BAOBIZZ: An African Perspective on Global Issues

The word bothers. Because he refers to an idea that many would like to believe foreign to the African continent, or relegated to a past. Yet castes in Africa, particularly West Africa, remain a historical, social and political reality that no serious reading can ignore.

Europe has fewer children, is ageing rapidly, lacks arms in its most essential occupations, and yet it is hardening its rejection of immigration at a time when the economy is structurally dependent on it. This paradox, seemingly absurd, becomes intelligible as soon as one stops treating it as a juxtaposition of crises and looks at it as a system: a chain of causalities, perceptions and feedback loops where fear — economic, cultural, security — works as a political accelerator.

The illusion of easy gain: when the game replaces work and redefines success – BAOBIZZ ← Back to Blog An African Perspective on Global Issues BAOBIZZ African Perspectives on the World Summary Podcasts About Our products Economy & Company The illusion of easy gain: when the game replaces work and ... Read more

The exploitation of women does not belong to the past. It has not disappeared as a result of modernity, urbanization or digitisation of societies. She changed. She adapted. She has integrated the codes of luxury, development, humanitarianism, mentoring, visible success. She learned to speak the language of consent and to follow the paths of respectability.

The news of this spring 2026 has dispelled an illusion that has structured Western economic thinking for more than three decades: that of an interdependent world but fundamentally stabilized by trade, finance, technology and institutions. The war that spread around Iran recalled that globalization had not abolished geopolitics; It had simply made it more diffuse, more systemic, and potentially more devastating.

Often presented as a democratic exception in Africa, Senegal has a rare image of political stability on the continent. Civil alternations, lack of military coups d'état, intellectual and religious vitality: the picture seems flattering. Yet, behind this reassuring institutional facade, the country gives the feeling of a deep stalemate. Stability without transformation, democracy without refounding, social peace without collective projection.

Every year, the Senegalese diaspora transfers more than 1,500 billion CFA francs to the country — the equivalent of more than ten per cent of the national gross domestic product. A sum that exceeds the combined budget of several ministries, which eclipses official development assistance, and which should, logically, act as a lever for structural transformation. However, the Senegalese economy is turning around. The circle of dependence continues. And the diaspora, tired of being reduced to an ATM function, begins to question the meaning of its sacrifice.