Regional Integration In Africa Research Articles

Xenophobia and the challenge of regional integration in Africa: understanding three cardinal dynamics

While the literature on xenophobia views the phenomenon as a major challenge to the regional integration of Africa, the key nuances about how xenophobia affects regional integration, and how that could be tackled, have not been adequately captured. Addressing this knowledge gap, we examine the scholarly constructs surrounding citizenship and economic participation, as enablers of xenophobia and demonstrate how the state is called into these negotiations, and how that affects regional and continental integration. Methodologically, this paper adopts a thematic qualitative approach relying on relevant literature and theories from history, political science, migration studies, peace and conflict, international relations, sociology, and development studies. The analysis offers a three- pronged argument that xenophobia (i) generates new discourses of ‘othering’ or belonging, (ii) promotes perceptions of betrayal and retaliation in foreign policy framing or ad-hoc actions and/or attacks on non-nationals, and (iii) redefines rights of occupancy or territorial belonging. The analysis of these dynamics offers valuable knowledge on security, development, and regional integration of Africa from in-country ‘xenophobia studies’ to both in-country and continental/regional level understanding of xenophobia.

Mass Preferences for the Free Movement of People in Africa: A Public Opinion Analysis of 36 Countries

The African Union (AU) has identified opening borders to cross-national mobility as a prime strategic goal, and AU leaders have heralded regional free movement as a vital tool for economic growth and skills development on the continent. Little, however, is known about the level (or determinants) of public support for opening borders in the AU. This article examines public preferences for free movement among 36 African countries. Using data from the sixth round of the Afrobarometer Survey (N = 53,935), the analysis presented here shows a remarkable degree of variation in mobility-related preferences both within and between nations, and explores whether a utilitarian model of attitude formation can explain mass preferences for open borders across African countries. Investigating both macro- and micro-level determinants of public attitudes toward border control, the article shows that the utilitarian model had greater explanatory power at the macro-level than at the micro-level. In addition, some support was found for identity-based predictors (e.g., nationalism versus cosmopolitanism) of support for free movement. These outcomes point toward a new way of understanding public attitudes toward regional integration in Africa. The article concludes by discussing future avenues of public opinion research toward mobility rights on the continent and beyond.

COMPREHENSIVE AND HOLISTIC HUMAN SECURITY FOR A POSTCOLONIAL SOUTHERN AFRICA: A CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

At the heart of the conundrum of regional integration in Africa is the very conceptual basis of the idea and its agendas. In southern Africa, the agenda has for decades been about fighting poverty and enabling a good life for the citizens of the region, but the so-called developmental regional integration agenda is undermined by the lack of coherence and synergy between the security and development arms of the Southern African Development Community (SADC). The former has the Strategic Indicative Plan of the Organ of Security Cooperation and Defence (SIPO) and the development efforts are guided by the Regional Indicative Strategic Development Plan (RISDP). Both claim to pursue human security by placing the plight of ordinary citizens at the centre of all efforts, yet in reality this shared aspiration has not provided a basis conceptually speaking, nor practically, for a deep cohesion in the manner in which SADC pursues its overriding goals. This article provides a critical analysis of the evolution of the concept and it also anticipates how it will evolve into a holistic idea in southern Africa. It identifies major obstacles to the achievement of the goal and offers possible solutions to the conceptual confusion that confounds the idea of human security by suggesting a comprehensive understanding of the concept and how it might apply in southern Africa.

Fundamental Legal, Economic and Political Obstacles to Regional Integration in Africa: Which Way Forward?

Fundamental Legal, Economic and Political Obstacles to Regional Integration in Africa: Which Way Forward?

