
Lagos: Hope and Warning - johnny313
https://www.city-journal.org/html/lagos-nigeria-16011.html
======
bumholio
A great article, but maybe too much emphasis on "the impending catastrophe".
Short of epidemics, fire and the like, the city is in permanent stasis: the
conditions devolve to the point where there is an equilibrium with the
arrivals from the country side.

It's unclear why or how could a disequilibrium form and stand in a free to
travel country: as long as the metropolis offers even a modicum of economic
opportunity, such as being a water seller at the intersection, that is already
much better then being a subsistence farmer in an overcrowded country that
experienced famine as recently as last year.

There is no catastrophe looming, just the slow grip of poverty following
people around and slowly suffocating their lives, absent coordinated social
organization and coherent politics to end it.

~~~
dnomad
> It's unclear why or how could a disequilibrium form and stand in a free to
> travel country: as long as the metropolis offers even a modicum of economic
> opportunity, such as being a water seller at the intersection, that is
> already much better then being a subsistence farmer in an overcrowded
> country that experienced famine as recently as last year.

Lagos and all of Nigeria suffers from the same plague that is consuming the
West: extreme inequality. There's economic growth but when the rich capture
the overwhelming majority of the new wealth then, combined with population
growth, you can get a population where many people are actually worse off as
time goes on. This is why even as the economy grows the number of people
living in poverty is actually increasing [1][2].

It's highly unlikely the government will/can/wants to address the inequality
[3]. At some point the only "fix" to this problem will be, as it has been in
the past, war. The growing regional and ethnic divisions just need another
decade or so (by that time we'll probably see as many as 120m living in
poverty) and then, suddenly, the water reaches a boil.

Ironically, if you speak to many Nigerians they'll tell you that inequality
isn't a problem at all. If you work hard and smart enough you can make it.
Sound familiar?

[1] [https://www.stearsng.com/article/inequality-in-nigeria-is-
wo...](https://www.stearsng.com/article/inequality-in-nigeria-is-worse-than-
it-looks)

[2] [https://qz.com/963465/some-of-the-worlds-biggest-
countries-h...](https://qz.com/963465/some-of-the-worlds-biggest-countries-
have-managed-to-wrangle-extreme-poverty-except-nigeria/)

[3] [https://www.oxfam.org/en/even-it-nigeria/nigeria-extreme-
ine...](https://www.oxfam.org/en/even-it-nigeria/nigeria-extreme-inequality-
numbers)

~~~
hardlianotion
I am a little confused - why is this downvoted?

~~~
whb07
Because a simple thought experiment disproves his point and criticisms of the
West.

If the “troubles” of a society are really the disparity between the richest
and poorest, then a country like Somalia would be a glorious example of
liberty and prosperity. Yet everyone there is poor and with extremely limited
options in anything you might want to measure.

Clearly this isn’t it. Maybe in order to get a healthy thing going you must
have some extreme outliers as a result of the freedom/ability to let people do
their thing.

~~~
hardlianotion
If that is a reason, I think the downvote wrong. I think this is a place for
exhange of views and debate, not an exam in which "wrongly" argued points are
downvoted.

~~~
whb07
Because those points he’s trying to make are extremist and violent it seems.
“The only fix is war” seems like the typical extremist sound bite by someone
with those views.

Proposing violence to fix an issue with which appears your friend is not well
versed on seems just like the mass mob lynching of a “suspected” person doing
X. The mob feels righteous at the time, only to learn the person killed didn’t
do anything at all.

~~~
nnnnnande
That seems somewhat disingenuous, unless I've somehow completely
misinterpreted OP's point. OP was not proposing violence as the fix, but
merely stating the fact that historically only wars or other kinds of
catastrophic events have reversed trends of increased wealth inequality [1].

Stating that as the basis for a debate is not the same as endorsing violence
as the fix. It seems to be a tragic fact that different societies have not
found a political way of solving this issue and that alone is worth
discussing.

[1] [https://voxeu.org/article/europe-s-
rich-1300](https://voxeu.org/article/europe-s-rich-1300)

------
peter_retief
I have never been to Lagos but I do live in Cape Town South Africa, and there
are lessons to be learnt here as well. Infrastructure in South Africa has
declined dramatically in the last 20 years since the first inclusive elections
in 1994. If you look at all state run institutions, like health, education,
police, water, sanitation, conservation and everything else people take for
granted in well run countries, you find a dramatic decline. What this
translates to in people on the ground is a widening gap between rich and poor,
civil unrest, growth in private healthcare and security, unreliable and
expensive power supply and high crime rate, often violent. Sub Saharan Africa
is a difficult place to invest in with corruption and the threat of
expropriation of property a possibility. Will it ever change? I am not sure,
it doesn't seem likely

~~~
grecy
I have driven though 25+ countries in West Africa from Morocco to Cape Town
and now on my up to Cairo in the last ~2 years [1].

While I understand what you're saying, I have some things to add:

1\. Cape Town and Lagos (Nigeria in General) have virtually nothing in common.
Cape Town is essentially Zürich compared to Nigerian cities.

2\. _state run institutions, like health, education, police, water,
sanitation, conservation and everything else people take for granted in well
run countries, you find a dramatic decline. ... a widening gap between rich
and poor, civil unrest, growth in private healthcare and security, unreliable
and expensive power supply and high crime rate, often violent._

You have just described the exact challenges faced by the United States.

3\. There are millions of stories about how bleak "Africa" is and how many
challenges it faces. I have been constantly shocked by how developed many
places are, and how fast they are not only catching up to, but in some cases
surpassing "Developed" places. For example: have you been to Brazzaville? very
nice and modern city, fantastic roads all over the Rep. Congo now - Pointe
Noire too. Lomé in Togo is another great example.

4\. In my experience Africans are positive and optimistic about the future.
That means they're working hard to make stuff better, as apposed to those who
sit around in the developed world and complain about how everything is getting
worse. I wonder where we'll be in ~20 more years.

[1]
[http://instagram.com/theroadchoseme/](http://instagram.com/theroadchoseme/)

~~~
peter_retief
I love Africa and its people, dont think I want to dismiss the continent as a
lost cause but if you want to compare the US with Africa look at one index
that of unemployment, South Africa is looking at an effective employment of
50% while the US has effectively 0% unemployment. I dont doubt the US has
problems but its way better governed than African states

~~~
philipps
Two points: It is not useful to generalize “African states” because different
African countries have different systems and qualities of governance. The
current US system of governance has some characteristics that citizens of
other countries would find unacceptable, eg the disconnect between popular and
electoral college vote, the large amount of power of the presidency, the
politicization of the judiciary. South Africa’s constitution and
constitutional court on the other hand are widely considered an example of
good governance.

------
modells
More Vanagons (T3) than Burning Man, Oregon, Santa Rosa and Turo app combined.
Just let it sink in that those go for $8k USD each in the US and parts are
scarce.

Also, flattening of the world, resurgence of populist pedagogues, crises of
the majority of countries slowly/quickly becoming perpetual failed states.
Corruption, manufactured consent and disengagement have led nearly every
civilization to this same conclusion at around 10 generations or 250 years.
It’s not inevitable, it’s just the doom of repeating history by being ignorant
and passive.

