Regionalization And Security In Southern Africa

Once torn by ideological conflicts and the dominance of command economies, Southern Africa is now moving towards economic liberalism and openness. In general, the ascendancy of 'market economics' is acknowledged by its governments, albeit with different degrees of enthusiasm. Theoretically rich and empirically engaging this timely book offers a critical insight into the ensuing debate on regionalism and the process of regionalization in southern Africa.

This book charts the history and contemporary landscape of African regionalism, investigating how regional cooperation can be used to help to tackle security and development challenges in Africa. Africa has a long tradition of regional cooperation, with the oldest trade and monetary integration schemes in the developing world, but its colonial period and partition of have caused lasting damage that still be seen in today’s African economies. Contemporary post-colonial African regionalism, deeply rooted in notions of pan-Africanism, has served as a means of collective self-reliance and economic transformation and development. This book starts with the history and theory behind African regionalism before discussing and comparing regional organisations such as the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS), the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the Community of Sahel-Saharan States (CEN-SAD), Southern African Development Community (SADC), the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) and the East African Community (EAC). Finally, the book considers how regional integration and cooperation can help to address security and development challenges. This ambitious and broad-ranging book will be a valuable resource for researchers working on African regionalism, security, African integration and development, and comparative regionalism. Policymakers should also consider it a useful guide to the background and contemporary landscape of African regionalism.

This edited volume transcends conventional state-centric and formalistic notions of regionalism and theorizes, conceptualizes and analyzes the complexities and contradictions of regionalization processes in contemporary Africa. The collection not only unpacks and theorizes the African state-society complex with regard to new regionalism, but also explicitly integrates the often neglected discourse of human security and human development. In so doing, the book moves the discussion of new regionalism forward at the same time as it adds important insights to security and development. It is organized into three parts. Part I theorizes, conceptualizes and analyzes the new regionalism in Africa from the point of view of the region (e.g. West, East, Central and Southern Africa). The national perspectives in Part II focus on the new regionalism in Africa from the point of view of particular countries or specific state-society complexes, such as Kenya, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), the enclave of Cabinda, Angola and Zambia. Part III contains two concluding chapters that tie the main threads of the volume together, theoretically and empirically, and discuss the contribution of the analytical framework, the new regionalism approach (NRA) to the larger study of regionalism.

At the 1996 EADI Conference, the papers presented in the World Trade and Trade Policy workshop looked at the new trends in regionalism from a variety of points of view for different institutions. They considered the effects of regions, their implications for policy and performance in the developing countries and for international economic institutions, and tried to interpret them in terms of economic and political theory.

Interrogating the notion of developmental regionalism as applies to Southern Africa, this volume explores the policy options and interventions necessary to ensure a peaceful and stable regional development process. With a focus on the Southern African Development Community (SADC).

How successful have Southern African states been in dealing with the major issues that have faced the region in recent years? What could be done to produce more cohesive and effective region-building in Southern Africa? In this original and wide-ranging volume, which draws on an interdisciplinary team of mainly African and African-based specialists, the key political, socio-economic, and security challenges facing Southern Africa today are addressed. These include the various issues confronting the Southern African Development Community (SADC) and its institutions; such as HIV/AIDS, migration and xenophobia, land-grabbing and climate change; and the role of the main external actors involved with the region, including the United Nations, the European Union, the United States, and China. The book also looks at the Southern African Customs Union and Southern African Development Finance Institutions, including the Development Bank of Southern Africa and Industrial Development Corporation, and issues of gender and peacebuilding. In doing so, the book goes to the heart of analyzing the effectiveness of SADC and other regional organisation, suggesting how region-building in Southern Africa may be compared with similar attempts elsewhere in Africa and other parts of the world.

This book examines the role of regional organizations in Africa's security from a theoretical and practical perspective. It was published as a special issue of African Security.