I agree with everything you have written here, and I have been espousing something similar.
But what you are asking of Nigerians (and more generally, Africans) take for granted the fact that most Nigerians or Africans lack the skill or ability to reason out complicated issues, or to even think rationally.
Two things to note:
1. Although many people debate the average IQ of Africans (or even the validity of IQ tests entirely), the stated average IQ of Sub-Saharan Africans sits somewhere between 67 (the most debated) and 82 (the best number arrived at by those who say it's not 67). Note that 70 is borderline mental retardation. Note also that most societies where a lot of people can deal with complex issues at a conceptual level have stated average IQ around 100, which means a lot when we start talking about the social implications. Hint: An average IQ of 67 or even 82 is just too low a number that it is hardly surprising that a society attributed to have it would struggle to reason through complex issues conceptually.
2. Okay, for the IQ deniers, let's come to the matter from a different angle (which, not coincidentally, arrives at the same conclusion as the IQ measures.). As I wrote here earlier https://philemonnwigwe.substack.com/p/empirical-rigour-over-poetry-the, a 2024 study by Sarah Gust, Eric A. Hanushek, and Ludger Woessmann (conventional researchers who doubt the IQ researchers -- Hereditarians!) estimated the proportion of young people across the world who attain basic proficiency in reading, mathematics, and science on a common international benchmark. Their findings are sobering. Approximately 76% of young people in North America reach basic proficiency. In South Asia, only about 11% do. In Sub-Saharan Africa, the figure falls to roughly 6%. That means a lot of things, if we understand the implications of math, reading, and science on modern life.
So the real issue is less that Nigerians (or Africans) don't like to engage in conceptual understanding of complex issues, and more that most Nigerians (or Africans) are unable or lack the skill to do so. From there, endless implications can be inferred.
If we're looking at the actual solution to the "so, what's the solution?" problem among Nigerians, we must first ask what the average Nigerian is capable of doing cognitively. Education, good healthcare, and better nutrition (to the extent that any of those environmental interventions improves cognitive ability or IQ) would then suffice as the more useful upstream actions to help Nigerians reason rationally about difficult issues.
At some point, the IQ thingy just sounded like a one-string banjo and i just dropped it. It's obvious, right? And certainly not the only thing. I think about getting to the critical mass of high IQ people. Not everyone would be high IQ, but you want many more people to be high IQ (Garret Jones - Hive Mind) and maybe your average converges around 100 rather than 65. It's doable a la Flynn effect. But I don't know how it happens under conditions of malnutrition, persistent low economic growth, and high food inflation.
Children need good food for the cognitive demands of learning math, reading, and science. Parent need stable jobs to be able to afford this on a consistent basis. The economy needs to keep growing for stable jobs to emerge.
I'm happy you are familiar with the IQ-development debate.
IQ is certainly not the only thing that matters, but from the literature (as economists, psychometrists, and psychologists agree from their best findings), it matters a whole lot. And even when you decide to ignore the IQ debate and try to use other metrics (like my second point above), you unsurprisingly arrive at a similar conclusion as the IQ measures. So, basically, these things are talking about the quality of human capital you have in a society, and all the measures say Africa's quality of human capital is low.
And yes, it's a chicken-and-egg problem. You need economic development to achieve quality education, healthcare and nutrition, but you also need those to achieve economic development. It's bi-directional.
And even when you try to break the vicious cycle by raising a critical mass like you suggested, you're immediately faced with the problem of "brain drain" (to the extent that that is a problem!). So you discover that the best you produce are also the most likely to leave the country (la selection effect). And you're back to where you started.
More practically though, the cycle can be broken (countries have done so before) but the history of doing so says it's very hard, which is partly why you don't easily African countries escaping poverty.
You can't have critical mass and have a brain drain problem, though. Critical mass already controls for those who leave. The fact that high IQ people leave China or Europe to America doesn't mean China or Europe lack a critical mass of high IQ people.
So, I really don't see it as a chicken and egg problem. It's maybe a question of leadership and ambition. Obasanjo used what he had at the time. We're not at all critical mass then or now, hence the reversion to the mean with subsequent leaders. IQ will always matter because, look at Jonathan and Buhari. But look at Wike. Look at Umahi. Look Seyi Makinde. Now imagine we had someone a little better than Tinubu that can coordinate these talents.