REGIONAL INTEGRATION IN AFRICA UNDER THE SHADOW OF THE MORAL ECONOMY OF THE EU-AFRICA RELATIONSHIP

Since the first moves of decolonization, African countries have not overcome the negative effects of colonization and are still facing underdevelopment, poverty gap, and low share in world trade The interregional relationship established with the European countries after independence does not seem to fulfill the development promises the European Economic Community made at the beginning. With many regional economic communities and conflicting trade rules, regional integration in Africa is so complex that it is described as a spaghetti bowl, in line with Bhagwati's definition. In addition, all the delays and discussions surrounding the Economic Partnership Agreements and the uncertainties regarding the future of the relations experienced before the signing of the post-Cotonou Agreement in April 2021, have also strained the interregional relationship with the EU. The article aims to discuss Africa's development and regional integration problems by blending the Moral Economy approach and the Historical Discourse Analysis method. This article discusses the current development and regional integration problems in Africa from a moral economy approach, combining it with Discourse Historical Analysis. It considers regional integration as one of the norms that the moral economy of the EU-Africa interregional relationship has been based on and explores its construction within this moral economy from a historical perspective. The main concern of this article is to investigate the construction of the regional integration norm in parallel to the development co-operation discourse and to explain its role in obscuring the impact of EU development co-operation on the current development and regional integration process in Africa, as well as the problems in the EU-Africa interregional relationship itself.

Nigeria’s Border Closure: Implications for Africa Continental Free Trade Area Agreement

African Continent Free Trade Area Agreement (AFCFTA) has long been considered as a mechanism for accelerating economic growth and engendering visible reductions in income inequality. Trading activities under the AFCFTA arrangement was expected to kick start in July 2020 but recent developments suggest that the implementation may be slowed down. The closure of Nigerian border barely 3 months after signing the pact is an indication of the low level of preparedness and commitments by most member states. The argument in favour of the border closure is further strengthened by the current reality of Coronal virus pandemic which suddenly hit the world's population. Moving forward, Nigeria's actions render the seriousness and prospects of regional integration in Africa a little doubtful. Apart from diverting focus from areas that can enhance free trade agreement such as trade data capture, transportation infrastructure, and border protection, the Nigeria's border closure may dampen the enthusiasm of other countries towards the free trade deal. The effect of the land closure placed a downward strain on the national income and GDP of Nigeria's neighbouring countries particularly Benin republic, Niger republic, Cameroun and Ghana. As a way forward, AFCTA should encourage member countries to diversify and specialize in the production of goods for which they have comparative advantage in order to deepen intra-African and intra-regional trade and for participating countries to benefit from economies of scale.

Examining the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic for regional integration in Africa

The covid-19 pandemic has had effect on all facets of human life. Regional integration is no exception. Meanwhile, regional integration has been largely held as one of the most feasible avenues for developing countries to achieve prosperity. This paper examines why African states took decisions that were in violation of regional integration protocols when faced with the covid-19 scourge. Four policy briefs about the effects of the covid-19 pandemic on regional integration in Africa were analysed using the qualitative content analysis method. The findings were interpreted through the lens of a rationalist actor choice model. The study found that state actors in Africa took decisions that broke regional integration protocols. These decisions were the result of severe limitations imposed by the pandemic against the desire of actors to maximise interests. The findings contradict a popular view expressed by the authors of the policy briefs who appeared to portray deliberate actions on the part of state actors to impose border closures and trade restrictions. The pandemic has unveiled a reality in the risk of overrating how far states can go in their search for integration. States as rational actors will always choose survival over loyalty. State actors would need to exercise more caution in their commitment to regional integration regimes.

AfCFTA and Regional Integration in Africa: Is African Union Government a Dream Deferred or Denied?

