Beyond ‘Africa rising’: Development Policies and Domestic Market Formation in Zambia

Abstract

Beyond 'Africa rising': Development Policies and Domestic Market Formation in ZambiaThe 'Africa rising' narrative sparked a lively discussion of the powers of orthodox economic policies to ensure good economic governance and attract private investments to further stimulate economic growth. The 2014 commodity bust and the Covid-19 pandemic effectively ended this discussion and triggered a critical examination of the fundamentals of the narrative. This study investigates how orthodox economic policies have affected the strive for structural transformation in a resource-rich economy like Zambia. It argues that there is a mismatch between the mostly orthodox policies that have driven policy formulation and the needs of the domestic private sector. Therefore, it makes a case for setting domestic market formation as a guiding principle for future economic policies, specifically by focusing industrial policy on business climate, rather than investment climate, and by focusing on capacity building, upgrading, and growth in consumer and inter-sectoral demand, rather than only liberalisation and good economic governance.

Development studies meet Pierre Bourdieu: the case of Chinese Private FDI in Zambia

“…In order to establish linkages between foreign firms and local companies, particularly in cases where significant disparities exist in technology and market access, it is essential for governments to offer incentives (Schmitz 2007; Jeppesen & Kragelund 2021). Guided by the above claim, we wanted to determine the extent to which Zambian institutions have taken steps to facilitate linkages between Chinese investors and local businesses.…”

“…Carmody et al . 2020; Jeppesen & Kragelund 2021). Our interview with the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (CCPC) corroborates this view, indicating that local companies in Zambia struggle to compete with foreign entities due to factors such as lack of scale, inferior technology and inferior quality and quantity of production (official from the CCPC 2017 int.).…”

“…The promotion of economic growth in Zambia has been hindered not only by the challenges mentioned above but also by the ‘fragmented and incoherent’ nature of the key policies and programmes aimed at achieving this goal (Jeppesen & Kragelund 2021: 602). This observation has been echoed by an official from the Ministry of Finance and National Planning, who explained that while there are some policies and programmes in place, they are generally too broad and lack specificity.…”