Many African states at independence wanted to be popular with the African masses. They, as a result, came up with many development projects than what the local resources could finance. The option was to supplement the local capital base with foreign capital. In the more recent past, the cold war...

During the last half century, the economic performance of the developing world has been far from uniform. Developing countries were polarised into those that made great progress in catching up and those that were mired in stagnation. Many African countries belong to the second group. Therefore,...