ABSTRACTThe concept of regional integration is not a new phenomenon; it has been raging since the 1960s when many African countries gained political independence from their erstwhile colonial masters. In essence, there were two blocs which had different views on how to integrate Africa, and the pace and veracity through which this was to be done. The first bloc was the Casablanca bloc under the leadership of Dr Kwame Nkrumah, the second was the Monrovia bloc which was led by Nnamdi Azikiwe, the first President of Nigeria. The former argued for a wholesale and once-off comprehensive political and economic unification of Africa, from Cape to Cairo, the Horn of Africa to the West of Africa. The latter insisted that Nkrumah’s approach was not feasible; therefore, a gradualist and more cautious approach was necessary, first by forming regional economic communities, then later an African Economic Community, with a politically integrated Africa emerging as the last step. The Monrovia bloc won the debate. The central argument of this paper is that almost all of these regional integration efforts and agreements (from the Lagos Plan of Action 1980, the Abuja Treaty 1991, the Tripartite Free Trade Area (TFTA) 2015, the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) 2018, and the eight official Regional Economic Communities (RECs) in Africa, etc.) disproportionately focused on trade and economic integration while saying very little about the crucial integration aspect concerning the political unification of Africa in the form of a centralised union government.

Regional Integration in Africa and the Performance of African Union (AU): an Appraisal

Regional integration has been known for its inherent benefits to the states. As a concept of international relations, it has brought growth, development, political stability and order in almost all the states of the world that have formed one regional integration system to another. The study examined the achievements, challenges and prospects of African Union since its inception in 2002. In other words, the central thrust of study was to find out about the performance of AU in comparison with the defunct organization of African Unity. The study adopts liberal institutionalism as its theoretical framework of analysis. The study also made use of secondary source of data. The findings of the study as follows: financial problem, high level of unemployment, poor implementation of its programme, poverty, prevalence of dictators and corruption and bad governance. The study recommends the following: that African Union should double its efforts to eradicate corruption and bad governance in the African continent if they are to make progress towards elimination of poverty and African leaders should rise up to their responsibility of funding peacekeeping operations within African States without the involvement of the external bodies/states.

From Pan-Africanism to African regionalism: A chronicle

ABSTRACT Classical African regionalism, as rooted in pan-Africanism, is a strategy for decolonisation, anti-colonial and neo-colonial struggles, and continental unity. Modern African regionalism is a means to achieving continental unity, collective self-reliance and economic transformation as well as to creating an agenda for solving African developmental challenges. The main objective of this paper, therefore, is to examine the historical evolution of pan-Africanism and regionalism in Africa from colonial to post-colonial era in order to trace the interface between them. The paper assesses the extent to which regional integration in Africa has been able to achieve its stated objectives and targets over the years. It also investigates the various obstacles, constraints and challenges that militate against the accomplishment of its objectives, opportunities and prospects. It then interrogates the narratives of the Western neoliberal theories of integration or approaches to African integration. Subsequently the paper suggests that there is a need to deconstruct them in the search for paradigm shift in African integration. It contends that there is also a need to evolve a new theoretical approach to African integration anchored on neo-neo-integrationism of post-neo-functionalism or post-modern integrationism of post-neo-nationalism.

Regional Integration and Development in Africa: Between the Rock and a Hard Place

Since independence in the late 1950s, and in the early 1960s, regional integration in Africa has been identified as an important strategy for the acceleration of development in the continent. The reality of the Post-Cold War international economic world order also stimulates the intensification and fine-tuning of existing regional arrangements leading to the establishment of a supra-national organization and capacity building institutions to address the problems of underdevelopment in Africa. As a consequence, numerous integration groupings have been reorganized and created but their achievements have largely been modest due to inappropriate integration approaches. It is against this background that this article examines the interlocking nexus between regional integration and development in Africa, and maintains that Africans need to adjust their orientation as well as take a major shift towards economic complementarity among member states of integration blocs for the actualization of laudable development. It concludes that inward looking and the involvement of all Africans in the regional integration processes would be the best approach for regional integration to foster development.

