21.Regional Integration and Africa’s Development Trajectory metatheories, expectations and reality

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Regional Integration and Africa’s
Development Trajectory: meta-
theories, expectations and reality
RICHARD GIBB
ABSTRACT Regional integration remains an integral part of Africa’s develop-
ment strategy and has underpinned most pan-African development policies for
the past 50 years. This paper explores the issue of regional integration in the
context of ‘development’ theory and the neo-patrimonial state system in Africa.
A central contention of the paper is that Western, Euro-centric conceptions of
regionalism, particularly those centred on the market integration approach, have
promoted a very biased understanding of regional integration in many parts of
the developing world. Using southern Africa as an exemplar case study, the
paper argues that the various meta-theories focused on explaining the political
economy of regionalism, often closely allied to a development theory paradigm,
fail to account for the nature, character and evolution of regional integration.
Regional integration in sub-Saharan Africa has been conceived and analysed in
the light of the market-led approach, modernity and development. Thus far, it is
has failed. This paper therefore explores why market-led regional integration
has failed and why, for the foreseeable future, it will continue to do so.
In the past 15 years there has been a proliferation in the number of regional
integration agreements world-wide, with the formation of new or the
deepening of existing trading blocs in Europe, North America, Latin
America, Africa and Asia. The number of these agreements has more than
quadrupled since 1990, rising to 230 in 2005/06.1 Clearly regionalism will help
shape, and is in part a product of, changing world economic and political
relations. Indeed, Jean Francois-Poncet, a former French foreign minister,
regarded regional agreements as forming ‘centres for political and economic
development’ in the new world order.2 Notwithstanding this trend towards
regionalism, and its associated geopolitical implications, the developing
world, and Africa in particular, has been neglected in the general theoretical
debate on regionalism.3 This lack of attention may help explain why, almost
without exception, the wider discourse on regionalism has had a developed-
country, principally eurocentric, focus. Importantly regionalism’s impact on,
and relationship with, ‘development’ remains largely unexplored.
Richard Gibb is in the Faculty of Science, University of Plymouth, Drake Circus, Plymouth PL4 8AA, UK.
Email: richard.gibb@plymouth.ac.uk.
Third World Quarterly, Vol. 30, No. 4, 2009, pp 701–721
ISSN 0143-6597 print/ISSN 1360-2241 online/09/040701–21 � 2009 Third World Quarterly
DOI: 10.1080/01436590902867136 701
From a postcolonial perspective the West has been able successfully to
assert and reimpose a cultural, economic, linguistic and political agenda for
regional integration on the South. This has resulted in, and is partly a
product of, the West being able to impose and sustain a discursive hegemony
over regionalism. Thus, throughout the developing world, and in particular
in sub-Saharan Africa, regional integration schemes have been established in
terms of a completely misconceived analogy with the European Union. Using
southern Africa as an exemplar case study, this paper will argue that the
various meta-theories focused on explaining the political economy of
regionalism fail to account for the nature, character and evolution of
regional integration in the developing world. A central contention of the
paper is that Western conceptions of regionalism have been fused with a
development discourse to promote a very biased understanding, and policy
agenda, of regional integration in many parts of the developing world. The
premise that Western, eurocentric conceptions of regional integration are
unquestionably successful, and are therefore the yardstick against which
Africa’s attempts at integration should be judged, needs to be challenged.
The global resurgence of regional integration, based to a large extent on
trading blocs, cannot be understood in economic terms alone.4 Whether in
Europe, Asia or Africa, regionalism is a political economy phenomenon that
requires a more general theory of social and economic transformation.
Although the discourse on regionalism in a Western context has a long
history of incorporating a political economy approach with, for example, the
federalist and functionalist explanations of European integration in the
1950s,5 the appropriateness of regional integration theories based on Western
conceptualisations, experiences and values to sub-Saharan Africa is, at best,
highly questionable. This paper will therefore argue that applying Western
conceptions of regionalism to sub-Saharan Africa exposes a fallacy of
transposition. It may also help explain Africa’s dismal track record in
effectively operationalising policies of regional integration. Bluntly put,
transferred meta-theories, conceived to explain the integrationalist agendas
that have prevailed elsewhere, are out of touch with the reality of the
economy and polity of sub-Saharan Africa, and in particular with the nature
of the African state.
In Africa regional integration is a fashionable, but far from novel,
phenomenon which has been high on the agenda of Africa’s policy makers
since independence in the 1950s. Throughout the developing world, and in
particular in sub-Saharan Africa, regionalism is viewed widely as a
mechanism to promote economic development and political independence
through the reconfiguration of neocolonial influences and unfair trading
practices.6 Thus, regional integration is often perceived as a way to
destabilise the global spatialities of economic power and unstable core–
periphery relations established in the colonial period.7 Since 1980 African
leaders have promoted an extraordinary number of development plans,
frameworks and programmes. Although diverse in nature and scope, these
initiatives are united in prioritising and privileging regional integration as a
prerequisite for political independence and economic development.8 Thus, on
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average, each African state now belongs to four different regional integration
agreements.9
The African context: regionalism as a grand ambition
The appeal of regionalism is, for many policy makers in Africa,
geographically intuitive. Colonialism created an extremely fragmented state
system which, combined with economic and political marginality, has
encouraged the formation of a large number of inter-state organisations and
institutions. In addition, multilateral agencies, non-governmental organisa-
tions, donor communities and national governments are united in their calls
for some form of regional integration.10 With a few notable exceptions, there
is a remarkable degree of consensus that regionalism is not only desirable but
necessary. The conclusion to an African Development Bank study on
economic integration reads:
so serious are the challenges facing southern Africa that governments cannot
afford to ignore . . . the limitations which national boundaries impose on their
prospects for economic recovery and growth . . . Regional integration is not an
optional extra; it is a matter of survival.11
There is no doubt that sub-Saharan Africa, and indeed Africa as a whole,
represents a small, relatively peripheral and shrinking component of the
world economy. According to the World Trade Organization (WTO),12 in
2006 the whole of Africa accounted for around 2.5% of all merchandise
trade. In 2005–06 the collective GDP of southern Africa,13 comprising 14
countries with a combined population of 243 million, was just US$346
billion14 (see Table 1). This is less than the GDP of Belgium, which has a
population of just 10.5 million and a surface area less than 1% of the size of
southern Africa. It is not surprising, therefore, that sincedecolonisation
many African leaders and multilateral institutions have prioritised and
promoted the cause of regional integration based primarily on an economic
rationale centred on the problems of ‘smallness’ and the benefits of scale-
economies. However, if the Organisation of African Unity (OAU)15 had
created a continental African common market by 2000, as originally
scheduled, it is sobering to note that the combined African economy,
comprising 54 countries with a total population of some 933 million,16 would
be smaller than that of Spain. By any reckoning, a united Africa would not
be a major economic force.
