Ghanaian economist George Ayittey was a voice in the wilderness for many years, speaking out against the corruption and complacency that—more than any other factor, he believes—are the bedrock problems of many troubled Africa states. “We call our governments Vampire States, which suck the economic vitality out of the people”. Ayittey’s influential book Africa Unchained has helped unleash a new wave of activism and optimism especially in the African blogosphere where his notion of Cheetah’s-vs-Hippo’s has become a standard shorthand. The Cheetah generation is a “new breed of Africans” the fast moving entrepreneurial leaders and citizens taking their futures into their own hands, instead of waiting for politicians to empower them. He compares them to the previous Hippo generation, complacent greedy bureaucrats, wallowing in the muck, who are lazily stuck complaining about colonialism, yet doing nothing to change the status quo.

Dr. Ayittey was listed by the Foreign Policy magazine among the world’s Top 100 Public Intellectuals in 2008.

Sponsored by the Economics Club at FSU; the Gus A. Stavros Center; and the College of Social Sciences' Shepard & Ruth K. Broad International Lecture Series.