Now, I just hope we get lucky! Cos the politics is in the gutter and I can only hope. But we need someone or a group of people who derive their status from what they build, you know, legacy chasing people with big dreams. Our current crop of leaders are just so low-stake people who lack ambition.
Dear Ronke, is it a coincidence that virtually every major country in Africa hasn't achieved "critical mass"? after several decades of independence?
Do you think all the leaders of these tens of nations, from different administrations, for several decades, have just not been able to achieve "critical mass" in their respective countries?
What would you say is the one one underlying factor? "Leadership" or the like wouldn't be that. We must reach for a more useful explanation this time.
I do not think our people have any problem with cognition or that their IQ is lower than anyone else's. The entire IQ thing is a fallacy. Many savants do not have statistically higher IQ than other people. There is also a lot of mentally ill people with really high IQs. The basic issue at stake here is a question of societal organization and the ability to address complex issues. Many countries in the world today are suffering from same problem even those with high average IQ. We may be suffering more because of our own context not because our general populace has low IQ.
Admitting that we have low average IQ doesn't mean that everyone has low IQ. People treat IQ has personal when it's not. IQ is a population effect.
The fact that other developed societies have cultural and social issues that are human in nature doesn't mean you are of the same IQ. They invent things. The phone or PC your typing on, economic models, judicial systems, machines, cars, all the things that make the modern world what is. That's a part of what higher average IQ gives you.
Exactly what I said earlier: Average IQ is a statistical tendency, not an individual issue.
For any given society, with high or low average IQ, you are bound to have lots of individuals with low or high individual IQs.
I keep reminding people: average IQ isn't individual IQ. (But of course, it's the individual IQs that eventually determine the average IQ for any given society, when summed up and divided by the population number.)
But people don't get that statistical fact readily.
Average means you tested a representative sample. No body has so the whole idea is nothing to stand on. Average IQ of 1.5bn people based on testing of 1000 people? Please
In that case, I think you need to engage more properly with the literature and the debate.
But even if we could somehow deny the IQ question (we couldn't!), just look at the second point I made above specifically for the sake of the IQ deniers: every measure points to the fact that Africa's quality of human capital (cognitive ability now) is low. I have the numbers and you can look at them again (see my earlier comment).
Granting that Africa's is low on cognitive ability isn't granting that every African is low cognitively (it's a statistical tendency) l, or that it's inherent in Africans (that's still being debated among the experts and we shouldn't try to settle it!) or that it can't be improved (it can, to the extent that environmental interventions help to improve it).
Just so you do not carry the IQ literature too much. The Nazi literature produced copious proof that Jews were subhuman. Also less than 0.1% of Africans have had their IQ tested? Even worse , psychologist all agree that there is no single measurement of intelligence since a lot of what we regard as intelligence is contextual. That whole IQ literature is pseudoscience. Out of 1.5bn Africans, how many have had their IQ tested?
Copious proof that Jews were subhuman has nothing to do with IQ.
Less than 0.1% of African have had their IQ tested is a question of statistics. Representative samples are enough.
IQ literature is not pseudoscience. Many things contribute to intelligence that's why cognitive tests is not limited to one thing. IQ tests test everything your brain is capable of doing.
It's not everything said in the literature that is right, which is why you need to engage both sides of the debate more deeply.
But I have already said that even if we set the IQ debate aside, we can consider the point I made about the level of cognitive ability in Africa. You don't need IQ research for that.
Just look at my point 2 in the original comment that you first replied to. Let me know what you think about that point in particular with regards to why Africans (on average) find it hard to do conceptual reasoning around difficult issues, which is the point of this conversation.
The lack of depth extends all the way to the formulation of the policies and laws. It is always sadly so cursory. Worse still when the policies or laws are questioned or analysed , there is a politicized battle rather than a proper introspection and review of what the problem is and how the proposed laws or policies or initiatives will solve them. Half baked solutions, half baked implementation and the problem is still there decade after decade.
It's not surprising: the average cognitive ability of the population is low, and I have the numbers for that. I wouldn't want to state them again as I already did in the thread. Please, check for my comment in the thread. And let me know what you think.
Your clearly written piece articulates a crucial problem in Nigerian political discourse; problem definition. We’re a generally a performative people and this extends to our social conventions. People want to seem and sound glib and knowledgeable, so they say a lot without saying anything and then proceed to “resolve” (or solve) governance problems with a few sentences.
To be fair, we don’t have a subculture of deep and engaged thought (why should you think when you can make money?) so it isn’t surprising we’re this way. What I don’t agree with is that this is “caused” by low IQ (as seems to be the case for a number of commentators to this piece).