The unproblematised use of GDP as a basis for calculating and discussing
economic size in the context of regional integration is fraught with problems.
Nonetheless, regional integration is widely regarded as a key strategy
capable of addressing Africa’s profound economic marginality.17 Hence
regional integration, together with regional solidarity, was a founding
principle underpinning both the OAU and its successor institution the African
Union (AU), the latter operating under the motto ‘Africa Must Unite’.18
Immediately after decolonisation, almost all the development resolutions
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703
adopted by the OAU called for ‘the economic integration of Africa as a
prerequisite for real independence and development’.19 Important milestones
in the history of African development plans, such as the Lagos Action Plan of
1980, the 1991 Abuja Treaty (which created the African Economic Union)
and more recently the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD),
promote regionalism as an essential building bloc for the ‘development’ of
Africa. Table 2, which is by no means comprehensive, details the
extraordinary number of development plans and programmes, in the period
1980–2001, that have prioritised regional integration. From the 1980 ‘Lagos
Plan of Action for the Economic Development of Africa’ (LPA), the Final Act
TABLE 1. Basic economic indicators, southern Africa
GDP (current US$) Population total Surface area (sq km)
Angola 32 810 670,000 15 941 390 1 246 700
Botswana 10 445 202 432 1 764 926 581 730
Congo, Dem Rep 7 103 539 200 57 548 744 2 344 860
Lesotho 1 456 599 936 1 794 769 30 350
Madagascar 5 039 974 400 18 605 920 587 040
Malawi 2 075 571 328 12 883 935 118 480
Mauritius 6 289 630 208 1 243 253 2040
Mozambique 6 823 020 032 19 792 296 801 590
Namibia 6 184 516 608 2 031 252 824 290
South Africa 242 058 919 936 46 888 200 1 219 090
Swaziland 2 612 942 336 1 131 000 17 360
Tanzania 12 586 291 200 38 477 872 945 090
Zambia 7 270 074 880 11 668 457 752 610
Zimbabwe 3,418 093 568 13 009 534 390 760
Total southern Africa 346 175 046 064 242 781 548 9 861 990
Belgium 370 824 282 112 10 478 650 30 530
Spain 1 124 639 965 184 43 398 152 505 370
TABLE 2. Regionalism: a grand ambition, 1980–2002
1980 Lagos Plan of Action (LPA)
1985 Africa’s Priority Program for Economic Recovery
1990 OAU Declaration on the Political and Socio-Economic Situation in Africa
and the Fundamental Change Taking Place in the World
1991 Kampala Document
1991 Abuja Treaty establishing the African Economic Community
1993 Mechanism for Conflict Prevention, Management and Resolution
1995 Cairo Agenda for Action
1997 African Common Position on Africa’s External Debt Crisis
1999 Algiers Decision
2000 Solemn Declaration on the Conference on Security, Stability,
Development and Co-operation
2000 Constitutive Act of the African Union
2001 Omega Plan
2001 New Africa Initiative
2001 New Partnership for Africa’s Development
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of which commits signatories ‘[to] strengthen the existing regional economic
communities and establish other economic groupings in the other regions of
Africa, so as to cover the continent as a whole (Central Africa, Eastern
Africa, Southern Africa, Northern Africa)’ to the NEPAD, which recognises
regional integration as one of its eight key priorities and established a NEPAD
Regional Integration Division, these frameworks are united in prioritising
regionalism as a necessary prerequisite for development. Pan-African
strategies for development have therefore been profoundly influenced by
the regional integration agenda.
The theoretical landscape
Notwithstanding this prioritisation for regional integration being consis-
tently and enthusiastically promoted over a period lasting 45 years, the
history of ‘attempts at regional integration in sub-Saharan Africa since
independence has been one of virtually unbroken failure’.20 Indeed, a large
and increasing body of research details the litany of failed and collapsed
African regional agreements.21 The enthusiasm for regional integration,
allied to what can only be described as Africa’s poor track record in this area,
poses a range of important theoretical and empirical questions, only some of
which will be addressed here:
. Most importantly, how different is African regionalism from the
‘Western’ ideal type?
. Are there structural features inherent within the ‘African state’
accounting for the failure of regional integration?
. What are the principal forces promoting African regionalism? Who
benefits?
. What are the causes behind its dismal track record of failure? Who stands
to loose?
Africa has been neglected in the general theoretical debate on regionalism.22
The literature that does exist on the nature of developing country regionalism
has, to a large extent, been dominated by policy-orientated analyses, and is
closely related to the various meta-theories that have dominated explanations
of European integration.23 Furthermore, this paper will argue that
developing-country regional integration has been locked into a set of
ideologies closely associated with the increasingly contested notions of
development and, in particular, modernity. It is contended that regional
integration in sub-Saharan Africa has been rationalised and pursued within
the context of three principal theories, each closely allied to a development
theory paradigm. First, it will be argued that modernist conceptions of
development promote a market integration approach to regional inte-
gration,24 based on the liberalisation of intra-regional trade designed to
abolish discrimination between contracting parties.25 Second, dependency-
led thinking has in the past promoted developmental co-operation
and integration, incorporating import-substitution programmes and
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705
protectionism. Development co-operation was part and parcel of the New
International Economic Order (NIEO) movement and based on the premise
that Africa had been integrated into the world economy on profoundly
disadvantageous terms.26 Finally, the neoliberal Washington Consensus of
the past 20 years has prioritised open regionalism, a variant of the market
integration approach, as a mechanism to enhance multilateral liberalisation
and promote integration in the world economy.27 As far as regional
integration is concerned, this has resulted in a return to a neoclassical
economic agenda, underpinned by a belief in modernity, and supportive of a
more aggressive market integration approach. A central contention of this
paper’s argument is that the three theories put forward to explain African
regionalism (market integration, developmental co-operation and open
regionalism) prioritise the economic while ignoring the non-economic state-
centric objectives that underpin the majority of regional agreements on the
sub-continent.28 The all-important relationship between these meta-theories
of regional integration and the postcolonial African state is rarely
commented upon. This has resulted in the discourse on regional integration
being locked into a set of ill-defined developmentobjectives, more often than
not centred on market integration and modernity. Furthermore these
theories are concerned more with the mechanics of integration, in terms of
explaining how co-operation works (neo-functional, supranational or
intergovernmental), than exploring the reasons for and rationale behind
co-operation.
