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The majority of African countries implemented import liberalisation in the 1990s. This paper explores factors that may explain the pattern of protection and of tariff reform. We consider political economy explanations, motivated specifically by the Grossman and Helpman (1994) model of protection in response to industry lobbies, and the possibility that reforms are technocratic. Using industry-level data for a sample of six African countries, we find limited evidence that political economy factors have influenced the pattern of tariffs or tariff reductions since the early 1990s. One result does appear frequently: relative sector size (measured by the number of employees or establishments) appears to be associated with the relative level of protection. We then explore various descriptive statistics for tariff changes in seven African countries. The analysis suggests that the pattern of tariff reductions was essentially technocratic in structure - across the board reduction in average tariffs and in the dispersion of rates, with larger proportional reductions for higher tariffs - consistent with policy reforms being guided by the World Bank. While political economy factors may have influenced the initial pattern of protection, the technocratic reforms since the early 1990s have diluted political economy influences on average and relative protection.

This book brings together a number of African anti-corruption policy makers from across different academic disciplines, religions, and generations. It engages in processes of economic, social, and political transformation to eliminate poverty and inequity, through individual and institutional means. Through historical and contemporary perspectives on authority structures, institutionalised myths, beliefs, and rituals of authority, the volume explores how to correctly mobilise and influence citizens' behaviour and attitudes towards accountability, transparency and probity, all of which are key to strengthening national integrity systems all over Africa, and are needed for equity and sustainable development. The book strongly advocates that corruption is everybody's business. All the chapters in some way commemorate the inaugural anti-corruption year of the African Union in 2018 by interrogating how mechanisms to eliminate inequity and poverty can be built in Africa.

This paper evaluates the Common Consolidated Corporate Tax Base (CCCTB) recently proposed by the European Commission. We find that if the CCCTB is introduced as it is currently proposed (including loss consolidation), then it is likely to impose large tax revenue costs of about one fifth of the corporate tax base. Second, we show that an application of the CCCTB proposals at only the European Union (EU) level would overlook the extent of profit shifting out of the EU and could lock in further unnecessary revenue losses. Third, major EU profit-shifting countries such as Luxembourg, Ireland and the Netherlands may experience significant revenue losses.

Recent advances in computers and telecommunications have allowed networked learning to play a significant role to play across the complete spectrum of higher education teaching. One of the most significant UK government initiatives to date has been the development the Information Environment (IE) originally called as the Distributed National Electronic Resource (DNER), which is aiming to create a managed environment for accessing quality assured information resources on the Internet (IE, 2004). This paper draws on our formative evaluation of the IE and the investigation of the take up of digital resources produced by a number of projects selected for funding under JISC circular 5/99. Although we identified examples of good practice in using the IE to support learning and teaching and instances where digital resources were successful in addressing certain needs for the learners the benefits were less then anticipated. The digital resources produced by the projects seem to hold a potential to support teaching in higher education, however, the actual impact they had on learning was found to be less than anticipated. The findings suggest that the application and implementation of networked technologies is partly determined by the social context in which it operates. Finally, the paper advocates the need for action to influence educational practice and engage related parties in a genuine way in order to realise the transforming potential of networked learning. By exploring the implementation of information digital resources in teaching and learning under the framework of actor network theory, this paper makes a contribution to the development of theory and practice in the area of networked learning.