I read your essays with keen interest and I consider you one of the best minds on development economics & political economy. Yet despite reading most of your works, there's a topic you have barely or hardly touched on — social and political cohesion in Nigeria. I will like to know your opinion on Nigeria as a country. Do you see it as a viable country with the right foundation to exist considering its diversity, which I find irreconcilable.
If you consider it viable, what do you think is the appropriate political system to use to avoid exclusionary politics vested in the center as we have now. Or just generally, what's your opinion about nation building vis a vis Nigeria. I will really like your response sir. Thank you.
Thank you for reading and the kind words 🙏. On your question on social cohesion, I have a few things to say about it in my independence day piece, look out for that 😄
It is always enlightening and eye-opening reading your piece.
I totally agree with you, as regards the limited scope with which Nigerians actually view problems and much focus being placed on the solutions.
Consequently, we fail to realize that before pragmatic solutions can be prescribed, in-depth understanding of the problem must have been achieved. Most times, these solutions does not even correspond with the socio-political realities of the country. Just a “copy and paste”.
The fuel subsidy talk prompted my sharing this 👇🏾. For I recognized that the debate took on a binary knife-edge form, barely even glossing over the main issue.
This reminds me of an excerpt from Ronald Reagan's a time for choosing speech 'Those who would trade our freedom for the soup kitchen of the welfare state have told us they have a utopian solution of peace without victory. They call their policy "accommodation." And they say if we'll only avoid any direct confrontation with the enemy, he'll forget his evil ways and learn to love us. All who oppose them are indicted as warmongers. They say we offer simple answers to complex problems. Well, perhaps there is a simple answer - not an easy answer but simple: If you and I have the courage to tell our elected officials that we want our national policy based on what we know in our hearts is morally right'
I agree with everything you have written here, and I have been espousing something similar.
But what you are asking of Nigerians (and more generally, Africans) take for granted the fact that most Nigerians or Africans lack the skill or ability to reason out complicated issues, or to even think rationally.
Two things to note:
1. Although many people debate the average IQ of Africans (or even the validity of IQ tests entirely), the stated average IQ of Sub-Saharan Africans sits somewhere between 67 (the most debated) and 82 (the best number arrived at by those who say it's not 67). Note that 70 is borderline mental retardation. Note also that most societies where a lot of people can deal with complex issues at a conceptual level have stated average IQ around 100, which means a lot when we start talking about the social implications. Hint: An average IQ of 67 or even 82 is just too low a number that it is hardly surprising that a society attributed to have it would struggle to reason through complex issues conceptually.
2. Okay, for the IQ deniers, let's come to the matter from a different angle (which, not coincidentally, arrives at the same conclusion as the IQ measures.). As I wrote here earlier https://philemonnwigwe.substack.com/p/empirical-rigour-over-poetry-the, a 2024 study by Sarah Gust, Eric A. Hanushek, and Ludger Woessmann (conventional researchers who doubt the IQ researchers -- Hereditarians!) estimated the proportion of young people across the world who attain basic proficiency in reading, mathematics, and science on a common international benchmark. Their findings are sobering. Approximately 76% of young people in North America reach basic proficiency. In South Asia, only about 11% do. In Sub-Saharan Africa, the figure falls to roughly 6%. That means a lot of things, if we understand the implications of math, reading, and science on modern life.
So the real issue is less that Nigerians (or Africans) don't like to engage in conceptual understanding of complex issues, and more that most Nigerians (or Africans) are unable or lack the skill to do so. From there, endless implications can be inferred.
If we're looking at the actual solution to the "so, what's the solution?" problem among Nigerians, we must first ask what the average Nigerian is capable of doing cognitively. Education, good healthcare, and better nutrition (to the extent that any of those environmental interventions improves cognitive ability or IQ) would then suffice as the more useful upstream actions to help Nigerians reason rationally about difficult issues.
At some point, the IQ thingy just sounded like a one-string banjo and i just dropped it. It's obvious, right? And certainly not the only thing. I think about getting to the critical mass of high IQ people. Not everyone would be high IQ, but you want many more people to be high IQ (Garret Jones - Hive Mind) and maybe your average converges around 100 rather than 65. It's doable a la Flynn effect. But I don't know how it happens under conditions of malnutrition, persistent low economic growth, and high food inflation.
