Nigeria's oil spills worse than Guf spill, also ignored

[Simon_Jester]

Nigeria is such a mess because in one way or another, every major interest group in the country is in some way harming every other group. The government does nothing but soak everyone they can reach for bribes, the corporations do nothing but take the oil and run while leaving the local population to rot, and the local population has nothing to do but try to cadge a living by robbing the powerful people who have already taken all the money. Everyone has an incentive to be a thief, even the people we'd normally consider victims of circumstance, because being a thief is the only way to survive.

That's what happens in a true kleptocracy. The nation winds up devouring itself a piece at a time, faster than any possible economic growth could fix their problems.

Even relatively primitive social structures like feudalism can be healthier than this sort of autocannibalistic kleptocracy, as long as there is some kind of functioning control that keeps the amount of screwing-over down to manageable levels. Because then someone (even if they're a designated exploiter-class of some sort) will have the time and energy to spare making sure that bandits aren't roaming the countryside at will, and that some vague semblance of economic infrastructure survives on a day to day basis.