The Bottom Billion—Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It?

Paul Collier, the author of The Bottom Billion, points out in his book that there are four types of traps that can explain why some of the poorest economies in the world are experiencing little or no development. These traps are: civil war conflict trap, natural resources conflict trap, bad neighboring countries, and poor governance within the country. Among his list of poorly performing economies, Kenya’s name caught my attention and interested me to read on further about the problems it faces.

Collier sees development as “giving hope to the people, assuring them that their children will live in a society that has caught up with the rest of the world.” This view is very unique and easily explains why not all “developing countries” are actually developing, and why some are doing much better than others. My home country, China, fits perfectly well into this definition of development. China has been developing at unprecedented rate, and the recent two generations have had lives significantly improved from their parents’. Growing up in such environment, I never realized what it meant until I read this book. Development means hope, and hope stimulates even more rapid development. But in countries like Kenya, now I come to think of it, there is very little hope when there’s hardly any development. This gave me another reason to feel very excited about SAI and the differences we can make.

His book made several important points that echo with Sauder Africa Initiative’s vision and mission. First of all, he recognizes that financial aids don’t solve the problem. What does is “change in societies… [that] come predominantly from within.” I believe this is exactly what SAI tries to achieve—educating and empowering local youth and guiding them to improve their lives and others’ around them. Collier also points out that in the past decades we have been bystanders of the burning issue of poverty. We should instead strengthen the hand of the reformers with the proper use of tools such as international trade standards. To a certain extent, Kenyan youths are the future of Kenya and SAI equips them with the tools to “reform” and to better their lives.