Search results

"Regional Integration Theory" published on by Oxford University Press.

This paper examines the history of regional integration in Africa, what has motivated it, the different initiatives that African governments have pursued, the nature of the integration process, and the current challenges. Regional integration is seen as a rational response to the difficulties faced by a continent with many small national markets and landlocked countries. As a result, African governments have concluded a very large number of regional integration arrangements, several of which have significant membership overlap. While characterized by ambitious targets, they have a dismally poor implementation record. Part of the problem may lie in the paradigm of linear market integration, marked by stepwise integration of goods, labour and capital markets, and eventually monetary and fiscal integration. This tends to focus on border measures such as the import tariff. However, supply-side constraints may be more important. A deeper integration agenda that includes services, investment, competition policy and other behind-the-border issues can address the national-level supply-side constraints far more effectively than an agenda which focuses almost exclusively on border measures.

This report, part of the "Cities" collection, highlights the contribution of border towns to the process of regional integration in West Africa. For 18 countries, six indicators are used to identify the specificities of border towns at the local, national and international levels: demography, urban morphology, formal enterprises, health infrastructure, road accessibility, border control posts. These indicators are analysed from the perspective of three geographical scales of regional integration (density, distance and division). The report details the economic and institutional obstacles facing border towns. It concludes with place-based political options to facilitate the economic and political development of West African border towns