States’ Attitude to International Boundaries and Africa’s Challenging Integration: CUES from Pre-1945 Europe

Since the 1960s, African states have sought ways to overcome the challenges of economic and political integration through the establishment and promotion of regional and subregional organizations across the continent. The different efforts have yielded very modest success altogether. However, it appears that Africans are the architect of the continent’s low level of integration. Africa’s nationalist approach to international boundaries coupled with the inclination and disposition towards economic nationalism with regards to neighbouring states has been identified as the major impediments to the process of integration in the continent. By adopting content analysis approach, this paper explores the nexus between the state’s attitude to international boundaries and regional integration. This paper analyses how European’s attitude to international boundaries and the resulting trans-boundary cooperation between and among the different groups of European states before 1945 was instrumental to the historic success of integration in post-1945 Europe. It further looks into the pre-1945 European experience with trans-boundary cooperation as a template for assessing trans-boundary cooperation among African states during the colonial and post-colonial periods. This paper concludes that modest achievements so far recorded in the process of regional integration in Africa is a function of the nationalistic attitude of states to international boundary. Subsequently, the study recommends that to achieve real integration in the continent, Africans and their leaders must change their attitude towards inherited colonial boundaries from their prevailing official postures as lines of divides to more liberal disposition as corridors of cooperation.

Regional Integration: Do Intra-African Trade and Migration Improve Income in Africa?

Regional integration in Africa is a subject of great interest, but its impact on income has not been studied sufficiently. Using cross-sectional and panel estimations, this article examines the impact of African integration on real per capita income in Africa. Accordingly, we consider intra-African trade and migration flows as quantitative measures reflecting the intensity of regional integration. To address the endogeneity concerns, we use a gravity-based, two-stage least-squares strategy. Our results show that, from a long-term perspective, African integration has not been strong enough to generate a positive, significant, and robust impact on real per capita income in Africa. However, it does appear to be significantly income-enhancing in the short and medium terms but only through intercountry migration. These results are robust to a wide range of specifications.

Towards the Development of Agenda 2063 Geo-Portal to Support Sustainable Development in Africa

The successful implementation of the African Union’s Agenda 2063 strategic development blueprint is critical for the attainment of economic development, social prosperity, political stability, protection, and regional integration in Africa. Agenda 2063 is a strategic and endogenous development plan that seeks to strategically and competitively reposition the African continent to ensure poverty eradication and equitable people-centric socio-economic and technological transformation. Its impact areas include wealth creation, shared prosperity, sustainable environment, and transformative capacities. Monitoring and evaluation systems play a critical role in collecting, recording, storing, integrating, and evaluating and tracking performance information in the implementation of longer-term strategic plans. The usage of the geographic information system (GIS) as a monitoring and evaluation tool has gained traction in the last few decades due to its ability to support the collection, integration, storage, analysis, output, and distribution of location-based data. The advent of web-based GIS provides a powerful online platform to collect, integrate, discover, use and share geospatial data, information, and services related to sustainable development. In this paper, we aim to describe the implementation, architectural structural design, and the functionality of the pilot Agenda 2063 geoportal. The live prototype internet-based geoportal is intended to facilitate data collection, management, integration, analysis, and visualization of Agenda 2063 development indicators. This geoportal is meant to support the planning, implementation, and monitoring of the Agenda 2063 goals at the continental, regional, and national levels. As our results show, we successfully demonstrated that a web-geoportal is a powerful interactive platform to upload, access, explore, visualize, analyse, and disseminate geospatial data related to the sustainable development of the African continent. Although in the pilot phase, the geoportal demonstrates the primary functionality of geoportals in terms of its capability to discover, analyse, share, and download geospatial datasets.

Xenophobia and the Prospects of Regional Integration in Africa

Xenophobia and the Prospects of Regional Integration in Africa

Transport Infrastructure Development in Kenya: How Connectivity Impacts Eastern Africa Regional Integration

The study examined Kenya’s transport infrastructure by assessing strengths, opportunities, challenges and initiatives aimed at enhancing existing systems and mitigating gaps towards more connectivity, mobility and reduced costs. Specific objectives of the study included evaluating the current state of transport infrastructure in Kenya, examining milestones in Kenya’s transport infrastructure development in the last decade and determining whether planned transport infrastructure development projects in Kenya would enhance regional integration. This study was significant to policy handlers, development partners and scholars in the region as findings will inform targeted planning and programming for improved transport connectivity. Target population was 150 individuals drawn from the categories of related actors with a sample size of 75 individuals, which was arrived at exclusively and objectively by researcher. The study established that the transport structural gap was a serious handicap to growth and poverty reduction in eastern Africa and that transport connectivity had a direct link to any country’s competitiveness because it weighs on cost of doing business and living. The study recommended sector reforms and innovation towards optimum level of connectivity as a result of the upgraded transport system, with eastern Africa reaching greater regional integration. The study adopted descriptive approach in analysing quantitative and qualitative data as variables under investigation were described.