Understanding the connections and interrelationships between regional
trade agreements and the pursuit of non-economic social and political
objectives is critical to understanding developing country regionalism. This is
particularly so in southern Africa, where the issue of regional integration as
an effective component and policy for development, and indeed state
survival, has received very little attention.29 Although regional integration in
southern Africa has been pursued within the context of the three theories of
regional integration identified above, the theory that has consistently
influenced regional integration more than any other is market integration.30
The prevailing market-led, neo-classical discourse sustains a hegemonic
regional model for developing countries in general and southern Africa in
particular. Examining the market integration approach in greater detail
focuses attention on a basic question related to the paper’s pivotal theme,
namely, to what extent are demands for regional integration related to the
political and economic systems underpinning the African state.
Market integration is based on Balassa’s conventional analysis of
economic integration focused on ‘customs union’ theory.31 As a process,
regional integration occurs stage by stage as states contemplate and then
commit to progressively higher and more complex levels of integration.
Balassa’s model prescribes a process of progressive integration via several
hierarchical steps, from preferential trade, via free trade, customs unions,
common markets and economic union to, finally, political union (see
Figure 1). The market integration model outlined by Balassa has been
adopted and adapted by numerous authors.32 Market integration theory was
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706
developed in the early 1960s and, although used initially to explain European
regionalism, was quickly absorbed into modernist conceptualisations of
development. Both market integration and modernity are based on a sense of
prescribed finalism and a belief in the inevitability of a pre-specified outcome.
In the case of regional integration, there was a belief in the inevitability of
market integration leading to a pan-African common market and economic
development. In common with universal conceptions favoured both by
neoclassical economics and modernity, market integration theory is
deterministically linear, representing a progression of increasingly more
complex integrative steps towards full economic and political union.
Epistemologically market-led integration is similar to the modernisation
thinking that underpinned Rostow’s growth model.33
However, market-led regional integration is both a model and a discourse,
with associated values and norms. It is a particularly eurocentric conception
of regional integration, adopting many Western values and, like modernism,
is underpinned by the notion of universality and a transposition of Western
values. The conceptual flaws inherent in market integration theory focus,
from a developing-country perspective, on its failure to explore the influence
of the spatial and temporal individuality of the states involved. In particular,
it neglects the influence of how domestic politics, particularly African-state
politics, can call into question many of the economic (and political)
assumptions that underpin the market integration approach. However, the
resilience of the market-led approach, and its associated structures and
values, is a reflection of a powerful and hegemonic postcolonial international
political economy (IPE) discourse dominated by a prioritisation of global
neoliberal values.
Since the early 1950s the economic impact of market integration
agreements has been the subject of vigorous, primarily neoclassical, debate.
FIGURE 1. Balassa’s market integration model.
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707
Viner’s concepts of trade creation and trade diversion,34 established over 50
years ago, are accepted by most neoclassical international trade scholars and,
most importantly, continue to form the basis of much current debate.35 Thus,
the seminal distinction between the trade-creating and trade-diverting
consequences of regionalism remains hugely influential.36 However, in order
to understand properly the influence and impacts of market-led regional
integration it is important to deconstruct what assumptions, and associated
values and discourse, underpin the market integration framework.
Market integration
There exists a substantial body of research concentrating on the benefits to be
derived from adopting the traditional market integration approach to
regional integration. This approach has its foundations in neoclassical
economic thinking, and in particular neoclassical international trade theory,
which promotes free trade, exploits economies of scale and creates a more
competitive business environment. In this framework, emphasis is placed on
intra-regional trade liberalisation, comparative advantage, the free move-
ment of the factors of production and, over time, the equalisation of costs.
The theory and practice of traditional market integration is rooted firmly in
the experience of Europe and, in particular, the European Economic
Community (EEC). It is strongly eurocentric, assuming the integration
process generates a form of economic determinism that will eventually bind
sovereign states into ever-closer union. This form of regionalism is also
predominantly state-centric and elite driven, focused on inter-state and inter-
governmental relations. It also takes for granted the ability of states to
establish a regulatory environment supportive of ever-closer integration.
Market integration theory has had a profound and very real impact on
southern Africa. Although almost 60 years old and, in Africa, having a
record of delivery marked by failure,37 it is the dominant integration theory
and discourse, adopted by every single regional bloc on the sub-continent.
The 1991 Abuja Treaty, which established the African Economic Community
(AEC),38 aims to create an African Economic Union by 2028. The AEC sets
out six stages to establish an economic union. It promotes a classical
neoliberal market integration approach to regional integration, calling for
the establishment of free trade areas leading to customs unions, common
markets and, finally, an economic union (by 2028).39 The AEC, similar to
Article Three in the Treaty of Rome,40 calls for the gradual removal of
obstacles to the free movement of the factors of production. The Abuja
Treaty makes it clear that the establishment of an economic union, based on
these six integrative steps, is the final objective to which all the regional
communities in Africa should aspire.41 The four most important regional
blocs in southern Africa—the Southern African Development Community
(SADC), the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa), the
Southern African Customs Union (SACU) and the East African Community
(EAC) (see Figure 2)—are indeed united in sharing a common goal to pursue
market-led regional integration.
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708
However, with the exception of SACU, establishing an effectively
functioning free trade area (FTA) has been problematic. Deadlines have been
missed, agreements have not been implemented and the level of commitment
FIGURE 2. Regional economic communities of southern Africa.