Children need good food for the cognitive demands of learning math, reading, and science. Parent need stable jobs to be able to afford this on a consistent basis. The economy needs to keep growing for stable jobs to emerge.
I'm happy you are familiar with the IQ-development debate.
IQ is certainly not the only thing that matters, but from the literature (as economists, psychometrists, and psychologists agree from their best findings), it matters a whole lot. And even when you decide to ignore the IQ debate and try to use other metrics (like my second point above), you unsurprisingly arrive at a similar conclusion as the IQ measures. So, basically, these things are talking about the quality of human capital you have in a society, and all the measures say Africa's quality of human capital is low.
And yes, it's a chicken-and-egg problem. You need economic development to achieve quality education, healthcare and nutrition, but you also need those to achieve economic development. It's bi-directional.
And even when you try to break the vicious cycle by raising a critical mass like you suggested, you're immediately faced with the problem of "brain drain" (to the extent that that is a problem!). So you discover that the best you produce are also the most likely to leave the country (la selection effect). And you're back to where you started.
More practically though, the cycle can be broken (countries have done so before) but the history of doing so says it's very hard, which is partly why you don't easily African countries escaping poverty.
You can't have critical mass and have a brain drain problem, though. Critical mass already controls for those who leave. The fact that high IQ people leave China or Europe to America doesn't mean China or Europe lack a critical mass of high IQ people.
So, I really don't see it as a chicken and egg problem. It's maybe a question of leadership and ambition. Obasanjo used what he had at the time. We're not at all critical mass then or now, hence the reversion to the mean with subsequent leaders. IQ will always matter because, look at Jonathan and Buhari. But look at Wike. Look at Umahi. Look Seyi Makinde. Now imagine we had someone a little better than Tinubu that can coordinate these talents.
Now, I just hope we get lucky! Cos the politics is in the gutter and I can only hope. But we need someone or a group of people who derive their status from what they build, you know, legacy chasing people with big dreams. Our current crop of leaders are just so low-stake people who lack ambition.
Dear Ronke, is it a coincidence that virtually every major country in Africa hasn't achieved "critical mass"? after several decades of independence?
Do you think all the leaders of these tens of nations, from different administrations, for several decades, have just not been able to achieve "critical mass" in their respective countries?
What would you say is the one one underlying factor? "Leadership" or the like wouldn't be that. We must reach for a more useful explanation this time.
I do not think our people have any problem with cognition or that their IQ is lower than anyone else's. The entire IQ thing is a fallacy. Many savants do not have statistically higher IQ than other people. There is also a lot of mentally ill people with really high IQs. The basic issue at stake here is a question of societal organization and the ability to address complex issues. Many countries in the world today are suffering from same problem even those with high average IQ. We may be suffering more because of our own context not because our general populace has low IQ.
Admitting that we have low average IQ doesn't mean that everyone has low IQ. People treat IQ has personal when it's not. IQ is a population effect.
The fact that other developed societies have cultural and social issues that are human in nature doesn't mean you are of the same IQ. They invent things. The phone or PC your typing on, economic models, judicial systems, machines, cars, all the things that make the modern world what is. That's a part of what higher average IQ gives you.
Exactly what I said earlier: Average IQ is a statistical tendency, not an individual issue.
For any given society, with high or low average IQ, you are bound to have lots of individuals with low or high individual IQs.
I keep reminding people: average IQ isn't individual IQ. (But of course, it's the individual IQs that eventually determine the average IQ for any given society, when summed up and divided by the population number.)
But people don't get that statistical fact readily.
Statistics is counterintuitive.
Average means you tested a representative sample. No body has so the whole idea is nothing to stand on. Average IQ of 1.5bn people based on testing of 1000 people? Please
In that case, I think you need to engage more properly with the literature and the debate.
But even if we could somehow deny the IQ question (we couldn't!), just look at the second point I made above specifically for the sake of the IQ deniers: every measure points to the fact that Africa's quality of human capital (cognitive ability now) is low. I have the numbers and you can look at them again (see my earlier comment).
Granting that Africa's is low on cognitive ability isn't granting that every African is low cognitively (it's a statistical tendency) l, or that it's inherent in Africans (that's still being debated among the experts and we shouldn't try to settle it!) or that it can't be improved (it can, to the extent that environmental interventions help to improve it).
