Economics

Introduction
Although it is famed as the cradle of mankind, Africa has guarded, and continues to guard, its place as the world poorest continent. Poverty, disease, famines, unemployment and uncontrolled population growth are still prominent elements for which the continent is most known. Amid the poverty and problems is however a hope and realization that Africa is finally headed in the right direction and pessimism is gradually giving way to hope. Most subsaharan countries gained their independence from their European colonial masters in the 1950s and 1960s, with a few becoming independent in the following decades. Since they started recovering from the initial shock of the departure of the colonialists, African countries have been going through periods of economic development. Although the development process has been interrupted by civil conflicts and other mishappenings in many Sub-Saharan countries, the overall economic and political development trend has been positive. Sub-Saharan Africa is today a much improved place than it was in the 1960s. This paper examines development trends in Sub-Saharan Africa and the different arguments advanced to explain the trends.

Development in post-colonial Sub-Saharan Africa
The end of colonial rule in Sub-Saharan Africa was accompanied by much hope on the part of Africans who saw the colonial masters as robbers of Africas wealth of natural resources. The colonialists had not only relocated resources to their industries in Europe but had also denied indigenous African communities access to the resources. The exit of the former would therefore give African communities the opportunity to exploit the resources and build their economies.

The hope that came with independence however waned rapidly as Africans realized that the colonial rulers had been replaced by ruthless dictators who had no place for democracy and who were greedy to grab what was left behind by the colonialists. According to Miguel, Sub-Saharan Africa was thus among the most undemocratic regions in the 1970s and 80s. Dictatorship, civil strife and corruption reigned supreme during these decades, thoroughly slowing down economic development. Sub-Saharan economies grew significantly during the 1960s and 1970s, growth which however declined from the mid-1970s. The political tides started changing in the 1990s when democracy started establishing roots in much of Sub-Saharan Africa.

Political freedom grew significantly in the 1990s and Africans were freer to express their political opinions openly. Kenya offered a good example of this political change. After a tyrannical rule under the independent countrys first and second presidents who tolerated no dissent, agitation for more political freedom intensified, forcing President Moi to allow multi-partyism in the early 1990s. Civil strife in many African countries had subsided by the 1980s and the continent was witnessing positive economic growth. There were exceptions in some countries including the Sudan, Congo, and Somalia where civil strife stands in the way of economic progress to this day. Liberia, Sierra Leone, Angola and others have gotten over years of civil war and their economies have been growing gradually. South Africa finally ended its apartheid system and like the rest of the continent, it has been going through a period of positive economic development since the early 1990s. The gross domestic product per capita of Sub-Saharan Africa rose sharply from the year 2000.

Africa is nowhere near China or India. Sub-Saharas pace of development is much slower that Indias or Chinas. Sub-Saharan Africa is still associated with corruption, poverty, over-population and over-dependence on foreign aid. This association must however not mask the fact that the continent has braved many challenges and has made big economic and political gains since the 1960s.

Explaining the African experience with economic development
Bloom, Sachs, Collier  Udry argue that any serious analysis of the economic progress or stagnation experienced in Sub-Saharan Africa must take into account the regions geography. While denying possible accusations of propagating geographical determinism, Bloom et al argue that Sub-Saharas climate, topography and the natural ecology have a significant impact on public nutrition, health, rate and nature of technological penetration, demographics and international trade. The larger part of Sub-Saharan Africa lies within the tropics, with only a part of South Africa falling into the temperate region. The tropical Sub-Saharan Africa has for decades depended heavily on agriculture and has performed poorly for as long as it has pursued agriculture. To explain the poor performance on the part of Sub-Saharan Africa, Bloom et al observe that most of the resources spent on research and development into agriculture are spent on the mid-latitude economies. Sub-Saharan Africa however is quick and willing to borrow from the technologies developed from the research and developmentof the temperate north. Unfortunately, many agricultual technologies are not transferable across ecological regions. The widespread importation of technologies which are irrelevant in Africa have much to contribute to the slow economic development common of Sub-Saharan Africa.

