Outward Orientation, Import Instability and African Economic Growth: an Empirical Investigation

Beleaguered policy-makers in developing countries have become quite tired of generalised advice. The remedies for macroeconomic malaise or stagnation that are appropriate in one country may be quite unsuited to the problems of another. Today’s ‘recipe’ for stabilisation and development in one country may be disastrous in its effects not only in other countries but also at other times in the same country. ‘Norms’ and ‘averages’ for the world, however fascinating to statisticians and development economists, are dubious guides for policy-makers in individual countries. Unhappiness with ‘global’ prescriptions has rarely been as vociferous as it has become in recent years in the context of the ‘conditionality’ attached to IMF, World Bank and other official lending. The IMF and the World Bank usually deny that they employ a single ‘model’ for all their member countries. Whether these institutions, qua institutions, do or do not, there can be little doubt that, within them, generalised prescriptions abound.