Publications
Publications
- October 2018
- African Affairs
Africa Rising? A Historical Perspective
By: Ewout Frankema and Marlous van Waijenburg
Abstract
Sub-Saharan Africa’s recent economic boom has raised hopes and expectations to lift the regions’ ‘bottom millions’ out of poverty by 2030. How realistic is that goal? We approach this question by comparing the experiences of three front-runners of region-specific development trajectories – Britain’s capital-intensive, Japan’s labour-intensive, and Ghana’s land-extensive growth path, highlighting some historical analogies that are relevant for Africa, but often overlooked in the current ‘Africa rising’ debate. We draw particular attention to Africa’s demographic boom and the possibilities for a quick transition to labour-intensive export-led industrialization. Although our exercise in diachronic comparative history offers little hope for poverty eradication by 2030, we do see broadened opportunities for sustained African economic growth in the longer term.
Keywords
Citation
Frankema, Ewout, and Marlous van Waijenburg. "Africa Rising? A Historical Perspective." African Affairs 117, no. 469 (October 2018): 543–568. (Finalist for the bi-annual Stephen Ellis Prize for the most innovative article in African Affairs.)