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Why do not African countries trade with one another? A qualitative study of factors affecting the intra-African trade

Grönbäck, Johanna LU (2014) STVM25 20141
Department of Political Science
Abstract
An increased regional trade in Africa is often defined as a key tool for a continued development of the continent, but although a numerous of policies aiming at increasing the trade have been adopted, the intra-regional trade remains stubbornly low. Why is that so? In this thesis some of the factors that potentially are affecting the trade are studied in a qualitative design. By conducting case studies on Mali and Zimbabwe—countries that have experienced a significant increase in their regional trade—the ambition of the paper is to in depth study and test if and how certain variables and mechanisms are affecting the trade. The variables are degree of free trade, transport and ICT infrastructure, peaceful environment and path dependency,... (More)
An increased regional trade in Africa is often defined as a key tool for a continued development of the continent, but although a numerous of policies aiming at increasing the trade have been adopted, the intra-regional trade remains stubbornly low. Why is that so? In this thesis some of the factors that potentially are affecting the trade are studied in a qualitative design. By conducting case studies on Mali and Zimbabwe—countries that have experienced a significant increase in their regional trade—the ambition of the paper is to in depth study and test if and how certain variables and mechanisms are affecting the trade. The variables are degree of free trade, transport and ICT infrastructure, peaceful environment and path dependency, and they are selected with the use of Rational Choice Institutionalism, Historical Institutionalism and earlier research. The using and testing of the variables are then done in a structured and focused analysis.

The main findings of the thesis show that a liberalisation of trade policies together with a diversified transport infrastructure constitute necessary conditions for increasing the regional trade, whereas the political environment needs to be stable in the sense of no outright wars, but not necessarily internally stable. (Less)
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author
Grönbäck, Johanna LU
supervisor
organization
course
STVM25 20141
year
type
H2 - Master's Degree (Two Years)
subject
keywords
Africa, Mali, Zimbabwe, regional trade, trade, institutionalism
language
English
id
4586873
date added to LUP
2014-09-17 13:20:22
date last changed
2014-09-17 13:20:22
@misc{4586873,
  abstract     = {{An increased regional trade in Africa is often defined as a key tool for a continued development of the continent, but although a numerous of policies aiming at increasing the trade have been adopted, the intra-regional trade remains stubbornly low. Why is that so? In this thesis some of the factors that potentially are affecting the trade are studied in a qualitative design. By conducting case studies on Mali and Zimbabwe—countries that have experienced a significant increase in their regional trade—the ambition of the paper is to in depth study and test if and how certain variables and mechanisms are affecting the trade. The variables are degree of free trade, transport and ICT infrastructure, peaceful environment and path dependency, and they are selected with the use of Rational Choice Institutionalism, Historical Institutionalism and earlier research. The using and testing of the variables are then done in a structured and focused analysis.

The main findings of the thesis show that a liberalisation of trade policies together with a diversified transport infrastructure constitute necessary conditions for increasing the regional trade, whereas the political environment needs to be stable in the sense of no outright wars, but not necessarily internally stable.}},
  author       = {{Grönbäck, Johanna}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  note         = {{Student Paper}},
  title        = {{Why do not African countries trade with one another? A qualitative study of factors affecting the intra-African trade}},
  year         = {{2014}},
}