Out of Africa

THE American Congress is an unlikely place to find promising proposals for economic development in Africa. After all, the usual cry on Capitol Hill is that Africa is a continent in chaos and that American aid must be slashed lest more taxpayers' dollars go down “foreign rat-holes”. Yet these misconceptions--for that is what they are--may be changing. Both the Clinton administration and a growing group of congressmen, some Republicans, some Democrats, are pushing a new kind of Africa policy. A bill is soon to be introduced to promote trade and investment in the most reform-oriented African economies. It deserves to succeed--if only because Africa, though by no means one big basket-case, is indeed the world's poorest continent, badly in need of change.