The Modern Congo

While reading Heart of Darkness and hearing about the mission to civilize the "creatures" in the Congo I couldn't help but wonder what the Congo is like now. This story took place around 1890, so after 125 years things couldn't possibly be the same. Although imperialism has mainly been but to a rest, this doesn't mean that the Congo isn't at all similar to how it was depicted in Heart of Darkness. 

Capitalism is a huge aspect of the story, as the Belgian imperialists main motive to occupy Africa is to acquire the money-making ivory there. This greed is what drives the imperialists to the continent in the first place, and overall their satisfactory gift for civilizing the Africans. This is also relevant today because there are many Nike factories in underdeveloped African countries where Nike can hire cheap labor to establish maximum profit for themselves. Although this is not quite the slave-type labor used in the late 1800's, it seems insane that after 125 years we are still employing people to be paid the absolute minimum, just to ensure maximum profit. 

Additionally, Marlow refers to Africa as "a prehistoric earth" with "prehistoric men", implying that these men are especially uncivilized and underdeveloped. Areas of Africa continue to be some of the poorest countries, but it's not the citizens fault. Corrupt governments are common, HIV/AIDS & malaria are widespread and military conflict isn't out of the ordinary. Until these issues are resolved it seems as though the majority of Africa will remain a third world country, behind countries like the United States.

Although Africa is not as wealthy as other countries (which often holds them back) the progress we have made is not attempting to "civilize" the African people. We now understand the customs and traditions of African people and for the most part let them be in the civilizing of themselves. Americans especially have offered support in Africa only when absolutely necessary, using organizations like Doctors Without Borders to help with some of the problems Africa faces.

Our modern heart of darkness still seems to be in the Congo area, just less dark than it used to be. There are still plenty of issues that leave Africa struggling, but thankfully no one is treating these Africans as slaves anymore.