Pockets of Effectiveness and the Politics of State-building and Development in Africa
Pockets of Effectiveness and the Politics of State-building and Development in Africa

Author: Sam Hickey

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2023-07-03

Total Pages: 305

ISBN-13: 0192688375

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This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-BC-ND 4.0 International License. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations. Why do certain parts of the state in Africa work so effectively despite operating in difficult governance contexts? How do 'pockets of bureaucratic effectiveness' emerge and become sustained over time? And what does this tell us about the prospects for state-building and development in Africa? Repeated economic and social crises have demanded that development thinkers and policy actors have had to engage with the critical role that states play in delivering development. Pockets of Effectiveness and the Politics of State-building and Development in Africa shows that politics is the driving factor that shapes how well state agencies perform their roles. It deploys a new conceptual framework – the power domains approach – to explore the shifting fortunes of key state agencies in five countries – Ghana, Kenya, Rwanda, Uganda, and Zambia – over the past three decades. Our original research reveals when, how and why political rulers decide to build effective state agencies and enable them to deliver certain forms of economic development – often through forming strategic coalitions with senior bureaucrats and with international support – and also when this support falters and gives way to a politics of survival. Comparative analysis identifies two potential trajectories towards state-building in Africa, each shaped by different configurations of social and political power. The book critiques the role that international development agencies have played in (mis)shaping the state in Africa and suggests a new strategic agenda for building the state capacities required to deliver sustained development at the current juncture. The book closes with critical commentaries from two leading scholars in the field, to help place our work in context and establish the next steps for research and strategy in this increasingly important area of development theory and practice.

The Political Economy of Bank Regulation in Developing Countries
The Political Economy of Bank Regulation in Developing Countries

Author: Emily Jones

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2020

Total Pages: 405

ISBN-13: 019884199X

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This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.International banking standards are intended for the regulation of large, complex, risk-taking international banks with trillions of dollars in assets and operations across the globe. Yet they are being implemented in countries with nascent financial markets and small banks that have yet to ventureinto international markets. Why is this? This book develops a new framework to explain regulatory interdependence between countries in the core and the periphery of the global financial system. Drawing on in-depth analysis of eleven countries across Africa, Asia, and Latin America, it shows howfinancial globalisation generates strong reputational and competitive incentives for developing countries to converge on international standards. It explains how specific cross-border relations between regulators, politicians, and banks within developing countries, and international actors includinginvestors, peer regulators, and international financial institutions, generate regulatory interdependence. It explains why some configurations of domestic politics and forms of integration into global finance generate convergence with international standards, while other configurations lead todivergence. This book contributes to our understanding of the ways in which governments and firms in the core of global finance powerfully shape regulatory decisions in the periphery, and the ways that governments and firms from peripheral developing countries manoeuvre within the constraints andopportunities created by financial globalisation.

Clientelism, Capitalism, and Democracy
Clientelism, Capitalism, and Democracy

Author: Didi Kuo

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2018-08-16

Total Pages: 181

ISBN-13: 1108426085

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In the United States and Britain, capitalists organized in opposition to clientelism and demanded programmatic parties and institutional reforms.

Governing Extractive Industries
Governing Extractive Industries

Author: Anthony Bebbington

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2018

Total Pages: 291

ISBN-13: 0198820933

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This book synthesizes findings regarding the political drivers of institutional change in extractive industry governance. It analyses resource governance from the late nineteenth century to the present in Bolivia, Ghana, Peru, and Zambia, focusing on the ways in which resource governance and national political settlements interact.

Political Settlements and Development
Political Settlements and Development

Author: Senior Research Fellow Tim Kelsall

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2022-05-19

Total Pages: 273

ISBN-13: 0192848933

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Few concepts have captured the imagination of the conflict and development community in recent years as powerfully as the idea of a 'political settlement'. At its most ambitious, 'political settlements analysis' (PSA) promises to explain why conflicts occur and states collapse, the conditions for their successful rehabilitation, different developmental pathways from peace, and how to better fit development policy to country context. Yet not all is well in the world of PSA. Rival definitions of the term abound, there are disagreements about its scope and the way it should be used, a growing schism between conflict specialists and economists, basic concepts are ambiguous and little progress has been made on measurement. Political Settlements and Development consequently has three main aims: to argue for a revised definition of a political settlement, capable of unifying its diverse strands, and opening new opportunities for the analysis of conflict and development; to put the concept on a more solid theoretical and scientific footing, providing a method for measuring and categorising political settlements, while using new data to analyse the relationship between political settlements and development; and finally, to examine the implications for policymakers. This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.

Democracy in Ghana
Democracy in Ghana

Author: Jeffrey W. Paller

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2019-03-07

Total Pages: 333

ISBN-13: 1108661815

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Rapid urbanization and political liberalization is changing the nature of African politics and societies. This book develops a framework for the study of democracy and development that emphasizes informal institutions and the politics of belonging in the context of daily life, in contrast to the formal and electoral paradigms that dominate the social sciences. Based on fifteen months of field research including ethnographic observation, focus group interviews, and original quantitative survey analysis in Ghana, this book intervenes in major debates about public goods provision, civic participation, ethnic politics and democratization, and the future of urban sustainability in a rapidly changing world. By developing new understandings of democracy, as well as providing novel explanations for good governance and development in poor urban neighborhoods, the book transcends the narrative of a failing and corrupt Africa and charts a new way forward for the study of democracy and development.

