Illustrated by

Joel Hopler

The Inspiration

South Africa: Cheerleaders and naysayers

Illustrator’s Notes

This week’s Special Report, Emerging Africa, included a section on South Africa which popped out, mainly due to the introspection from South Africans reflected in this quote:

Business conferences are filled with frothy talk of African lions overtaking Asian tigers.

Besides the mounted Asian tiger, I injected some pretty obvious symbolism, as the African lion totes a gun and an IOU. Most of the Special Report shows the conflict of a rising African economic power, struggling with varied types of warfare. The dichotomy of internal war and economic growth, seems to draw attention mainly to the banks hopes of being repaid on their investments, hence the IOU.