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African Journal of Political Science
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Economic development
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- Description:
- Undoubtedly, globalisation is a complex process. It is touted as having the potential to accelerate Africa's development if the continent's economies would be reformed in accordance with market principles. But clearly, globalisation is widening the disparities between the developed and developing economies. Africa's economies, in particular, are experiencing severe stagnation and, in some case, decline. By exacerbating Africa's development crisis, globalisation further poses a challenge to Africa. It emphasizes economic integration as the only viable alternative for survival in this New World order, and the urgency for a renewed commitment to the African Economic Community (AEC). Given the inherent weakness of existing regional integration schemes and the constraints in the development environment, there is also the need to reformulate the theoretical basis of the African Economic Community by incorporating the idea of "variable geometry" to enable countries to join the AEC as and when they can cope with the economic and political demands of integration.
- Date Issued:
- 2000-06-01T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- African Journal of Political Science
- Description:
- Despite improvements in some social sectors in some countries, conditions in African countries worsened over the last two decades of the 20th century. As corporate globalization continues to make in roads into national policies and politics, further weakening the ability of African countries to act, there is a need to explore other alternatives for development in Africa. Although this article is essentially an effort to articulate a theoretical deconstruction and reconstruction of the African State, in its content, it is based on numerous empirical case studies and research projects developed by the author over the years on Africa's international relations, political economy, development, and world politics. Reconceptualizing the African state is a must because, firstly, about four decades of preoccupation with development have yielded only very meager returns. It has proven a mistake to attempt to analyze something that has not yet been seriously on the agenda, dealing mainly with symptoms related to behaviors of the state instead of its substance. Secondly, all the available evidence points to the inescapable conclusion that political conditions in Africa are the greatest impediment to development. Thirdly, despite the explosion of the number of actors in the global system and the deliberate efforts of mega financial, multinational and multilateral institutions to African States, and also despite the fact that the African systems of delivering services or performance at the national level are highly problematic, the African State is still the most visible actor in world politics. Finally, the fate of Africa's peoples and cultures has been historically defined by the dynamics of the state, especially its role in international political economy and in making alliances for its own immortality. Colonial Africa was created essentially as states and not as nations, and neo-colonial political elites inherited African States as the central agencies defining the parameters of economy, culture, and the people or citizens.The typologies used here are shaped by an historical structuralist approach that stipulates that systems, states, corporations or social institutions do not function randomly. The system is not just the sum of its elements. It is more than what is tangible. This holistic approach puts the emphasis on change. The African State in its current form is not an agent of positive social change because this state was created to advance the interests of metropolitan capitalism. Development has not started in Africa for many reasons, despite the goodwill of many Africans and African social movements. African people need to reinvent new state forms that can effectively address issues related to poverty, gender inequalities, etc. Despite corporate globalization and the struggles to dismantle welfare states, African people can learn a great deal from the policy and politics of such states.
- Date Issued:
- 2002-06-01T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- African Journal of Political Science
- Description:
- The death of Julius Nyerere in 1999 has renewed interest in the history of the socialist experiment in Tanzania and its relevance for the future of the developmetalist project in Africa. Positions on the issue have been polarized, with some commentaries based on reasoned, empirical research and analysis and others, essentially speculative, assuming a pattern that has been described as "African bashing". This article explores Nyerere's philosophy of Ujamaa as an attempt to integrate traditional African values with the demands of the post-colonial setting. As a philosophy, the central objective of Ujamaa was the attainment of a self-reliant socialist nation. The fact that its achievements were rather qualified was no doubt partly due to its inadequate appreciation of the Tanzanian reality, and the fact that it was more Utopian than practical. But this is not to deny the legitimate intentions and aspirations that informed Ujamaa as a development strategy. Implementation was a major challenge. However, in assessing how well it fared as policy, Ujamaa has to be placed side by side with comparative schemes, or alternative developments models, including the IMF/World Bank sponsored structural adjustment programmes. Given the current developmental challenges in Africa, there is need to go beyond "Africa bashing" to constructively interrogate previous developmental experiments like Nyerere's Ujamaa and ask what lessons they hold for the quest for socio-economic development in the continent.
- Date Issued:
- 2003-06-01T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- African Journal of Political Science