Carlos Lopes’ The Self-Deception Trap offers a comprehensive analysis of Africa-Europe relations, drawing on historical, economic, and geopolitical insights. It critiques EU-Africa negotiations, particularly around trade agreements, and highlights the complexities of aid, development, and Africa’s global positioning. By Stephen Williams.
Carlos Lopes, the former executive secretary of the UNECA, served as the AU’s High Representative for Partnerships with Europe. His experience in negotiating with the EU led to this book – which is not only a no-holds barred account of reaching a trading agreement with the Europeans, but much more besides.
The book is structured in three parts. The first part (chapters one, two, three and four) delves into history, carefully tracing the roots and evolution of this intricate relationship.
The second part (chapters five, six, seven and eight) offers a panorama of current affairs, concentrating on the last three years of negotiations that have shaped the narrative between these two continents. The third and final part (the concluding chapter nine) casts a contemplative gaze forward, addressing the challenges and opportunities ahead.
The EU’s preferred negotiating stance (that many criticise as a divide and rule strategy) had been to enter divergent trade arrangements with individual countries. This strategy threatened to endanger Africa’s integration attempts, such as the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) agreement.
The AfCFTA’s long-term objectives include creating a single, liberalised market that aims to increase socio-economic development, reduce poverty, and make Africa more competitive in the global economy.
As Lopes writes: “The AU had a comprehensive agenda, namely, Agenda 2063, meticulously outlining its developmental aspirations. Moreover, two AU Summits had unequivocally underscored the necessity for any negotiations on the post-Cotonou Agreement to conform to AU-approved decisions – not the inverse.”
The Cotonou Agreement was the treaty between the European Union and the African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States (ACP countries), signed by 78 ACP countries (Cuba did not sign) and the European Union. It was due to expire in October last year.
However, Lopes experienced a fair degree of pushback from the EU Commission. “While the EU’s passive-aggressive manoeuvres aimed to steer negotiations, the eventual outcome unveiled a shared reality,” Lopes comments. “Neither the EU’s objectives nor the AU’s aspirations were fully realised.”
In the first chapter of the book, the title of the volume is explained: “I believe that European and African leaders who head up the partnership between these two continents share a deeply ingrained mindset characterised by self-deception, and it is this mindset that I endeavour to unravel and elucidate within the pages of this book.”
Chapter two deals with the ‘parody of misconceptions’ about Africa. These narratives can be summed up into three elements.
“First, geography does not reflect the actual spatial coverage of human activity. Second, the economy needs to capture true resource endowments and layers of complexity that a set of established key performance indicators like GDP couldn’t determine.
“If the real GDP were known, Africa would represent a bigger economy than India (with a larger population still), its debt-to-GDP ratio would diminish, and its consumer market would be resized considerably.
“Africa could qualify besides the G20, for a seat at the G7, G20, and other fora as a continent, the same way the EU does.
“Third, demographics underestimate the current population boom that positions the African continent as the reservoir of youth globally while the rest of the world is ageing fast.”
Cabral, Fanon et al.
In his soundings, Lopes draws on the work of, among others, Amilcar Cabral and Frantz Fanon as well as more contemporary writers such as Adams Oloo – who draw attention to the marginalisation of Africa within international organisations; and Howard French, who “begins to gauge the enormity of the demographic assault that the slave trade represented”.
Chapter three discusses the ‘disappointing’ effectiveness of official development assistance (ODA). Drawing on the work of Paul Collier, Geoff Lancaster as well as others, Lopes writes: “Over $1.2 trillion of development assistance has been poured into the continent in the last 30 years, twice that if you include unofficial charitable giving.”
But, as he explains, “addressing urgent humanitarian crises and systemic factors perpetuating global poverty, is still lacking” and “the truth is that the multifaceted nature of aid-giving involves mixed motivations, of which development is just one aspect”.
Lopes’ analysis of ODA is both pertinent and acute, but in that he does not draw on the work of Dambisa Moyo whose 2009 book Dead Aid proposed that aid itself is the cause of a “never-ending cycle” of economic, political and social problems keeping Africa in a perpetual state of poverty.
Moyo writes provocatively: “The problem is that aid is not benign – it’s malignant. No longer part of the potential solution, it’s part of the problem – in fact aid is the problem.”
Perhaps Lopes shares the opinion of many others that Moyo’s very successful book, topping the NYT Bestseller list, simply echoed the work of others such as William Easterly whose influential work, The White Man’s Burden was published three years earlier.
Broadening the subject, Lopes tackles the issues surrounding compensation and reparations – as well as that “while all nations share a collective obligation to combat climate change, developed nations, which have historically contributed the most to carbon emissions and benefited from industrialisation, bear a heightened responsibility to support vulnerable and less developed nations”.
Summarising, Lopes argues: “The relationship between Europe and Africa remains multifaceted, extending far beyond financial aid.
“Consequently, there is a growing call for a more discerning approach to aid acceptance, selective engagement, and a nuanced understanding of African societies to guide European decision-making.”
Comparative advantages?
Just as the relationship between Africa and the EU is multifaceted, so too is Lopes’ book that by its fourth chapter explores the economic theory of the comparative advantage. This theory, dating from the colonial era, promotes the myth that Africa is perpetually the junior party.
The author argues that this played down the imperative for African countries to establish specific production capabilities “for effective participation and integration into global value chains”.
The following chapter discusses the lost development decades of the 20th century, with the Bretton Woods implementation of Structural Adjustment Programmed (SAPs – often interpreted in Africa as ‘sufferings for African peoples’) that became preconditions for ODA.
Chapter six deals with the lop-sided nature of proposed Africa-EU agreements. And Lopes also bemoans the proliferation of EU initiatives, quoting the Zambian proverb, “Too many cocks crowing at the same time make the dawn take too long”.
The EPA trap
A section of this chapter deals with the EU’s Economic Partnership Agreements, which regrettably the EU opted to offer individual countries, rather than reconsidering its position on an all-Africa EPA.
Chapter seven is concerned with the issue of migration, one of the many chapter themes that unarguably deserve a whole book.
The penultimate chapter returns to a focus on the asymmetry of Africa-EU trade. One passage jumps out as a summary.
“Furthermore, the lack of an overarching strategy on the part of the AU is stopping Africa from playing a more proactive role in its external partnerships and putting African countries at a disadvantage.
“This can be seen in negotiations with the EU where, despite common African positions on migration, energy access, climate adaptation, and vaccine access demonstrating African assertiveness, African countries have struggled to formulate strategic priorities with the EU beyond thematic and reactive proposals.”
This is a remarkable ‘Open Access’ book that deserves a huge readership.