My time in Benin came to an end a couple of weeks ago, and I left the cute, not-even-anyway-near-as-rowdy-as-Lagos-but-busy-enough-to-be-called-a-city Cotonou. I spent a couple of days in Lagos and then went to the University of Nigeria Nsukka for some work. That was my second time in southeastern Nigeria and I decided to go by road so I could see more. Roads are really bad, and since it was raining, it was even worse than it would have been during the dry season. I got into the city quite late so I took a motorbike straight to the university guest house. It was a good option simply because I did not know the security situation of the city, and I thought that it would be a good idea to stay on a university campus. That was about it. Almost every other thing about the place screamed incompetence. Water was not running in the rooms, and the porters had to fill a small drum of water in the rooms each morning. There were no telephones in most of the rooms so if one wanted to have warm water one had to go down to the reception to place a request for it. The water would then be brought up to the room in a small bucket. And because there had not been power in the city for 4 days – by the time I left the count was up to 6 days – there was no power in the guest house. They put on the generator for some hours each day. And the only rooms that were available were the ones whose toilets/bathrooms had to be shared by two rooms. Plus the toilets were not exactly in the best shapes… they reminded me of my boarding house days in a government secondary school.

The university too was not in a much better shape. There was no power… and the red dust that is characteristic of southeastern Nigeria lay thinly over the buildings in the university, the offices, and the documents and furniture in them. I will try to avoid getting too many emails by simply saying that the place looked like it needed some help. Anybody who can manage to produce research papers under the condition I witnessed really deserves a lot of praise. Many of the teachers I met did deserve that kind of praise.

I decided to spend a couple of days at my parents’ place in Ondo state. It was not exactly an easy thing to decide to do: the last time I was there thieves came to visit their house the day I left. Apparently, they thought the son who lived abroad had brought some dollars and they thought they could come to get their share. My parents’ night watchman was really brave cos he engaged them in a shoot-out. They were unable to get in. This time around, I got in at about 9 in the night and left the compound only once throughout the two days I spent there, and even then I got my younger brother to drive me around, and sat at the back of the car, where the window was slightly tinted. Today, I returned to Lagos.

Ok, that has been bringing you guys up to speed.

My old teacher, Dr Ayobami Ojebode, just started a blog. You can see it here.

How much should one get involved with the field? Don’t get me wrong, this is not about activist ethnography, at least not explicitly.
One of the problems of being a native anthropologist is the presence of the possibility of being co-opted by the field. As you probably know already, I am a Nigerian doing fieldwork with Nigerians in Cotonou, Benin. One afternoon, one of my friends called to invite me to write an article in the magazine that is going to be published by the Nigerian community in Cotonou as part of the 48th Nigerian Independence Day celebrations in Cotonou. He asked whether I could write an article on the contributions of Nigerians in Benin to the Beninese economy. I know much about that, as that actually forms a part of my research: there is no studying informal trans-border trade between Nigeria and Benin without studying the impact of Nigerians on the economy of the country, so I could reel them off right away. But then, I know that the audience of the magazine is made up of Nigerians, and most likely of officials of the Nigerian state. I am also quite aware of the ‘official’ stance of the Nigerian state towards smuggling, and even towards Nigerians who trade, in Cotonou, in goods that are banned in Nigeria. I had to find a way to write an article with enough meat to qualify for publication in the magazine, and therefore make my friend proud, but with just enough not to incur the wrath of the Nigerian embassy in Cotonou, or to call undue attention to my research.
The compromise was to write a one-page article about the impact of Nigerians in Cotonou by focusing on the social. When I wrote about the economy I had to make sure I mentioned only goods that originate in Nigeria and so contributed to the official economy of the country. My friend explicitly asked me not to write about certain goods that are imported into Benin chiefly to be re-exported, informally, to Nigeria. The questions: was I unethical by agreeing to write the article at all? And was I wrong by agreeing to be selective in the goods I mentioned? Who has ever been in this kind of situation?
Oh, by the way, my friend and I decided to share the credit for the article.

Thanks Owen for checking in on me! It is nice to know that some people get around here.
I am in the last few weeks of fieldwork, and it has got really intense. I am discovering holes in my knowledge, and I am trying to plug them before I leave. I realise that I cannot have all the information I would like to have, but that understanding does not stop me from trying anyway.
So, I am around, and I know that I should update regularly, but according to a Yoruba saying, It is the mountain over here that blocks our view of the one behind it.

Much has been made by the IMF of emerging markets (.pdf) in Africa. Dani Rodrik looks at what happens in the current period where rich countries, especially the US, are in a ‘slowdown’, and there is much anti-globalisation sentiments among Americans. Add to this a not-so-hospitable disposition towards exports from developing countries (actually, China is the biggest deal, and for outsourcing, India), an American current-account deficit of $739 billion (5.3% of its GDP), and an emerging markets and oil-exporting countries surplus of $631 billion and you have a recipe for protectionism in developed countries. He concludes by writing:

Long-term success still depends on what happens at home rather than abroad. What is moderately bad news at the moment will become terrible news only if economic distress in the advanced countries – especially the US – is allowed to morph into xenophobia and all-out protectionism; if large emerging markets such as China, India, and Brazil fail to realize that they have become too important to free ride on global economic governance; and if, as a consequence, others overreact by turning their back on the world economy and pursue autarkic policies.

Of course, a lot depends on what happens inside developing countries. Rodrik is big with institutions, and I am firmly with him on that; institutions matter, and in really serious ways. But so does the international policy environment. I am concerned with what happens if an all-out protectionism breaks out. But then, why do I fear for Nigeria? It is not like we export anything, right? As long as there is still oil we are fine. Anybody says non?

Rodrik’s full article, part of Project Syndicate, is here. The post announcing the article is on Dani Rodrik’s blog here.

I just discovered the Project Syndicate site…. I am not yet done exploring it, but I think it promises to be interesting. The objectives, according to the home page, are:

- bringing distinguished voices from across the world to local audiences everywhere;
- strengthening the independence of printed media in transition and developing countries;
- upgrading their journalistic, editorial, and business capacities.

The list of contributors include Jeffrey Sachs, Joseph Stiglitz, Dani Rodrik, Kenneth Rogoff, and Joschka Fischer, among others. If you have time you could check it out… http://www.project-syndicate.org/

Emerging Economies and the WTO
Ms. Mariarosaria Iorio of the International Gender and Trade Network (IGTN) thinks, among other things, that the fact that the insistence of emerging economies on keeping the Special Safeguard Mechanism (SSM) during the last Doha Round, an insistence that led to the breakdown of the round, shows that the world of trade policies is experiencing a geopolitical shift. This, she says, is certainly different from what happened during the Uruguay round that led to the formation of the WTO. I agree with her. Here is the paper (.doc)

SSM and South-South Trade
An ActionAid publication, supporting SSM, debunks the argument that SSM would discourage south-south trade. It addresses what it describes as false premises:

1. the South – South trade in agriculture comprises the bulk of world trade in agriculture

2. the countries of the south are either agricultural exporters or agricultural importers

3. SSM will be used frequently and indiscriminately by many developing countries

4. the inclusion of an effective SSM in the final Doha Round outcome will negatively affect the expected gains from agricultural trade liberalisation

5. South-South trade is an absolute good that must be pursued at all costs

The publication is here (.pdf)