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709
has been less than convincing. For example, Comesa’s original deadline to
establish an FTA by 1992was spectacularly missed. A new timetable was
established for 2001 but, by 2006, only 11 of Comesa’s 20 member states had
signed up to a partial FTA.42 Comesa, SADC, SACU and the EAC are united in
their perception that intra-regional free trade, based on an FTA, is of absolute
importance to the cause of regional integration. Furthermore, all the regional
communities of southern Africa are committed to the establishment of
customs unions. Again, SACU is the only group in southern Africa to have an
effectively functioning customs union. Comesa, SADC and the EAC are in the
process of implementing their own customs unions.43 Again there has been a
difficulty of implementation, with Comesa’s planned timetable to move from
an FTA to a customs union in 2004 not being realised. Comesa and SADC now
plan to have customs unions established by 2009 and 2010, respectively (see
Figure 3). The EAC’s timetable for a fully operational customs union in 2005
has slipped.
The integration strategies of the regional communities of southern Africa,
although starting from very different positions historically, economically and
politically, have over the past 15 years converged towards a market
integration agenda. It is no longer appropriate to describe SADC as dirigiste
or SACU as colonial. All groups prioritise and promote market strategies as
the primary mechanism to deepen regional integration. Furthermore, all the
regional communities have implemented (in the case of SACU), or are in the
process of implementing, customs unions that will, in theory, be fully
operational by 2010.
While it is technically possible for the free trade areas of Comesa, SADC,
SACU and the EAC to coexist, it is not possible for any member state to belong
to more than one customs union regime. This poses a major obstacle for the
development plans of the regional economic communities within southern
Africa.44 Multiple memberships of overlapping customs unions with different
trade regimes are geographically, economically and politically unsupportable
and unsustainable. The dilemma of multiple memberships applies to all the
regional communities; none of the regional groups is exclusive. Figure 4
FIGURE 3. Regional integration timetables of SADC, Comesa, SACU and the EAC.
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710
demonstrates this as follows: 1) all five member states of SACU belong to
SADC; 2) Swaziland has membership of SACU, SADC and Comesa; and 3)
eight SADC member states are also members of Comesa.
The case of Zambia serves to illustrate the unsustainability and contra-
dictions inherent in multiple memberships. Zambia is a member both of SADC
and Comesa. Under the SADC Trade Protocol Zambia is obliged to dismantle
all tariff barriers to South Africa, a fellow SADC member, by 2012 at the
latest. However, Zambia is also obliged, as a result of its Comesa
membership, to create a Comesa common external tariff (by 2009) that
excludes and discriminates against South Africa (which is not a member of
Comesa). Thus, Zambia has agreed simultaneously to promote free trade
with South Africa and to maintain tariff barriers against it. Madagascar,
Malawi, Mauritius and Zimbabwe are in exactly the same position. Clearly,
the present situation of overlapping memberships and shared integrative
goals cannot work. In short, the existing structure of overlapping regional
institutions adopting the market integration approach is neither credible nor
practicable.
FIGURE 4. Overlapping memberships among SADC, Comesa, SACU and the EAC.
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711
Measuring the success of market integration
In 2004 the African Development Bank (ADB) observed that the success of a
regional integration community ‘will be measured by the extent to which it
promotes intra-regional trade’.45 While this assertion may be contested on
many fronts, there is no doubt that the level of intra-regional trade provides a
useful barometer of market integration. Indeed, it is a particularly
appropriate measure to gauge the effectiveness of market integration as
intra-regional trade underpins its theory of integration.
Despite the various trade promoting initiatives of SADC, Comesa, SACU
and the EAC, and progress with regional trade liberalisation strategies,
inter-regional trade throughout southern Africa remains limited, asymme-
trical and, in comparison with other regional communities, a small
proportion of total trade. The dominant issue determining the character
and extent of intra-regional trade flows is South Africa. Without South
Africa, intra-regional trade is in the order of 6% to 7%, since most
countries in the region maintain traditional roles of being exporters of
primary goods to industrialised countries.46 This is a very low figure
compared with almost any other regional community in the world. With
South Africa included, intra-regional trade flows expand to around 20%,
which is still low by world standards.47
Thus, and notwithstanding the widespread support for market integration
theory and policy, it is important to question the applicability and relevance
of this theory to sub-Saharan Africa. This paper does so in two ways. First,
by deconstructing the relevance and applicability of many of the neoclassical
assumptions that underpin market integration theory. Second, by adopting a
critical approach to understanding the relationship between the African state
system and regional integration.
Several factors serve to undermine the economic rationale supporting
market integration. First, the lack of economic complementarity between
integrating states is one of the principal reasons explaining the limited
impact of regionalism on promoting trade and development in southern
Africa. With the exception of diversified South Africa, the region’s
economies are underpinned by primary production: agriculture and
minerals. Simply put, again with the exception of South Africa, there is
a lack of tradable products, both manufacturing and services.48 The
absence of tradable goods is a major structural impediment to market
integration.
Second, as we have observed already, a united Africa would not be a major
economic force. This led Jeffery Herbst to ask the rather blunt question;
Why go through the effort to try to have a relatively small number of
extraordinarily poor people trade with each other when the world economy is
larger, more populous, and growing faster?49
There are, of course, many answers to this question, not least the
disadvantageous terms of trade between Africa and the industrialised North.
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This argument ignores the power relations and regulatory structures
governing the world economy, where the very powerful states effectively
control governance. Nonetheless, Herbst’s question serves to highlight the
fact that the trade effects from integration will be small and that the greatest
potential for growth, if market integration theory is taken to its logical
conclusion, rests with engaging more successfully in the global world
economy. What Herbst argues is that multilateral globalisation is better than
regional integration. While this is open to debate, there is no doubt that the
market-led approach to regional integration has failed to promote substantial
progress in either trade or development.
Third, for market-led integration to be successful, a number of
preconditions have to be satisfied.50 In southern Africa not only is there
a lack of complementarity between states, there also exist severe structural
inadequacies in transport, services, banking, labour skills and competi-
tiveness. In addition, market-led integration theory calls for economies to
be at broadly comparable levels of development for integration to
proceed.51 In southern Africa there are acute absolute and relative
inequalities between South Africa and the other states of the region. Many
of the structuralpreconditions for the market-led approach to work are
absent.
