The reason deals with their history, borders, leaders, and lack of national identity.
Firstly, during the Berlin Conference of 1884-1885 divided Africa, for the most part, as we know it today. European powers such as Britain, France, Germany, etc. lobbied back and forth over territories to take. The British wanted to control a monopoly of the Suex canal and the Nile so they took much of the East. France took much of the west. The geographic distribution was only focused on European power lobbying, and not intelligent land divisions.
There are thousands of languages and cultures in Africa. When the future countries were divided, they weren't divided considering the various cultures. Many Europeans didn't even care. They only concerned themselves with "who had the most land, or defend this monopoly." Thus, many African counties have people who can't even communicate. Tribal rivals may be stuck in the same country leading to ethnic clashes.
The nations also implemented alternate rules. The British would go, find the first "king" in the territory, and use them like a puppet. They'd be in charge provided they listen to the British. That may have been one of 20 Kings in the territory. The French on the other hand, took the territory as French turf. They initially saw it as extended France; however, realizing the African populace out numbered the French populace... they began to create a social elite where European educated elite would count as the citizens.
After WWII, decolonization occurred. The British labeled their puppet kings as in charge, and simply left. France left with a educated elite ruling over an uneducated mass. Nations like Belgium said, "Here is the capital city, whoever rules it is the legit ruler of the Congo." Leading multiple rebel factions to just kill each other. So now you have this.
1. Territories that were hardly governed being told they are a nation.
2. Territories that are honestly cluster ****s of different cultures and languages. AKA: No one can work together #LanguageBarrier
3. Absolutely no governmental institution other than maybe a king or social elite.
At this point, the world basically recognized whomever ruled the capital city as the legitimate government. Let's look at the Democratic Republic of Congo.
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Firstly, note the capital is Kinshasa towards the left side of the country where it starts to pan out. All you have to do to be the leader is control that city. SOOOOO.
1. You just have one city to control.
2. See the city of Isiro in the top right? Well... we don't know who they are... we didn't even care they existed before now. I can't even speak their language so **** 'em. Hell they may not even know they're a new country!
3. A good deal of African finance comes from Natural resources. So all we have to do is hold the capital, and control the resources. Who gives a shit about the people? That's all we have to do!
That is the mentality that rises in many African nations at times of independence. Other nations like Sierra Leone, start off successfully democratic, but quickly turn into authoritarian regimes and ultimately a 20 year civil war. Since all one must do to gain financial wealth and power is control the capital and resources, many countries end up not even caring about their nation outside of the capital and resource spots. This gives rise to Neopatromonialsim.
This concept is pretty simple: You form a government that is a one party system (meaning one political party), and you make laws restricting everything to the party.
1. Want to run a business: Better be a party member or it is illegal.
2. Elections are coming up: You only have one candidate.
That kind of deal. And when you have this power... you assign the government positions to your buddies and family so you capitalize on everything. You may receive foreign aid, and profits from National trade and just slip it into your pocket. You don't even care about people on the outside. Some African rulers even PURPOSEFULLY destroyed road systems so possible rebel groups couldn't move around as easily.
It is also a rule that the borders of African nations can't be changed (except for the rare and new development of the practically failed state South Sudan). So they can't even redefine borders to better accommodate language barriers.
Not every nation is doing bad. Botswana, South Africa, and possibly now Nigeria are rising. Sierra Leone has the world's highest rising industrial growth rate as well as second in GDP growth rate. Only behind South Sudan because it went from 0 to a number (new nation and all). Though Leone still has massive problems of its own lol!
In the end, Africa boils down to three groups: Specialists in Violence, Common Citizens, and Social Elite. When they are balanced... nations are at peace.
Social Elite are your gov. officals. They pay the specialist in violence in order to keep them from rebelling. They can mess up balance in two ways. A) begin taking too much money.... leaving the specialists in violence seeing they won't profit and fighting. B) Continued corruption and surpression leaves the general Citizens rebelling: what do they have to lose at this point?
Specialists in violence: Rebel groups, military forces.... as the name implies: fighters. They mess the balance when they see they will no longer profit from a situation. When the government begins going bankrupt.... you aren't sticking around. Time to pillage and burn.
Finally, general citizens are the residents of countries. Pending the specialists in violence and their state of living (laws from Elites) they are passive, angry, or out right rebellious.
1. Berlin Conference ****s up the distribution of people.
2. Sudden independence leaves countries (some of which didn't have any plans to be free.... and some places in the countries not knowing they are even ruled
3. The rise of neopatramonial rulers who took the profits and basically led their people into poverty (minus the elites).
The only other things to note would be lackings in State Capacity (The ability of the government to regulate events: Like say stopping a disease... or enforcing law), public provisions (like say parks, jobs, clean water), and one other aspect I can't recall at the moment.
After all that... how do you have a national Identity. Especially when you can't communicate with everyone, and industrialization is so low you may not have the technology to spread around the information.
Africa was pretty screwed over in its foundation, and at the time of their independence (which many didn't have plans for), they were left with no clue what to do. Some found a plan at the cost of others.
