African American Paternalism

INTRODUCTION
The history of the West and their interactions with those in Africa especially, are fraught with paternalism and the trend is continuing today. American journalists in particular, only cover the negatives of Africa while ignoring the countries’ political and economic success stories. This narrative only continues the narratives of Africa’s helplessness. By downplaying African countries abilities to plan and follow through with efforts to develop and improve themselves, it harms not only relations between the countries but also diminishes the effectiveness of foreign aid that the West offers to many African countries by putting limitations and restrictions on how it may be used, because the West thinks they know what is best for
While many are drawn to charities because of morals and a sense of responsibility to help, and while that is a valuable desire, many do not consider the paternalistic aspects of their actions. The care for others never occurs between equals, inside American society it can be seen often in the care of the elderly, but also in how America interacts with other countries on an international scale. The paternalistic attributes could be minimalized though if in the process of giving, more agency was attributed to the recipients, unfortunately this is not the case in much of the foreign aid offered by
By attributing less agency to poor African countries than other poor countries, it ignores those communities’ political and economic success stories. When a country in the West believes they know what is best for a country outside of their own, it is not only not true usually, but it diminishes the assistance that they are trying to offer. The interference of paternalism is justified by saying that the group will be better off because of it, but as we can see from the past, it is rarely true and an idea that those in the West must work hard to re-contextualize their understanding of countries outside of the West to fit with their true