Fourth, despite the existence of a myriad of regional trading blocs, intra-
African trade is limited for the majority of African states. Almost without
exception most African states trade more with the developed world,
particularly Europe, than they do with each other.52 Furthermore, trade as
a percentage of GDP is low, usually not more than 25%.53 The impact of
regional integration on trade and development is, therefore, likely to be small
in the aggregate. For example, intra-regional trade for SADC represents
roughly 4–5% of GDP.
The failure of market integration theory to recognise the individuality of
the states involved critically undermines the appropriateness of this theory to
southern Africa. However, this very same criticism can be applied to the
other principal theoretical explanations of developing-country regionalism:
development co-operation; open regionalism; and even new regionalism. The
translation of these meta-theories of regional integration into practice simply
does not work when confronted with the reality of the state, society and
economy in southern Africa. However, the structural flaws associated with
the market integration approach extend beyond the neoclassical context
outlined above.
The state in southern Africa
With few exceptions the role and influence of the African state on regional
integration has been ignored.54 International Relations, IPE and critical
geopolitics, in a rush to denounce realism and undermine state-centric
analyses, have promoted, albeit inadvertently, a fairly superficial analysis of
the African state as being somewhat dysfunctional, collapsed, weak and
somehow ‘more imagined’ than Western states. Furthermore, this uncritical
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713
analysis of the African state has been extended to regional integration in
Africa. As observed by Soderbaum, African regionalism is:
being more or less ignored in the general mainstream academic debate. If
regionalism in Africa receives any recognition at all, then the standard
argument is that it is primitive or failed.55
A central assertion of this paper is that the ‘traditional’ (market-led,
dependency-led and ‘open’) approaches to conceptualising integration fail to
examine critically the influence of the African state. This assertion would
appear to contradict the claim of the new regionalism approach (NRA),56
which is based, in part, on dissatisfaction with traditional perspectives giving
too much credence to ‘rationalist’ and ‘realist’ explanations of regional
integration, especially their narrow focus on the state. As far as proponents
of the NRA are concerned, the traditional state-centric approach is too
restrictive and misleading. As observed by Grant and Soderbaum:57
Most approaches in the research field have been excessively concerned with
formal and states-centric notions of regionalism . . . it should thus be evident
that the NRA looks beyond state-centrism . . . it [is] necessary to transcend the
conventional obsession with the state.
Iheduru, also writing from an NRA perspective, argues that:
pressures from below have begun to undermine the ideological and practical
basis of the state and free market liberalism and, consequently, the very
architecture of an integrated regional polity and economy.58
NRA proponents seek to integrate post-structural, critical realist, ‘reflectivist’
and postmodernist influences into their frameworks.59 The NRA remains in its
infancy and is rather wide-ranging and explorative in nature, albeit solid in a
rejection of state-centric research. However, the NRA’s criticism of state-
centric analysis needs to be challenged as it is based on a restrictive
interpretation of state-centrism as ‘neorealism’, ‘neoliberal institutionalism’
or ‘intergovernmentalism’.60 In other words, the NRA’s criticism of the state-
centric approach is founded on a narrow Westphalian understanding and
interpretation of the state. Hence, the NRA has the specific aim of moving
away from the state in order to emphasise ‘non-state networks and
cognitive allegiances and projects (often) in opposition to the old
regionalism’.61 It is here contended that it is not the state-centric focus that
has undermined previous integration theories but, rather, the nature of the
conceptualisation and contextualisation of the African state. Far from
moving away from state centrism, it is argued that regional integration is
essentially a state-led, often an elite-led, phenomenon and that states should
continue to form the focus of attention. In essence, the critical point of
weakness has not been the focus on the state but the uncritical way the state
has been contextualised and analysed. Market-led, dependency-led and
RICHARD GIBB
714
‘open’ regionalisms assume uncritically the ultimate goal of both regional
integration and the African state to be synonymous—modernity arising from
export-led industrialisation that promotes development. Thus both tradi-
tional and new regionalism approaches fail to evaluate critically the internal
dynamics of the African state and linkages between those dynamics and
external relations, in this case regional policy. As will be argued below, state-
centric notions of regionalism have neither to be realist nor deterministically
formalistic. A basic premise of this article is that regional integration is
essentially state-led and it is important, therefore, to deconstruct critically the
workings of the African state, including state building, state collapse and
state interests.
The classic neorealist interpretation of regional integration is that states
co-operate with each other over regionalism because it is in their best
interests to do so. And, when co-operation comes into conflict with the
interests of the state, co-operation ceases. The crucial question here is state
interest, which is often uncritically and simplistically assumed by the
traditional theories of regionalism to be national self-interest. In any
evaluation and generalisation of the African state system it is important to
recognise the enormous diversity among the 54 states that constitute Africa.
However, and notwithstanding this diversity, most postcolonial African
states, as observed by Taylor,62 function quite differently from the
conventional Westphalian state model.
Perhaps the reason why regionalism has been so notably unsuccessful in
southern Africa is not because states are weak but, on the contrary, because
the regimes governing those states, who may not want regionalism to succeed,
are often quite strong and, ultimately, determine the ‘success’ of regional
integration efforts. Morten Boas correctly defines the African state system as
‘one that is constituted by weak states but strong regimes’.63 In many ways it is
opposite to the Westphalian European state model, characterised by strong
states and often fairly weak regimes. As Boas observes:64
the neo-patrimonial post-colonial state has created a state that is both strong
and weak simultaneously . . . it is this special logic that has led to a situation of
weak states but at the same time remarkably stable regimes.
Again, the fallacy of the transposition argument applies. The postcolonial
African state is very different from the Westphalian west European state
model. However, just as African states are weak, so too are African civil
societies, business and NGOs. Indeed, as weak as the African state structure
may be, such structures are often among the most powerful forces ‘governing’
the country.65 Thus, if we accept, as argued here, that regional integration is
essentially state-led, it is important to unpack and understand the role and
influence of the postcolonial state on African regionalism.
While there is diversity in both the nature of and approaches to the study
of the postcolonialstate, most studies recognise the traditional Westphalian
model as an inadequate tool of analysis. Several attempts have been made to
characterise and generalise the postcolonial state as governed by personalised
REGIONAL INTEGRATION AND AFRICA’S DEVELOPMENT TRAJECTORY
715
rule,66 elite subservience to the core, or as a shadow state.67 However, most
Africanists refer to the postcolonial state, incorporating various elements of
the above, as neo-patrimonial. The defining characteristic of the neo-
patrimonial state is the lack of differentiation between the public and private
spheres of governance, with governance focused on personal power,
patronage, clientelism and, from a Western perspective, corruption.
