James Shikwati

James Shikwati, at TEDGlobal in June 2007 in Arusha, Tanzania

James Shikwati (* 1970 ) is a Kenyan economist, director of the Inter Region Economic Network (IREN) in Kenya and is considered an expert on Africa's economic development.

Shikwati is considered a staunch opponent of development aid . This puts the developing countries in a dependency situation and suppresses entrepreneurship and trade relations between neighboring countries. Development funds would stabilize unstable regimes, which would give them the opportunity to take violent actions and pursue repressive policies. He mentions Mengistu from Ethiopia , Pol Pot from Cambodia and Idi Amin from Uganda as examples . Even food aid had been distributed to soldiers whose sole aim was the oppression of the population, such as Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe .

The aid serves the local elite as a means of enrichment. In 1982 Zaire had a foreign debt of $ 5 billion. His president Mobutu Sese Seko , on the other hand, amassed a fortune of four billion dollars.

In 2015 Skikwati was awarded the Walter Scheel Prize .

Publications

• Do Intellectual Property Rights Harm Africa . ( Memento of December 8, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Liberales Institut, Occasional Paper 4, 2004
• Wrong development aid. In: Internationale Politik , 61, No. 4, 2006
• Reclaiming Africa. Inter Region Economic Network, Nairobi 2004

Web links

in German language:

• "Anyone who wants to help Africa must not give money" . In: FAZ . April 4, 2007 (interview).
• Christoph Bertram : The African patient . In: Die Zeit No. 20 . May 11, 2006.

in English:

• Shikwati: The developing world needs trade, not aid, to help the poor . November 15, 2002.
• "For God's Sake, Please Stop the Aid!" In: Spiegel international . April 7, 2005 (interview).
• Lawrence W. Reed: Lighting the Way on the Dark Continent . March 4, 2002 (portrait).

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Prof. Eicke Weber receives Walter Scheel Prize 2015 - Solar scientist's commitment to solar energy as an economic factor honored - Fraunhofer ISE. Retrieved February 2, 2018 .