DISILLUSIONED- THE ECONOMIC/ ENTREPRENEURIAL CULTURE OF BOTSWANA

As a nation we have managed to isolate our interpretation of culture as only relating to the social set up and to the political set up in so far as traditional leadership is concerned. And as a result have been blind to the harmful effect of the culture we have adopted to our business/ entrepreneurial thinking and therefore our economic and political systems.

We acknowledge that our economic system as is has not been working for us. Year in and year out we complain that we are not growing and advancing- well as far as the last 10 or so years are concerned. Which leads me to believe we are great practitioners of insanity because so far we have changed very little in the MO of the role of government in the economy and the empowerment of individuals to be enterprising. Government is still heavily involved in the funding and development of local businesses and is still coming up with economy stimulating initiatives that are advanced versions (not by way of differentiation but by better sounding names and targeted audience) of previously failed ones.

Our culture is not an enterprising one nor that of self determination and we don’t seem to be directing our efforts and collective thinking that way. Since independence the culture has always been that the government of the day has got our backs and will take care of us and our children by giving us jobs and schooling our children. Back then with a population of less than a 700K that may have seemed sustainable, however as the population grows and the cash cow that is our diamonds ages and withers away, the model has proved to be unsustainable. Young people now who are supposedly enterprising are still very reliant on government grants and support for their businesses to get off the ground. 

Our government is an example of a parent who has bought their child a bicycle to learn how to ride but wont stop holding the bike at the back and let them learn how to pedal on their own.

The system and culture will not change because the government of the day benefits from such dependency policies. They “take care” of the citizenry and therefore ensure their stay in power as people reward them with votes. And so even as the economy dictates that the system can no longer operate in the same way, there is sabotage (conscious or not) to real progress in favour of giving a simulation that the government is taking care of the people and therefore deserving of their votes to govern.

Most progressive economic/ business books have been writing about how the role of the government is not to run business or to invest in business but to put in place policy that is enabling for business to thrive. However this involves the people having an understanding of this role and being socialised to be industrial, innovative and experimental as opposed to being dependent on government to provide solutions.

What we are refusing or ignorant to see and learn from is how our counterparts, locally who are of different nationalities have managed to build thriving businesses despite not having government funding. And it is because they believe in each other and support each others businesses and ventures. What they require from government are the rules of engagement and they engage within their communities to find ways to fund their ventures and then buy from each other so that their economies can grow. This concept is explained very well by Chika Onyeani in Capitalist Nigger.

In the book “Is your thinking keeping you poor” Douglas Kruger highlights how when you approach an issue with a mindset of entitlement, the inspiration to work hard and prove the viability of what you are proposing is lost. You come with the sense of being owed and in turn you get what you never deserved nor respect nor have any knowledge of managing and that is how we end up with businesses that never grow beyond initial funding.

OPINION DOMINION: YOU ARE A GIRL THEREFORE.....I have over the yea...

OPINION DOMINION: YOU ARE A GIRL THEREFORE.....

I have over the yea...: YOU ARE A GIRL THEREFORE..... I have over the years growing up come to somewhat resent being a girl because it would seem this gender is ...

YOU ARE A GIRL THEREFORE.....

I have over the years growing up come to somewhat resent being a girl because it would seem this gender is burdened with the survival of all sexes. I cant tell you how many times I was told and have heard other people being told to learn a skill or behave a particular way because they are a "girl". Now I would not have a problem with this if it wasn't that the context is always related to your ability to therefore attract a boy. Never though have I heard, you are a boy, therefore, reference. Boys are allowed more self determination than girls are.

Girl- a female human species
Female-An individual of the sex which conceives and brings forth young, or (in a wider sense) which has an ovary and produces ova.

Society has managed to heap what i consider an unnecessary burden on the girl child and take away her freedom to self determine and these are some of the ways that i find to be totally unreasonable and I will share with you the practical reasons why.

1. You are a girl therefore you must know how to cook and clean the house. Fair enough I must know how to keep my surroundings clean and be able to feed myself. But why must this responsibility be the girl child's alone? What must become a boy who cannot clean his surroundings and feed himself? Are we condemning our brothers to hunger and filth? I for one care too much about them to allow this stereotype to be perpetuated at least in my family.

2. You are a girl therefore you must look good and be beautiful to be desired. I am bothered by the fact that we don't necessarily encourage the boys to do anything about their appearance so we also find them attractive. Why is it that society has allowed the men to think they can get away with looking unkept and still manage to score themselves a pretty girl? Well one might say because they are busy making money to attract the said females- well females also have the capacity and ability to make money, what then?

3. You are a girl therefore you can't be drinking lagers and whiskies and smoking. Well last I checked, no company has come out with a product made for any particular sex. It would be in their worst interest anyway as women make up the most of the world population. These imposed societal expectations based on ridiculous notions of what it means to be a proper 'girl'/ woman are just a great way to limit women's self exploration and expression.

I mean even in the relatively advanced society we live in where we recognise the need to have all people being educated for the girl child society has still managed to link it to a man.

4. You are a girl therefore you must get yourself a 'decent' education so that you may find a man. "Men these days don't want an uneducated woman". I resent here not the notion of getting an education but the association with getting a 'proper' man. Why aren't girls in our society just being taught to get educated so that they may be able to be contributing individuals to the economy and be able to sustain themselves?

5. You are a girl therefore you mustn't fight or be muscular. What will the men think of you? No man wants to have another male looking like person as a partner. Well if the same said men are the ones violating us and abusing us, isn't it in our best interests that we train our bodies and learn how to fight so that we are ready with the technique and the strength to be able to counter such attacks on our bodies from them?

6. You are a girl you must not be too loud! Don't laugh like that it is not attractive. Well, I have no scientific proof but I do believe that tones differ and voice pitches are something we are born with. You could try and train yourself to speak softer, but why waste time on that when you could be learning more practical skills that can help advance you economically, education wise or in business? Laughs are laughs- I am waiting to see the handbook that has the laws on laughing because otherwise my raucous laugh stays. Its very fun to laugh freely and loudly.

The last and final one;

7. You are a girl therefore you must get married and have kids. Chimamanda put this one to bed nicely for me when she said, the girl child is taught to aspire to a family and marriage and the boy child isn't and that already creates an imbalance in the kind of relationships that are formed between the two sexes! I mean being a girl child does not mean you have the emotional agility and maturity to bear and raise another human being, it does not necessarily mean you aspire to being Mrs somebody. Marriage as an institution should not be a desire because you are a girl but because you identify with the values it espouses. Children as well should not be something we have have because we have ovaries and wombs but they should be had by individuals with an ability and willingness to have them. Ability her ranges from the psychological to the economical.

Yes I am a girl. 10 points for stating the obvious but that does not subject me to anything that I do not identify with or that does not align with my spirit and give me peace.

You are a girl, therefore nothing.