-party elections have brought the return of democratic governments. In most of northern Africa and in a number of countries of sub-Saharan Africa, there has been economic growth and development, albeit at lower rates and in a far fewer countries than is needed. Most important of all, there is evidence throughout Africa that the people of the continent increasingly recognize that they must take charge of their own destiny, whatever the external pressures.