Global Financial Subordination and the Pathologies of Sovereign Debt

In this chapter Moyo posits that debt crisis is a symptom of the larger problem of asymmetric integration of Africa into the global financial system than a consequent of policy missteps as often argued by the Bretton Woods Institutions. In this chapter, Moyo broaches a number of questions including the following: Will African countries ever be able to pay their debts? Are the debts payable in the first place? What is preventing African governments from addressing the debt conundrum? Are the creditors willing to have their debts cleared? Is the global financial architecture neutral and or innocent in all this? How come some of the funds that are offered by international financial institutions (IFIs) as bailouts for debt-distressed countries are also squandered by the political elites and the IFIs have not come up with actions against such practices? In grappling with these questions, Moyo singles out predatory lending as a tool in the hands of global capital that is perennially deployed to subjugate African economies. He concludes that unless there is a radical reworlding and transformation in the workings of the global financial architecture, the debt burden will continue to wreck the African economies and those of the Global South aground.