By Professor Artwell Nhemachena

IT does not make sense to insist on a balance of power in the political realm alone such that the economic realm, which is much more important, is not balanced in the sense of ensuring economic balance of power.

It does not make sense for Africans to seek to have political balance of power when the African states are not economically balanced.

It does not make sense for Africans to seek to have African politics when they do not have African economies to support the African politics.

There is no balance between the Africanness of African politics and the foreignness of economic ownership and control in Africa.

Majoritarianism in Africa is sadly only applied to the realm of politics.

The majoritarianism that is practised in Africa and the Global South more generally is not inclusive in the sense of being similarly applied to other realms of African lives.

Therefore, the liberal democracy that offers a narrow conceptualisation of majoritarianism is itself not an inclusive democracy.

Political majorities in Africa are in fact minorities in the economic realm, yet they do not receive support from those that claim to protect minorities.

It is not only minorities in a political sense that need protection: minorities in an economic sense also need protection and support on the continent.

Put differently, Africa is not yet ruled by the majority in the economic realm, and this is why Africa is failing to move forward.

When Western scholars theorised democracy, in terms of liberalism, they were not theorising for Africans but for themselves.

They already had ownership and control of their own resources.

So, they sought to liberalise their politics in such a context.

The scholars were not theorising politics on continents and in countries that had suffered enslavement and colonisation.

Their theories were not tailormade for continents that sought to address and redress politics of enslavement and colonisation.

When Western scholars theorised constitutionalism, they were not theorizing for Africans but for themselves, and that is why Western constitutional theories are failing to assist Africans deal with problems in Africa.

The constitutions stress liberal freedom, and they do not speak to the necessity of economic freedom for Africans.

The constitutions stress the balance of political power between the executive, legislature, and judiciary, but they never speak to the necessity of balance of power in the economic realms.

They wrongly assume that there is no power to balance in the economic realm even as it is trite that transnational corporations are monopolising ownership and control of resources on the continent of Africa.

Without balance of power in the economic realms, Africans will continue to experience disappointment cycles in politics, which is supposed to be African politics even as it is ironically controlled by extraterritorial purse strings.

This has seen Africans being squeezed between politics of majoritarianism in the political realm and politics of extraterritorial purse strings.

Of course, the politics of extraterritorial purse strings are played under the guise of assistance and aid but in a context where transnational corporations and global capitalists have dispossessed and exploited Africans for centuries, without reparations, who would believe that they are assisting and aiding Africans.

Worse still, the context is one where colonialists keep holding onto African resources which were seized during colonisation and have been subjected to exploitation for centuries, even as the profits were and are externalised.

It is part of these externalized profits that come back as assistance and aid in the politics of extraterritorial purse strings.

The politics of extraterritorial purse strings are worsened by African leaders who unwittingly privatise African state enterprises on the basis of global capital’s advice which is often provided via some international institutions.

When African state enterprises are privatised and when they are bought up by transnational corporations, African states become more vulnerable to the politics of extraterritorial purse strings. They effectively become economic protectorates of the transnational corporations and their home states, overseas, upon which they would increasingly depend.

Apart from externalising profits, enjoying tax concessions, and externalizing raw materials to their home countries, the transnational corporations also acquire the capacity to hold African states economically at ransom.

In other words, economic dependence is weaponized such that African states become powerless and African sovereignty is devolved unwittingly or wittingly to the corporations and their home countries which then begin to dictate African politics, cultures, and laws.

The point in the foregoing is that what I call politics of extraterritorial purse strings is a kind of politics without checks and balances.

It is politics that is not controlled by the legislature of the targeted country, and it is politics that is not controlled by the judiciary of the targeted country; it is politics that is not even controlled by the executive of the targeted country.

It is bare and brute politics.

The politics of extraterritorial purse strings is politics that rides on the invisible hand of the empire.

It is politics with the capacity to set conflagrations on targeted states.

The politics of extraterritorial purse strings has the capacity to lock targeted states into states of waithood or damnhood, as seen in the effects of sanctions that are imposed on some states.

The politics of extraterritorial purse strings makes it possible for the empire to issue commands.

Economic, political, military, information, technological, cultural, legal, and jurisprudential command centres are all being concentrated in the imperial centres, and, by remote control, they are issued and executed to and in the margins of the empire.

The overall effect is to nullify majority rule.

The effect is to nullify democracy and human rights in the margins of the empire and nullify notions of good governance.

The crucial question is, who really is ruling or governing the margins of empire that are susceptible to and are often targeted in politics of extraterritorial purse strings?

To speak of good governance, it is essential to first of all identify the governor; to speak of a dictator, it is necessary to identify the governor who is dictating.

To speak of balance of power, it is necessary to identify the constellations of power in the margins of the empire.

By retaining its ownership and control over the economies in the Global South, the empire aimed to retain its power despite the independence granted to postcolonial states.

The point here is that there has been power-sharing, without agreements, between African states and the imperial forces—with empire retaining economic power and African states being given some political power.

But the imperial power is power without accountability, it is power without any checks and balances, and it is power without transparency and openness.

It is power to override and power to perturb. It is power to play politics of perturbations, even though it derives from economic power over the margins of empire.

 If empire is sharing power with African politicians, this has implications for theorizations on balance of power.

The question to political scientists and international relations scholars, government studies scholars, political sociologists, and political anthropologists is how such power can be balanced.