Jense and Wantchekon have established a strong relationship between Sub-Saharan Africas wealth of natural resources, and its history of economic development since the 1960s. This relationship has been particularly applicable in rentier states or states whose economies are supported by income from the sale of minerals and other natural resources. Examples of such states include Angola, Sudan, Libya, the Congos, Sierra Leone, Gabon and Nigeria whose economies have gravitated around oil exports, South Africa and Botswana (diamond), and Zambia and its copper. According to Jensen and Wantchekon, the wide availability of these natural resources and the dependence on these resources tend to have a negative effect on the level of democracy in these states. A casual glance at the history of civil strife in Sub-Saharan Africa reveals that civil unrests have been most intensified in natural-resource dependent states.The politics of these states tend to revolve around, not ideology or economic policy but, distributing the revenue earned from these rents. With a seemingly stable source of revenue available, there is little incentive to invest in research and development or to diversify from the natural resources on whose exports these economies are built. The majority of these states tend to be autocratic, with incumbents using the revenue to enrich themselves and buy, intimidate or crush opposition. Natural-resource dependent states are therefore among the poorest democracy-wise and are strongly associated with poor governance and uncontrolled government spending. Jensen and Wantchekon therefore argue that the availability of natural-resources in Sub-Saharan states has shaped the regions history of economic development since the 1960s.

While this argument holds for most resource-rich states, other Sub-Saharan states have been through years of autocracy, political violence, poor governance, and wild government expenditures yet they have do not have much in the way of natural resources. These states include Kenya, Uganda, Ethiopia and Somalia which have shared a history of autocracy and internal strife with the resource-rich states yet they earn very little if anything- from exporting natural resources.

Miguel, Satyanath  Sergenti argue that Sus-Saharan Africas history of civil conflict has contributed much to the economic development trends since most of the states gained independence from their European colonial masters. Unlike Jensen and Wantchekon who blame such strife on the greed for revenue earned from exports of natural resources, Miguel et al associate the unrest with weather shocks. With the majority of Sub-Saharan Africans depending directly on the environment for food and income, it follows that weather shocks, mostly taking the shape of droughts, can be devastating on the people and their economies. Acute shortage of precipitation spells disaster to the largely rain-fed agriculture. It also occasions much damage to pastoralists livestock. When this happens, the economies take a hit while the possibility of conflicts inceases significantly.Weather shocks have contributed much to economic stagnation in Sub-Saharan Africa, a situation which increases the likelihood of citizens rising against the government and against other members of their society.

Trade is always at the core of economic growth. Not much economic growth occurs if there is no trade going on among the residents of one country, across countries or both. However, trade relations betweeen parties necessitate a level of trust in the absence of which trade relations between the parties are interfered with. Trust is at the centre of Nunn  Wantchekons argument which relates Sub-Saharan Africas economic development experience with the continents history of slave trade. Slave trade had profound effects on the social fabric of the African communities, affecting relations even among members of the same family. Cases were common of people selling into slavery members of their own families. Years since slavery was abolished in Europe and the Americas, the effects of slave trade on the level of trust among members of communities most affected by slave trade still plague their economies. Slavery created in the affected communities a culture of mistrust which still adversely affects trade relations among Africans and with other continents.

Slave trade had devastating impact on the social fabric of the affected African communities. There is truth in the argument that slavery could have led to the birth of a culture of suspicion and mistrust, which could have long-term effects on the way Sub-Saharan states interacted with Europe and the Americas, particularly in trade matters. However, slave trade was more widespread in countries which had a coastline and which entertained relations with the foreign merchants. One finds an exception in Ethiopia which remained hostile to foreign interference to the extent that it was never colonized. Although European states did attack and try to take control of the country, Ethiopia fought back. One would therefore expect that slave-trade had a shallow effect on the countrys social fabric. Ethiopias economic development history is however not much different from the history of other African economies. This suggests that no one single factor can account for the continents experience of economic development.