The Enduring Malformation of West Africa
https://republic.com.ng/february-march-2023/the-malformation-of-west-africa/
Why Economics Alone Cannot Explain West Africa’s Slow Development
https://republic.com.ng/february-march-2023/the-malformation-of-west-africa/
Why Economics Alone Cannot Explain West Africa’s Slow Development
Jamaica is doing OK
https://noahpinion.substack.com/p/jamaica-is-doing-ok
Jamaica Is Not Doing Ok
https://rasheedgriffith.substack.com/p/jamaica-is-not-doing-ok
https://noahpinion.substack.com/p/jamaica-is-doing-ok
Jamaica Is Not Doing Ok
https://rasheedgriffith.substack.com/p/jamaica-is-not-doing-ok
Explaining the Mixed Legacies of Colonial
Legislative Institutions
https://broadstreet.blog/2021/10/08/explaining-the-mixed-legacies-of-colonial-legislative-institutions/
Ken Ochieng' Opalo (Assistant Professor at Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service) notes:
Institutional persistence is an inherent assumption in the “European colonial origins” literature. Yet, as demonstrated by the historical institutionalism literature, coherent accounts of persistence must also be able to account for change. Furthermore, the “domestication” of adopted European institutions was significantly shaped by local political and social conditions. Colonized populations had agency in shaping the realized impacts of institutions. In colonies that did not see significant European settlement, administration was characterized by a “thin White line” of officials whose diurnal conduct was arbitrary, autocratic, and far removed from stylized accounts of Western institutional order. Finally, the mere establishment of colonial institutions did not mark the end of politics. Different political actors in the colonies saw their powers wax and wane, in ways that shaped institutional development.
Assumptions of linear persistence of colonial institutions elides important mechanisms driving institutional persistence and change. This calls for detailed historical institutionalist accounts to uncover the sources of colonial institutional persistence and change. What specific institutions were created under colonialism and what factors shaped institutional design? What logics drove their internal operations? How did political realities in the colonies shape the persistence and/or change of specific institutional processes and outcomes?
https://broadstreet.blog/2021/10/08/explaining-the-mixed-legacies-of-colonial-legislative-institutions/
Ken Ochieng' Opalo (Assistant Professor at Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service) notes:
Institutional persistence is an inherent assumption in the “European colonial origins” literature. Yet, as demonstrated by the historical institutionalism literature, coherent accounts of persistence must also be able to account for change. Furthermore, the “domestication” of adopted European institutions was significantly shaped by local political and social conditions. Colonized populations had agency in shaping the realized impacts of institutions. In colonies that did not see significant European settlement, administration was characterized by a “thin White line” of officials whose diurnal conduct was arbitrary, autocratic, and far removed from stylized accounts of Western institutional order. Finally, the mere establishment of colonial institutions did not mark the end of politics. Different political actors in the colonies saw their powers wax and wane, in ways that shaped institutional development.
Assumptions of linear persistence of colonial institutions elides important mechanisms driving institutional persistence and change. This calls for detailed historical institutionalist accounts to uncover the sources of colonial institutional persistence and change. What specific institutions were created under colonialism and what factors shaped institutional design? What logics drove their internal operations? How did political realities in the colonies shape the persistence and/or change of specific institutional processes and outcomes?
Background Readings:
Understanding Institutions by Daron Acemoglu
https://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/cp161.pdf
Institutions Matter, but Not for Everything by Jeffrey D. Sachs
https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2003/06/pdf/sachs.pdf
Understanding Institutions by Daron Acemoglu
https://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/cp161.pdf
Institutions Matter, but Not for Everything by Jeffrey D. Sachs
https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2003/06/pdf/sachs.pdf