The African Union

African Union The African Union is a conglomerate of 53 African countries. The Libyan leader, Muammar Gaddafi in order to replace the old Organization of African Unity, which was no longer effective, conceived it in 2002. The union is based on the European Union and its goal is to create political and social development between the member nations. It also hopes to create better economic ties between each of the member nations. One of its goals is to have a single currency, much like the Euro for the European Union, by 2023. The union also allows member nations communicate and provide aid for one another. All of this is mainly focused on bringing prosperity to Africa The African Union is certainly influential, due to the great migrations of intelligent Africans to other, more developed parts of the world. Because of this “Diaspora”, countries all over the world would feel the effects of native Africans taking part in the AU agenda. Another great plus is the African Peer Review Mechanism, which reviews countries’ corruption levels of civil servants and has led to a widespread casting off of more corrupt officials across the continent. Such a change also brings to light the effectiveness that the APRM has when dealing with sweeping reforms- enacting them rather than debating over whether or not they have the right. However, there is also a downside. The overall goal of Pan-Africanism is far too vague, which may lead to frequent overstepping of boundaries in the name of unity. Also, the venture is poorly funded, which prohibits delegates from meeting as often as would be optimal. This leads to a failure to stop major violence and crimes, because the members of the Pan-African Parliament aren’t able to properly meet all at once. Finally, the types of governments that make up the AU are not the most democratic or famed. This undermines the authority of the organization when some of the edicts come from countries with shady pasts and human rights

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