Although the postcolonial African state displays the outward manifesta-
tion of the rational–bureaucratic Westphalian state, the reality is different.
While there is a large and growing literature on the neo-patrimonial state,68
almost all studies of regional integration fail to embrace and recognise the
character and influence of the postcolonial neo-patrimonial state. In so
doing, they fail to situate regionalism in its proper context. This has resulted
in superficial and over-optimistic analyses of regionalism and its ability to
promote development. Under the neo-patrimonial model, control of the state
equates to control of resources and control over power. This is what lies at
the heart of the deep-seated reluctance of African leaders to share voluntarily
elements of sovereignty in a regional organisation. Regional integration, even
development, is less important to the neo-patrimonial state elites than the
continuation of their personal power and prestige. Clearly not all actors are
interested in promoting the ‘order-inducing properties of regionalism’.69 As
observed by Bratton and van de Walle:70
relationships of loyalty and dependence pervade a formal political and
administrative system and leaders occupy bureaucratic offices less to perform
public service than to acquire personal wealth and status.
Notwithstanding the endemic ‘corruption’ embedded in the neo-patrimonial
regime, and the lack of any meaningful distinction between the private,
public and state good, neo-patrimonial states have been in favour of regional
experiments to bolster the image of state sovereignty.71 In order to increase
the legitimacy of the neo-patrimonial state, both domestically and abroad,
outward signs that promote the perception of differentiation between public
and private are promoted: flags, border posts, uniformed police and army
officers, etc. As argued by both Sidaway and Clapham, postcolonial African
state regimes have mounted a strident defence of the Westphalian state-
model in order to legitimise the neo-patrimonial African state system.72 The
Westphalian state system provides international and regional legitimacy,
both legally and imagined, to the neo-patrimonial state structure of Africa.
Belonging to a formal, state-structured, regional organisation is interpreted
as an important symbol of the virility of sovereignty, as regional integration
is based on and presupposes formal state sovereignty. Regionalism is seen,
both internationally and locally, to confirm state sovereignty and regime
legitimacy. Regional integration should therefore be seen in terms of state
interests, however these are defined. Thus regional integration, so long as it
does not promote democracy, the sharing of sovereignty, or development
outside of clientalism, supports the neo-patrimonial state. In short, ‘nominal’
regionalism is regarded as a useful, but easily disposable, form of legitimacy.
RICHARD GIBB
716
In sub-Saharan Africa regional integration is tightly constrained by the
requirements intrinsic to the particular circumstances of the neo-patrimonial
state. Supported by the OAU’s/AU’s adherence to the principle of non-
intervention and non-criticism in the affairs of other African states, regional
integration offers a non-threatening form of international legitimacy.
Conclusion
the future of Africa, for better or worse, will be determined regionally.73
Notwithstanding Africa’s apparently unsuccessful track record in the field of
regional integration, regionalism remains an integral part of Africa’s
development strategy and has underpinned most pan-African development
policies for the past 50 years. Nonetheless, extending regional integration to
sub-Saharan Africa remains a most challenging issue. As this paper has
illustrated, neither the economic nor political character of the continent can
sustain effective and meaningful regional integration. Part of the problem
rests with ‘Europe’s capture of the regional integration paradigm [which] has
been hard to shift, and persists in the newer literature’.74 African regionalism
has been pursued, both theoretically and empirically, in terms of a neoliberal,
free market and Westphalian state model built upon the experiences, values
and norms of European integration. The market integration approach to
regional integration, supported by modernist conceptions of development, is
hegemonic on the African continent. However, despite superficial similarities,
the relevance and appropriateness of the European integrative model to
southern Africa is limited and structurally inappropriate. Indeed, the
comparison is misconceived to the point of being fraudulent. The metaphor
of regional integration has given rise to a Western hegemonic programme and
policy, based on a fusion of neoclassical economics with a predetermined and
inevitable modernist destiny. However, a lack of complementarity, ‘smallness’
and uncompetitive economies, together with imperfections of the market,
protectionism and the disadvantageous terms of trade, undermine the
neoclassical rationale of the market-led approach to regional integration.
The social construction of the market-led model is based on the contested
notions of modernity, economic determinism and ‘development’.75
This paper has argued that regional integration in sub-Saharan Africa is
essentially a state-led, and often an elite-led, phenomenon. Thus regional
integration can only be as strong as its constituent parts or, more precisely, as
strong as its constituent parts want it to be (the constituent parts in southern
Africa being comprised of neo-patrimonial states). An inherent and inevitable
feature of any integrative arrangement is the acceptance that member states
have to share or cede elements of sovereignty voluntarily and, as a conse-
quence of this, recognise limits and restrictions on their freedom of action.
Politically, regional integration faces two significant obstacles associated with
the voluntary sharing of sovereignty. First, the newly independent states of
Africa prioritised the maintenance and enhancement of their own sovereignty,
in part to promote nation-building and ‘unity’. The prioritisation and
REGIONAL INTEGRATION AND AFRICA’S DEVELOPMENT TRAJECTORY
717
unquestioning acceptance of state sovereignty and legitimacy were funda-
mental to the OAU and African solidarity. Second, and most importantly, the
neo-patrimonial African state system is structured in a way that prevents the
effective sharing of sovereignty. Under the neo-patrimonial state model
control of the state equates to control over resources and power, resulting in a
lack of differentiation between the public and private. African state
sovereignty is, therefore, underpinned by a neo-patrimonial culture and value
set that imposes real impediments to the sharing of sovereignty. Put simply,
African states are reluctant to share sovereignty because, from a classic
Westphalian perspective, ‘neo-patrimonial sovereignty’ cannot easily be
shared. Indeed, the neo-patrimonial system, based on patronage and
personalised rule, has limited extra-territorial presence. Thus, many African
states are reluctant to share sovereigntybecause in reality they do not have
sovereignty to share. The credibility and effectiveness of the neo-patrimonial
state system outside its state of origin is undermined by its inability to promote
patronage extra-territorially. Indeed, regional integration based on the sharing
of sovereignty would threaten the sustainability of the neo-patrimonial model.