Towards an Inclusive Model of African Regional Integration: How Effective has the Linear Model been so Far?

Abstract: The proponents of African regional integration hoped to create large economic spaces that allow economies of scale, increased efficiency, competitiveness and faster growth of Africa states. Whereas the linear model of regional integration seemed to have worked for the European Union, many have questioned its applicability in the African context. The applicability of the Linear model at the stages of Regional Economic Communities (RECs) like the EAC has met with significant stagnation primarily because of some bottlenecks such as poor infrastructure that limits the connectivity with the continent and lack of political will out of fear for the loss of sovereignty. The question thus lies in how the dream for a regionally united Africa will arise when its people cannot move and interact freely within the continent? By utilizing a secondary research design, this paper, therefore, sought to not only examine the effectiveness of the linear model of regional integration for Africa but also explore the possibility of incorporating the functionalist and federalist approach into an inclusive model for African regional integration. In examining the economic dynamics of regional integration, the paper identifies the benefits of economic integration, such as larger markets as a result of free movement of people and goods that could be harnessed by trading communities within Africa. Thus, the central argument in this paper does not discard the benefits and successes of the linear model of regional integration but concludes that its effectiveness can be enhanced by incorporating functionalist and at later stages federalist approaches to regional integration in Africa. The principal argument is that political and elitist integration agreements are futile when the continent is not connected physically and trade wise.

Civil society participation in regional integration in Africa: A comparative analysis of ECOWAS, SADC, and the EAC

ABSTRACTThere is an undeniable trend towards civil society participation in virtually all issue-areas of global governance, yet civil society participation varies widely among international organisation (IOs). While this trend has inspired a voluminous academic literature, empirically-based, comparative studies of IO-civil society interaction in Africa remain largely absent. This article therefore examines civil society participation in three African subregional organisations – the East African Community (EAC), the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), and the Southern African Development Community (SADC). What are the factors that have made regional integration in ECOWAS relatively more people-driven, and that have thus far hindered effective civil society participation in the affairs of SADC and the EAC? Support from member states, allies in the respective organisation’s bureaucracy, and characteristics of civil society itself, the research shows, affect participation in regional integration, with the latter aspect apparently more salient in SADC and the EAC than in ECOWAS.

Challenges and Breakthrough for Horn of Africa Regional Integration

Horn of Africa (HoA) region brushed multiple frontlines for the last four decades; Outsiders were playing proxy politics within the area. Uncertainty and insecurity, extremism and radicalization, poverty and inter-state and intra-state conflict become accepted. Besides HoA is one of the most vital shipping lines in the world. Historical breakthroughs emerged in the region when the reformist leader Dr. Abiy becomes the Prime minister of Ethiopia. Proactive moves of ending longstanding disputes and conflicts between the states in the region such as Ethiopia-Eritrea border conflict. Therefore, this paper seeks to critically calculate the breakthrough and challenges ahead for the leaders of the region to bring successful regional integration. Specifically focuses on three countries namely Ethiopia, Eritrea, and Somalia. A critical analysis on the tripartite summits among the leaders of the three nations, the declarations, the points of action as well as the ramification of the change envisaged will shed more light on the progress of the social and economic integration in the region. Moreover, this paper will navigate through the challenges and achievements that are likely to be realized from this integration, considering the political diversity that currently exists among these three countries.

OECD Observer Roundtable on regional integration in Africa

OECD Observer Roundtable on regional integration in Africa