Africa’s turn to industrialize? Shifting global value chains, industrial policy and African development

On 3 May the department of International Development held a one day conference on Industrialisation in Africa. LSE Fellow Pritish Behuria reviews the day’s events

The challenge of thinking and working politically to reform public services

In this post LSE Research Fellow Dr Pritish Behuria reviews the UNDP (United Nations Development Programme) Global Centre for Public Service Excellence 3-day Conference, that was held in Singapore last month (April 2016

What next after the Delhi Declaration? The challenges and opportunities of harnessing India-Africa relations

As the India Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeks to usher in a new era of Africa-India relations, LSE’s Pritish Behuria analyses his approach

The political economy of import substitution in the 21st century: the challenge of recapturing the domestic market in Rwanda

Import substitution has been marginalised from development policy discourse since the 1970s. This paper examines the Rwandan government’s recent attempt at reintroducing industrial policy with some attention devoted to ‘recapturing the domestic market’ – a term used to replace the ignominy associated with ‘import substitution.’ The paper examines two cases – cement and textiles – where such policies have been recently established in Rwanda. The paper argues that any attempt at recapturing the domestic market will require a strategy close to the policies of East Asian developmental states in terms of ‘picking winners.’ However, strategically maintaining reciprocity through statebusiness relationships is only part of the challenge. Though foreign investors have been leant on initially, actions must be put in place to develop local capitalist partners who may step in if foreign investors leave once incentives are reduced. This is further complicated by the government’s failure to develop partnerships with existing local capitalist partners. The Rwandan government is also constrained by a small market size. Any attempt at import substitution must occur in the context of accessing larger markets through the East African Community (EAC). This paper demonstrates that such regional trade agreements constitute a much greater constraint on the use of industrial policy than multilateral trade agreements or bilateral trade agreements with the United States of America or European countries (although pressure from donors may also contribute to reducing policy space). Such challenges showcase how the Rwandan government has sought to build reciprocal control mechanisms while attempting to access large markets through regional integration. Though the Rwandan government has made some progress recently, state intervention is required to reintroduce import substitution in the 21st century and must be balanced by the need to meet domestic and international political constraints

The youth in Africa: Opportunities, resistance and transformation

Pritish Behuria writes a report on The Youth in Africa workshop hosted by the LSE Department of International Development on 15 May, 2017

The cautious return of import substitution in Africa

As import substitution becomes fashionable again in some African countries, LSE’s Pritish Behuria analyses how successfully this policy can be implemented given the evolving aid and investment landscape

The tentative developmental state in Rwanda: From anti-manufacturing to recapturing the domestic market

In this post, Dr Pritish Behuria highlights the reintroduction of import substitution in Rwanda under the moniker – recapturing the domestic market. He argues that this signals the tentative emergence of Rwanda’s developmental state, which has previously paid little attention to its domestic manufacturing sector

Aspiring to new heights with no ladder: the barriers to technology acquisition in India’s solar energy sector

In order to meet its ambitious solar targets India has sought to boost local production of solar cells. However, Pritish Behuria highlights how it has come up against problems, as America, the WTO and others have restricted the country’s ability to develop its domestic manufacturing capabilities. He writes that if solar cell production is to survive in India, much more government action will need to be taken

Countering threats, stabilising politics and selling hope: examining the Agaciro concept as a response to a critical juncture in Rwanda

The political settlements literature [Khan, M. Political Settlements and the Governance of Growth-enhancing Institutions. School of Oriental and African Studies Working Paper, 2010. Accessed June 19, 2014. http://eprints.soas.ac.uk/9968; North, D., J. Wallis, and B. Weingast. Violence and Social Orders: A Conceptual Framework for Interpreting Recorded Human History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009] has assigned a privileged role to rents as instruments used by ruling elites to maintain political stability. Since then, there has been some attempt [Hickey, S. Thinking about the Politics of Inclusive Development: Towards a Relational Approach. Effective States and Inclusive Development Research Centre Working Paper No. 1, 2013; Hudson, D., and A. Leftwich. 2014. From Political Economy to Political Analysis. Development Leadership Programme Research Paper 25, Birmingham] to highlight how ideas may play a similarly important role in contributing to political stability. This article explores how ruling elites in Rwanda responded to a ‘critical juncture’ in 2012 when donors withdrew foreign aid after they alleged that the Rwandan Patriotic Front government was supporting rebel groups in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Ruling elites then used an idea – Agaciro (a Kinyarwanda word, which means dignity or self-respect) – as one instrument to maintain political stability and legitimise its revised development programme in Rwanda. Ruling elites have also used the rhetoric around Agaciro to target the younger generation in Rwanda. This paper argues that Agaciro is symbolic of the vulnerabilities faced by ruling elites in Rwanda today. These vulnerabilities are a specific outcome of the Rwandan developmental strategy, which combines neoliberal market-led reforms, with some developmental state-like policies. The Agaciro concept was also operationalised, with the creation of an Agaciro Development Fund (AgDF) in 2012. The AgDF was legitimised on the basis of a commitment to self-reliance (among elites) during a time where symbolic coalition building among elites was important for political stability. However, Agaciro is also used to project the country’s development strategy (particularly in relation to entrepreneurship and financial inclusion) as one of opportunity, instead of acknowledging the severe inequality that has been associated with development in Rwanda thus far