Managing Sovereignty: The World Bank And Development in Sub-Saharan Africa

David Williams

Mondes en développement, 2003, vol. 123, issue 3, 5-21

Abstract: At the heart of state sovereignty is a tension. On one hand it promises collective freedom and autonomy. On the other hand, sovereignty is laden with expectations. One of the most important of these, which comes from international society itself, is that states will pursue a project of national development. When the states of Sub-Saharan African achieved formal independence, they therefore became enmeshed in institutions and practices that demanded of them that they pursued a national development project. In recent years, as African states are seen to have failed to live up to this expectation, donor activities have increased in scope and depth. As a result of this, the sovereignty of many African states has become severely compromised. They have lost whatever control they had over the national development project. But this control has not been transferred to the donors. No other agency has replaced the state as the central vehicle for directing and controlling the development project. The result of this is an increasingly fragmented policymaking and policy implementation process in much of the continent. This paper explores these developments with particular reference to the World Bank.

Date: 2003
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