Just so you do not carry the IQ literature too much. The Nazi literature produced copious proof that Jews were subhuman. Also less than 0.1% of Africans have had their IQ tested? Even worse , psychologist all agree that there is no single measurement of intelligence since a lot of what we regard as intelligence is contextual. That whole IQ literature is pseudoscience. Out of 1.5bn Africans, how many have had their IQ tested?
Copious proof that Jews were subhuman has nothing to do with IQ.
Less than 0.1% of African have had their IQ tested is a question of statistics. Representative samples are enough.
IQ literature is not pseudoscience. Many things contribute to intelligence that's why cognitive tests is not limited to one thing. IQ tests test everything your brain is capable of doing.
It's not everything said in the literature that is right, which is why you need to engage both sides of the debate more deeply.
But I have already said that even if we set the IQ debate aside, we can consider the point I made about the level of cognitive ability in Africa. You don't need IQ research for that.
Just look at my point 2 in the original comment that you first replied to. Let me know what you think about that point in particular with regards to why Africans (on average) find it hard to do conceptual reasoning around difficult issues, which is the point of this conversation.
The lack of depth extends all the way to the formulation of the policies and laws. It is always sadly so cursory. Worse still when the policies or laws are questioned or analysed , there is a politicized battle rather than a proper introspection and review of what the problem is and how the proposed laws or policies or initiatives will solve them. Half baked solutions, half baked implementation and the problem is still there decade after decade.
It's not surprising: the average cognitive ability of the population is low, and I have the numbers for that. I wouldn't want to state them again as I already did in the thread. Please, check for my comment in the thread. And let me know what you think.
Which thread pls.
This article effectively moves the conversation to a meta level.
Your clearly written piece articulates a crucial problem in Nigerian political discourse; problem definition. We’re a generally a performative people and this extends to our social conventions. People want to seem and sound glib and knowledgeable, so they say a lot without saying anything and then proceed to “resolve” (or solve) governance problems with a few sentences.
To be fair, we don’t have a subculture of deep and engaged thought (why should you think when you can make money?) so it isn’t surprising we’re this way. What I don’t agree with is that this is “caused” by low IQ (as seems to be the case for a number of commentators to this piece).
I read your essays with keen interest and I consider you one of the best minds on development economics & political economy. Yet despite reading most of your works, there's a topic you have barely or hardly touched on — social and political cohesion in Nigeria. I will like to know your opinion on Nigeria as a country. Do you see it as a viable country with the right foundation to exist considering its diversity, which I find irreconcilable.
If you consider it viable, what do you think is the appropriate political system to use to avoid exclusionary politics vested in the center as we have now. Or just generally, what's your opinion about nation building vis a vis Nigeria. I will really like your response sir. Thank you.
Thank you for reading and the kind words 🙏. On your question on social cohesion, I have a few things to say about it in my independence day piece, look out for that 😄
The key issue
“Which way forward?” - the demand of the person that wants solutions without understanding.
“Low hanging fruit!” “Quick wins!” . More inanities.
This is the language and mentality of the recurrent YoYo Dieter.
What is the Ozempic of economic development — progress without the need for discipline? We will need patience.
Expect more Deja Vu all over again
# YoYoDevelopment
It is always enlightening and eye-opening reading your piece.
I totally agree with you, as regards the limited scope with which Nigerians actually view problems and much focus being placed on the solutions.
Consequently, we fail to realize that before pragmatic solutions can be prescribed, in-depth understanding of the problem must have been achieved. Most times, these solutions does not even correspond with the socio-political realities of the country. Just a “copy and paste”.
Can’t wait for your Independence Day piece. 🏌️♂️
The fuel subsidy talk prompted my sharing this 👇🏾. For I recognized that the debate took on a binary knife-edge form, barely even glossing over the main issue.
https://substack.com/@0equilibrium/note/p-215774390?r=2ry62q
This reminds me of an excerpt from Ronald Reagan's a time for choosing speech 'Those who would trade our freedom for the soup kitchen of the welfare state have told us they have a utopian solution of peace without victory. They call their policy "accommodation." And they say if we'll only avoid any direct confrontation with the enemy, he'll forget his evil ways and learn to love us. All who oppose them are indicted as warmongers. They say we offer simple answers to complex problems. Well, perhaps there is a simple answer - not an easy answer but simple: If you and I have the courage to tell our elected officials that we want our national policy based on what we know in our hearts is morally right'
Ties into what I also discuss here https://substack.com/@jamesagada609223/note/p-213535311?r=25n4h&utm_medium=ios&utm_source=notes-share-action