Regional Integration Experience in the Eastern African Region

Andrea Goldstein and Njuguna S. Ndung’u

No 171, OECD Development Centre Working Papers from OECD Publishing

Abstract: It is relatively easy to assess the progress, achievements, and possible future direction of an existing regional integration pact. However, evaluating the prospects for a successful revival of the East African Community (EAC), a regional integration scheme that collapsed in 1977, is arguably a more difficult task. This paper examines recent attempts to revive the EAC, especially as it concerns the harmonisation of macroeconomic policies, infrastructure services, and movement of people, goods and services. Despite the hopes of the different partner countries, it appears there are no easy solutions to the problems posed by regionalism in Eastern Africa, especially when one considers that the problems that led to the EAC’s collapse during the 1970s still exist today. Moreover, partners now have many options for multiple memberships: many East African nations are already members of COMESA, and SADC includes one East African member. The paper argues that the presence of these new ... S’il est relativement aisé d’évaluer les progrès, les réalisations et la possible évolution d’un accord d’intégration régionale existant, il est beaucoup plus difficile d’estimer les perspectives de rebond de la Communauté de l’Afrique de l’Est (East African Community — EAC), qui s’est effondrée en 1977. Ce Document fait le point sur les récentes tentatives de relance de l’EAC, en particulier en ce qui concerne l’harmonisation des politiques macro-économiques, des services d’infrastructure et des mouvements de populations, de biens et de services. En dépit des espoirs des pays partenaires, il semble qu’il n’y ait pas de solution évidente aux problèmes posés par le régionalisme en Afrique de l’Est, surtout si l’on considère que les raisons de l’effondrement de l’EAC dans les années 70 sont toujours. En outre, les partenaires disposent désormais d’une grande variété d’options d’appartenance : de nombreuses nations sont déjà membres du COMESA et un pays de la zone a rejoint la SADC ...

Date: 2001-03-01
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (19)

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1787/148254462148 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:oec:devaaa:171-en

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in OECD Development Centre Working Papers from OECD Publishing Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().