The Politics of Distributing Social Transfers
The Politics of Distributing Social Transfers

Author: Senior Lecturer in Politics and Development Tom Lavers

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2022-03-14

Total Pages: 289

ISBN-13: 0192862529

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This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations. The Politics of Distributing Social Transfers in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia provides a systematic analysis of the political processes shaping the distribution of social transfers in six countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. In doing so, the book addresses a notable gap in recent research on social protection concerning the politics of implementation. While considerable attention has been devoted to debating the merits of different policy designs and the political factors shaping the adoption and diffusion of different policy models, ultimately the ability of any social transfer programme to deliver on its promises is dependent on the effective implementation and distribution of social transfers in line with intended objectives. The chapters in this book examine international and sub-national variation in programme implementation in Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Nepal, and Rwanda, drawing on a common analytical framework that highlights the importance of state capacity and reach, rooted in histories of state formation, and contemporary political competition in shaping the distribution of social transfers. Comparative analysis of the case studies supports the view that variation in the capacity and reach of the state within countries is a centrally important factor shaping the effectiveness and impartiality of distribution. Yet state capacity alone is insufficient. Rather political competition and power relations shape how this capacity is actually deployed in practice. As such, the book underscores the inherently political nature of implementation and questions common technocratic efforts to improve implementation by de-politicizing the social protection policy process.

Public Budgeting in African Nations
Public Budgeting in African Nations

Author: Peter Fuseini Haruna

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2016-04-14

Total Pages: 386

ISBN-13: 1317267540

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Public Budgeting in African Nations aims to provide usable budgeting and fiscal policy management information to development practitioners interested in improving the performance of governments in the context of good governance. It shares regional and cross-cultural experiences with international audiences and gives reflective attention to comparative budgeting and fiscal policy management. With a promising economic and fiscal forecast, such information is timely for international development practitioners and for scholars and researchers interested in advancing development management. This book adopts an interdisciplinary/pragmatic approach to analyze and present research findings on public budgeting as a sustainable development tool. The central argument is that development practice will benefit from a bottom-up, decentralized approach to budgeting and fiscal policy management, involving national, sub-national, and civil society institutions. From this perspective, a balanced budget should draw from and reflect values and priorities across the full spectrum of social and political life.

The Routledge Handbook on Livelihoods in the Global South
The Routledge Handbook on Livelihoods in the Global South

Author: Fiona Nunan

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2022-05-05

Total Pages: 713

ISBN-13: 1000581543

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The Routledge Handbook on Livelihoods in the Global South presents a unique, timely, comprehensive overview of livelihoods in low- and middle-income countries. Since their widespread adoption in the 1990s, livelihoods perspectives, frameworks and methods have influenced diverse areas of research, policy and practice. The concept of livelihoods reflects the complexity of strategies and practices used by individuals, households and communities to meet their needs and live their lives. The Handbook brings together insights and critical analysis from diverse approaches and experiences, learning from research and practice over the last 30 years. The Handbook comprises an introductory section on key concepts and frameworks, followed by five parts, on researching livelihoods, negotiating livelihoods, generating livelihoods, enabling livelihoods and contextualising livelihoods. The introduction provides readers with an appreciation of concepts researched and applied in the five parts, including chapters on vulnerability and resilience, social capital and networks, and institutions. Each part reflects the diversity of approaches taken to understanding livelihoods, whilst recognising commonalities, including the centrality of power in shaping, enabling and constraining livelihoods. The book also reflects diversity of context, including conflict, climate change and religion, as well as in generating livelihoods, through agriculture, small-scale mining and pastoralism. The aim of each chapter is to provide a critically informed introduction and overview of key concepts, issues and debates of relevance to the topic, with each chapter concluding with suggestions for further reading. It will be an essential resource to students, researchers and practitioners of international development and related fields. Researchers and practitioners will also benefit from the book's diverse disciplinary contributions and by the wide and contemporary coverage.

Geopolitical Economy of Energy and Environment
Geopolitical Economy of Energy and Environment

Author:

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2017-07-10

Total Pages: 537

ISBN-13: 9004273115

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This book is the product of a joint research program between the Institute of West Asia & African Studies of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing and the Energy Program Asia of the International Institute for Asian Studies, Leiden University. China’s transition to an urban-industrial society relies on its abundant domestic coal supplies, and on an increase in oil and gas imports. However, authorities are confronted with trade-offs between investments in expanding supplies of fossils, environmental sustainability, energy efficiency and in clean energy. Resources spent on expanding imported energy have to weighted against clean energy investments and improving efficiency of the fossil-fuel sector. The same is no less true for the European Union and its member states. Import dependency on piped gas is again growing. Security of supply of natural gas depends on political cooperation with energy-rich countries. At the same the EU has to meet its clean energy commitments by compromises between member states and ‘Brussels’. Chinese National Oil Companies bridge the worlds of government in China and the extractive sector in hydrocarbon exporting-countries. At the global level, Chinese (Trans-)National Oil Companies maintain competitive and cooperative relations with privately owned International Oil companies. This book focuses, among others, on these networks with the objective to contribute to the study of the geopolitical economy of the energy sectors in the global system. Contributors are: M.P. Amineh, Eric K. Chu, Wina H.J. Crijns-Graus, Robert Cutler, Li Xiaohua, Liu Dong, Chen Mo, Nana de Graaff, Joyeeta Gupta, Sara Hardus, Barbara Hogenboom, Sun Hongbo and Yang Guang.