Mbeki and Anti-Western sentiment in South Africa

Hey delegates,

We're super excited to meet you all in a little less than a week's time! While you go about your preparation, we hope you will take into account the blog posts we have posted over the past couple of weeks providing deep dives on particular topics we think are worth addressing.

I wanted to use this blog post to elaborate more on anti-Western sentiment in South Africa and how that plays into AIDS denialism. After decades of colonization followed by apartheid, the reassertion of African identity was a key goal of the African National Congress. President Mbeki called this goal 'African Renaissance' and believed that the South African psyche had been crippled by decades of colonial rule and apartheid (Paroske 154). Especially in matters of science and medicine, Mbeki and other AIDS denialists in SA were well aware of Western stereotypes of Africans as primitives who naively relied on herbal or folk medicine and were incapable of understanding public health guidelines. Moreover, western researchers have historically ignored local factors when conducting trials or gathering data. Consequently, attempts by the West to impose their solutions on South Africa came to be seen as colonial paternalism which Mbeki was extremely skeptical of (Paroske 154). 

In a similar vein, Mbeki was also very distrustful of multinational pharmaceutical companies, whom he saw as exploitative and unethical. In 1997, when Mbeki was Deputy President, the ANC tried to break AIDS drugs' patents to manufacture cheaper generic versions but 39 pharmaceutical companies filed suit in Pretoria's High Court to oppose this under WTO patent rules and US Vice President Al Gore threatened to punish South Africa with sanctions if they followed through with circumventing patents held by American companies (Paroske 155, Wang 11). Around this time, there was also an uproar over unethical HIV clinical trials in Africa, where some pregnant women with HIV were given dummy pills as a placebo, causing potentially 1000 infants to be born with HIV that may not have if the women were given the ARV drug (Stolberg). Due to this distrust, Mbeki sought domestically-made solutions such as Virodene, an AIDS drug made in South Africa that Mbeki heavily promoted despite its dangerous and lethal effects. 

Delegates, as you continue your research and planning for this committee, I urge you to consider how your solutions may be perceived in a South Africa that remains wary of Western intentions and how you can build trust between the government and international actors. Why should they trust you? I hope you will consider this and am excited to see you all soon!

- Anish V

Citations:

1. Wang, J. (2008). AIDS denialism and “The humanisation of the African.” Race & Class, 49(3), 1–18. doi:10.1177/0306396807085898 [Unfortunately this article is behind a paywall but feel free to email me at avankayalapati@bmun.org if you would like the PDF]

2. Paroske, M. (2009). Deliberating International Science Policy Controversies: Uncertainty and AIDS in South Africa. Quarterly Journal of Speech, 95:2, 148-170. www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/00335630902842053?casa_token=u_cs_1sjEmgAAAAA%3AfeAdWn2DCC0uFUdweIwv0TiiuwJYk9k-2PYIBYCLQoA2CHz8ApNXB2f5OKPYKqa3GFzJOoEOdj54&

3. Stolberg, Sheryl Gay. "U.S. AIDS Research Abroad Sets Off Outcry Over Ethics". The New York Times, 18 Sept. 1997, https://www.nytimes.com/1997/09/18/us/us-aids-research-abroad-sets-off-outcry-over-ethics.html. Accessed 19 Feb 2021.