The authors investigate the relationship between weak growth performance and low investment rates in Africa. The cross-country evidence suggests no direct relationship. The positive and significant coefficient on private investment appears to be driven by Botswana's presence in the sample....

The authors investigate the relationship between weak growth performance and low investment rates in Africa. The cross-country evidence suggests no direct relationship. The positive and significant coefficient on private investment appears to be driven by Botswana's presence in the sample....

While many analysts decry the lack of sufficient investment in Africa, we find no evidence that private and public investment are productive, either in Africa as a whole (unless Botswana is included in the sample), or in the manufacturing sector in Tanzania. In this restricted sense, inadequate...

One of the primary reasons that otherwise good politicians enact bad policies in countries all over the world, but especially in low-income countries, is that they face significant constraints in their efforts to bring about reform. These constraints, the "room for maneuver", are shaped by the...

Small states, no different from large states in income and growth, should receive the same policy advice large states do. Because of their greater openness, they may be more vulnerable to volatility in terms-of-trade shocks--but their openness pays off in growth

October 1999 - Continued efforts to develop high-level industrial skills in Sub-Saharan African countries may be wasteful without a more competitive environment in the industrial sector. But lack of such skills may limit the benefits to the industrial sector from future liberalization. As a...

This paper examines the potential role of civil society action in increasing state accountability for development in Sub-Saharan Africa. It further develops the analytical framework of the World Development Report 2004 on accountability relationships, to emphasize the underlying political...