Underdevelopment and Poverty in Contemporary Africa: from Nigeria

The Pre-Colonial African concepts of development emphasized the material wellbeing of the community in a local subsistence economy. The modern Post-Colonial African states integrated in a complex global political economy requires technological production in the competitive international economic environment. An environment dictated and driven by Neo-Liberal ideology of the western industrial countries who are well equipped to compete with other countries with infant industries, as in Africa. This competition called free trade implied lack of protection for local infant industries in Africa. Under the Euro- American politically led government deregulation and privatization; there have been various consequences of underdevelopment and poverty in contemporary Africa. This paper examines the impact of neo-liberal policies in contemporary African political economy in the search for alternative paradigms for African development. The research methodology is the qualitative, descriptive approach and the submission of the paper is that African state must device ways of achieving an African version of economic integration through the linkage of basic infrastructure such as the continental rail road starting from the sub-regions.