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The paper is an attempt at applying Samir Amin's lens in the analysis of socio-economic development in Africa. Social and economic development in Africa has been substandard, largely because of the economic system followed and because effective structural transformation has not taken place – Samir Amin's works explained what needed to be done to transform Africa (and the broader global south). It is in this context that the paper posits that post-colonial Africa has had to contend with disruptive socio-economic and political realities instituted by European colonialism, slave trade and inappropriate integration of Africa to the so-called global economy. The fundamental explanation for the poor socio-economic development in Africa is global capitalism, and one of the possible solutions is in Samir Amin's delinking proposal as well as the restructuring of the African economies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is a well-known fact that Africa continent is grappling with developmental challenges. The main objectives of this paper therefore are to examine the impact of neoliberalism on these developmental challenges and to encourage African leaders to take a bold and radical departure from the norm in order to chart a new course of development which will take the continent out of the woods of economic retardation and development deficit which envelope the region now. Drawing on the case study which centre on African realities and experiences, the paper discovered that the claim that neo-liberalism is the undisputable means of attaining economic development in Africa is an illusion. On the strength of this, the paper expands on the theory of assimilation with its concomitant smart or strategic protectionism through the adaptation of foreign technology, promotion of education and encouragement of entrepreneurship as means of genuinely engendering economic development in African. The research adopts qualitative and case study methodology. Similarly, the work embraces inductive research approach as the research process systematically focuses on finding answer to the question Of, What effective step can African governments take in order to candidly overcome the challenge of underdevelopment? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers the prospects and promises of continent‐wide infrastructure projects under China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), and its implications for intra‐regional trade and economic development in Africa. Building on the supply side theory of trade and economic development, and taking cognizance of the impacts of asymmetric market sizes on trade integration, this paper argues that continent‐wide infrastructure projects are perhaps not the biggest constraints to intra‐Africa trade. Consequently, the paper recommends caution in pursuing regional infrastructure projects under the BRI. Given that the economies of most African countries depend largely on natural resources, the BRI could be adopted strategically to establish and manage infrastructure projects that would relax the binding constraints to structural transformation and allow for the development of manufacturing and/or service capabilities in the respective countries, especially in niche areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A growing body of literature highlights the importance of export sophistication for economic development. Given the newness of the literature on export sophistication, its determinants are under‐exploited. As a pioneer study, this paper attempts to fill this gap in the literature by examining the effect of infrastructure development on export sophistication. Based on a panel of 45 African countries over the period 2003–2016, the results of the different estimations show that infrastructure, including transport, electricity, ICT and access to water and sanitation, improves export sophistication in Africa. Our results also show that the effect of infrastructure varies at different intervals of the export sophistication distribution. Therefore, improved infrastructure would allow African countries to not only improve their export structure but also achieve sustainable and durable growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examined finance-growth nexus in the finance industry and the influencing factors of economic indicators which deliberate on the performance of the Solow Growth model to prove the actuality of financial development (FD) inside the economic growth (EG) model, based on the regional data from 1980 to 2017 in Africa. We applied the econometric method of GMM style panel vector autoregressive (PVAR) and panel quantile regression (PQR). With the optimal finance-growth outcome, the review shows that the economic indicators influence the finance-growth nexus. The quantile results show that high economic indicators help to strengthen the finance-growth nexus, whereas low economic indicators hinder it. The GMM style PVAR results present a mixed effect in terms of the connection and marginal significance, indicating that FD has a varied impact on economic growth. Last, the granger causality results show a two-way causal association amid finance-growth in Western, Central, Eastern, and Southern African economies and a unidirectional causal link of finance-growth in Northern Africa. The policy conclusion is that to gain the long-term economic benefits of FD, African countries should strive for low and steady economic stability. To attain the required economic stability, it may be important to use suitable fiscal and monetary policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• We investigate the effects of refugees' camps on the occurrence of protests and conflicts in host localities employing a counterfactual approach were we compare geographical cells that host a camp (treated) with other cells that have a priori similar probability of hosting a camp and a similar socio-economic context. • We do not find that after the establishment of a camp the average occurrence of protests increases significantly. • Using a panel event study estimation, we find evidence of a significative increase in the number of protests in the 2-years after the establishment of the camp. • Over time the easing of tensions might be related to the increased socio-economic contacts as we find that the establishment of camps boosts the growth of host-localities. • The intensity and density of interactions are unlikely to generate strong social tensions as refugees contribute to the expansion of economic opportunities also in marginal and relatively underdeveloped contexts. In this paper we study the effects of the establishment of refugees' camps in Africa on the occurrence of protests and social conflicts by using geo-referenced panel data (2000–2014). We use 50x50 km cells as units of analysis and match data on the frequency of protests, armed conflicts and other organized violence events (based on GDELT and GED databases) with information on the location of camps contained in the UNHCR Camp Mapping Database. By using a counterfactual empirical strategy, we find that refugee camps significantly increase the occurrence of protests only in the initial period (2 years) while no statistically significant effect is detected in subsequent years. We interpret these findings as the asynchronous effect of two shocks associated with the presence of refugee camps: a sudden population shock which initially increases social tensions with the host-communities and a growth effect spurred by the increase in aggregate demand due to a public-spending shock and the progressive participation of refugees in the host socio-economic system. To support this hypothesis, we analyze the effect of hosting a camp on economic growth in the surrounding area (within 10 km from the camp). We find evidence that, on average, camps positively affect economic growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]