State capacity consists of extractive, military, bureaucratic/administrative and institutional capacity. The mainstream view among Western scholars is that African states are characterized by low state capacity. The statistics between 1970 and 2012, however, show that the aforementioned four dimensions of state capacity are not evenly distributed on the African continent. Specifically speaking, while Africa’s materialistic capacities, namely extractive and military capacity, are on par with the global level, its institutional capacities, including bureaucratic/administrative capacities, are much lower. Western scholars predominantly attribute this characteristic to the following reasons: African states’ lack of experience in modern state governance, the prevalence of Neo-patrimonialism, the rational choice of African political and economic elites, dependency upon natural resources and foreign aid, as well as the absence of inter-state wars and the contemporary international law that prohibits changing existing territorial boundaries by force.