As a consequence, the level of political commitment to fulfil and honour
regional obligations is often limited. Hence the issue of multiple and
overlapping regional memberships promoting contradictory obligations is
not seen as problematic. Nobody, including and in particular the member
states, expects effectively functioning regional institutions to develop inAfrica.
While the African states might want to convey an outward impression that
they ‘buy into’ the Western model of regional integration and seek to emulate
it, their approach is actually rather more nuanced and sophisticated, designed
principally to support the neo-patrimonial African state system.
Notes
1 World Bank, Global Economic Prospects: Trade, Regionalism and Development, Washington, DC:
World Bank, 2005, p 53.
2 V Worl, ‘Die EU wa¨chst in eine globale Verantwortung’, Sud-deutsche Zeitung, 15 June 1994, p 21.
3 T Shaw, ‘Preface’, in A Grant & F Soderbaum (eds), The New Regionalism in Africa, Aldershot:
Ashgate, 2003, p xv–xvii.
4 RA Gibb & W Michalak (eds), Continental Trading Blocs: The Growth of Regionalism in the World
Economy, London: Wiley, 1994.
5 See A Milward, The European Rescue of the Nation-State, London: Routledge, 1992; and D Mitrany,
The Functional Theory of Politics, London: Robertson, 1975.
6 C Mulaudzi, The Politics of Regionalism in Southern Africa, Occasional Paper No 51, Johannesburg:
Institute of Global Dialogue, 2006, p 8.
7 C Clapham, ‘The changing world of regional integration in Africa’, in C Clapham, G Mills, A Morner
& E Sidiropoulos (eds), Regional Integration in Southern Africa: Comparative International
Perspectives, Johannesburg: South Africa Institute of International Affairs (SAIIA), 2001.
8 I Taylor, Nepad: Towards Africa’s Development or Another False Start?, London: Lynn Rienner, 2005.
9 World Bank, Global Economic Prospects.
10 R Gibb, Rationalisation or Redundancy? Strategies for Making Eastern and Southern Africa’s Regional
Trade Units Relevant, Johannesburg: Brenthurst Foundation, 2006.
11 African Development Bank, Economic Integration in Southern Africa, London: Biddles, 1993, p 1,
emphasis added.
12 World Trade Organization, Annual Report I and II, Geneva: WTO, 2005.
13 Southern Africa is defined as the 14 member states belonging to SADC: Angola, Botswana, Democratic
Republic of Congo, Lesotho, Namibia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, South Africa,
Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
RICHARD GIBB
718
14 World Bank, World Bank Development Indicators, Washington, DC: World Bank, 2006.
15 The OAU was established in 1963.
16 See http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats1.htm.
17 S Chauvin & G Gaulier, Regional Trade Integration in Southern Africa, CPRII Working paper, 2002-12,
Paris, 2002, at www.cepii.fr.
18 See the AU website, at http://www.africa-union.org/.
19 Taylor, Nepad, p 17.
20 C Clapham, ‘Regional integration Africa: lessons and experiences’, paper presented to a conference on
‘South Africa and Southern Africa: Lessons from Emerging Markets’, South African Institute of
International Affairs, Johannesburg, 16–17 July 1997.
21 See, for example, S Asante, Regionalism and Africa’s Development: Expectations, Reality and
Outcomes, New York: St Marin’s Press, 1997; and P Mistry, ‘Africa’s record of regional cooperation
and integration’, African Affairs, 99 (937), 2000, pp 553–573.
22 J Grant & F Soderbaum, ‘Introduction: the new regionalism in Africa’, in Grant & Soderbaum, The
New Regionalism in Africa.
23 J Sidaway, Imagined Regional Communities: Integration and Sovereignty in the Global South, London:
Routledge, 2002.
24 I would argue that functionalism, neo-functionalism and neo-functional institutionalism form part of
the market-led approach. For functionalism, see E Haas, The Obsolescence of Regional Integration
Theory, Berkley Research Paper No 25, University of California, Berkely, 1975; and D Mitrany,
A Working Peace System, Chicago, IL: Quadrangle Books, 1966. In addition, the Global Markets
Approach (GMA) proposed by Schirm in 2002 is based on market integration theory. S Schirm,
Globalisation and the New Regionalism, Cambridge: Polity, 2002.
25 For example, the establishment of the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland, also called
Central African Federation, in 1953, embracing the colony of Southern Rhodesia (later Rhodesia
and now Zimbabwe) and the territories of Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia) and Nyasaland (now
Malawi).
26 A good example in southern Africa was the establishment of the Southern African Development Co-
ordination Conference in 1980.
27 The Preferential Trade Area for Eastern and Southern Africa (PTA), later known as the Common
Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa), established in 1994 and 1981, respectively, provide
good examples of ‘open regionalism’.
28 World Bank, Trade Blocs, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000, p ix.
29 J Sidaway & R Gibb, ‘SADC, COMESA and SACU: contradictory formats for regional integration in
southern Africa’, in D Simon (ed), South Africa in Southern Africa: Reconfiguring the Region, London:
James Currey, 1998, ch 10, pp 164–184.
30 Gibb, Rationalisation or Redundancy?
31 T Ostergaard, ‘Classical models of regional integration—what relevance for southern Africa?’, in
B Oden (ed), Southern Africa after Apartheid: Regional Integration and External Resources, Uppsala:
Nordic Africa Institute, 1993.
32 See, for example, R Lipsey, ‘The theory of customs unions: a general survey’, Economica, 24, 1960, pp
40–46; P Robson, The Economics of International Integration, London: Allen & Unwin, 1980; and J
Hansen (ed), An Economic Analysis of the EC, London: McGraw-Hill, 1992.
33 W Rostow, The Stages of Economic Growth: A Non-communist Manifesto, Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1960.
34 J Viner, The Customs Union Issue, New York: Carnegie Endowment for World Peace, 1950.
35 See, for example, R Dandrey, Trade Creation and Trade Diversion Resulting from SACU Trading
Agreements, Tralac Working paper 11/2006, Stellenbosch: Tralac, 2006.
36 World Bank, Regional Trade Pacts Must Create—Not Divert—Trade to Reduce World Poverty, 2004,
at http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/NEWS/0,,contentMDK:20281961*menuPK:34
463*pagePK:64003015*piPK:64003012*theSitePK:4607,00.html.
37 R Gibb, ‘Regional integration in post-apartheid southern Africa’, Tijdschrift voor economische en
sociale geografie, 98 (4), 2007, pp 421–435.
38 African Economic Community, Treaty Establishing the African Economic Community, 2004, at
www.panafrican.
39 African Economic Community, The Pan-African Perspective: The African Economic Community, 2008,
at http://www.panafricanperspective.com/aec.htm.
40 Treaty of Rome, Treaty of Rome Establishing the European Economic Community, London: HMSO,
1967.
41 African Economic Community, Treaty Establishing the African Economic Community, Art 88.
42 R Thomas, A South African Perspective on the SADC Trade and Development Protocol, Johannesburg:
Foundation for Global Dialogue, 1997.
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719
43 R Gibb, ‘The new Southern African Customs Union Agreement: dependence with democracy’, Journal
of Southern African Studies, 32 (3), 2006, pp 583–604.
44 R Hess & S Hess, ‘A pending crisis of overlap’, eAfrica, 2, 2004, pp 20–12, available at http://
www.saiia.org.za/index.php?option¼com_content&view¼article&id¼543:a-pending-crisis-of-overlap&
catid¼74:eafrica.
45 African Development Bank (ADB), Southern Africa: Regional AssistanceStrategy, ONCB Department,
Executive Summary, Tunis: ADB, 2004, p 2.
46 SADC, Trade Policy and Intra-regional Trade in SADC, SADC Secretariat, Gaborone, 2005; and Comesa,
‘Intra-Comesa trade, 2000–2004’, 2006, at www.comesa.int/trade/information/external.
47 SADC, Trade Policy and Intra-regional Trade in SADC; and Comesa, ‘Intra-Comesa trade’.
48 N Charalambides, The Private Sector’s Perspective, Priorities and Role in Regional Integration, ecdpm
Discussion Paper No 66, September 2005, Maastricht: ecdpm.
49 J Herbst, ‘Developing nations, regional integration and globalism’, paper presented at the conference
on ‘South Africa and southern Africa’, South African Institute of International Affairs, Johannesburg,
16–17 July 1997.
50 Robson, The Economics of Integration.
51 Ibid.
52 R Gibb, ‘Post-Lome´: the European Union and the South’, Third World Quarterly, 21 (3), 2000, pp 67–
86.
53 A Goldstein, The New Regionalism in Sub-Saharan Africa, Policy Brief number 20, Paris: OECD, 2002.
54 Sidaway, Imagined Regional Communities.
55 F Soderbaum, The Political Economy of Regionalism: The Case of Southern Africa, Basingstoke:
Palgrave, 2004, p 1.
56 For literature on the New Regionalism Approach (NRA), see J Grant & F Soderbaum, The New
Regionalism in Africa, Aldershot: Ashgate, 2003; and F Soderbaum & T Shaw, Theories of New
Regionalism: A Palgrave Reader, Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2003.
57 J Grant & F Soderbaum, ‘Introduction: the new regionalism in Africa’, in Grant & Soderbaum, The
New Regionalism in Africa, pp 4, 11.
58 O Iheduru, ‘New regionalism, states and non-state actors in West Africa’, in Grant & Soderbaum, The
New Regionalism in Africa, p 51.
59 For a detailed discussion on the NRA, see Soderbaum, The Political Economy of Regionalism, chs 2
and 3.
60 Soderbaum, The Political Economy of Regionalism.
61 E Sandberg & N Saabel, ‘Cold war regional hangovers in Southern Africa: Zambian development
strategies in SADC and the new regionalism approach’, in Grant & Soderbaum, The New Regionalism in
Africa, p 159. See also D Simon, ‘Regional–development–environment discourses, policies and
practices in post-apartheid southern Africa’, in Grant & Soderbaum, The New Regionalism in Africa.
62 Taylor, Nepad.
63 M Boas,‘Weak states, strong regimes: towards a ‘‘real’’ political economy of African regionalisation’,
in Grant & Soderbaum, The New Regionalism in Africa, p 31.
64 Ibid, p 33.
65 G Erdmann & U Engel, ‘Neopatrimonialism revisited: beyond a catch-all concept’, GIGA German
Institute of Global and Area Studies Working Paper No 16, 2006, available at http://ssrn.com/
abstract¼909183.
66 P Chabal & J Daloz, Africa Works, Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1999.
67 See D Cammack, ‘The logic of neopatrimonialism: what role for donors?’, Development Policy Review,
25 (5), 2007, pp 599–614.
68 J Me´dard, ‘The underdeveloped state in Africa: political clientelism or neo-patrimonialism?’, in
C Clapham (ed), Private Patronage and Public Power: Political Clientelism and the Modern State,
London: Frances Pinter, 1982, pp 162–189.
69 L Fawcett, ‘Regionalism from an historical perspective’, in M Farrell, B Hettne & L Van Langenhove
(eds), Global Politics of Regionalism: Theory and Practice, London: Pluto Press, 2005, p 21.
70 M Bratton & M van de Walle, ‘Neo-patrimonial regimes and political transition in Africa’, World
Politics, XL (VI), 2004, pp 453–489.
71 Sidaway & Gibb, ‘SADC, Comesa, SACU’.
72 Sidaway, Imagined Regional Communities; and C Clapham, Africa and the International System: The
Politics of State Survival, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996.
73 C Clapham, ‘The changing world of regional integration in Africa’, p 59.
74 Fawcett, ‘Regionalism from an historical perspective’, p 21.
75 G Esteva & M Prakash, ‘Beyond development, what?, Development in Practice, 8 (3), 1998, pp
280–296; and G Esteva, ‘Development’, in W Sachs (ed), The Development Dictionary, London:
Zed Books.
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Notes on Contributor
Richard Gibb is Dean of the Faculty of Science at the University of
Plymouth. He is the co-editor of Globalisation, African Recovery and the New
African Initiative (South African Institute of International Affairs, 2002) and
of Continental Trading Blocs: The Growth of Regionalism in the World
Economy (Wiley, 1994). His research interests focus on regional integration in
southern Africa and EU–Southern African trade relations. He has a
particular interest in the nature, evolution and character of the Southern
African Customs Union.
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