Lessons for Sub-Saharan Africa from Latin American Experience ?

G. K. HelleineP

Abstract: There are many issue areas in which African policymakers and analysts may learn from Latin American experience. These include appro- priate incentive structures, industrialization strategy, response to external shocks, anti-inflation policies, policies on foreign direct investment, and econ- omic integration. Comparisons of particular country experiences can also be useful if carefully made. Attention is called to the possibility of fruitful com- parisons between specific Latin American countries’ experiences and the cur- rent problems of Cameroun, C6te d’Ivoire, Kenya, Senegal, Zambia and Zim- babwe.

Resume: I1 y a maintenant de nombreux domaines oh les dirigeants et les analystes africains peuvent tirer des lecons de l’experience latino-americaine. On peut citer, entre autres, des structures incitatives adoptees, une strategic de l’industrialisation, une reponse aux chocs externes, les politiques de lutte contre l’inflation, les politiques concernant les investissements directs etrangers et l’integration economique. Des comparaisons des experiences particulieres de pays si elles sont soigneusement faites, peuvent egalement se reveler utiles. L‘attention est attiree sur la possibilite de comparaisons fructueuses entre les experiences precises des pays dpmerique lathe et les problemes que connais- sent actuellement le Cameroun, la C6te d’Ivoire, le Kenya, le Senegal, la Zambie et le Zimbabwe.

The disappointing economic performance of the African economies over the past two decades has generated a search for fresh policy approaches to the future. There is unfortunately more agreement today on what not to do, or on what to do over only a relatively short time horizon, than there is on longer-run development strategy for African economies. Approaches to the long- run problems of African development raise difficult policy issues that have not as yet been adequately addressed. Widespread agreement that the relative neglect of agriculture during the post-independence period was mistaken, for example, still leaves many issues for further investigation and continuing policy

*Professor, Department of Economics, University of Toronto. Professor Helleiner has written extensively on issues ofeconomic development in Africa and elsewhere. This paper has been prepared for the inaugural edition of the African Development Bank’s economic review, the African Development Review, launched on the occasion of the Bank‘s 25th anniversary.

0 1989 by African Development Bank / Banque africaine de developpernent

4 AFRICAN DEVELOPMENT REVIEW

debate. A recent survey of African development experience and prospects soberly concludes : ‘ The present debate on agriculture’s role in Africa’s econ- omic development sadly lacks the extent of understanding needed for the for- mulation and implementation of an effective long-run policy. ’ (Lele, 1988, p. 212).

How can one begin to address some of the current dilemmas of African development? The most direct and obvious approach is to analyse, without preconceptions, the specifics of the African situation. A secondary approach with a fairly respectable intellectual pedigree is to study the experience of other similar regions during periods when they faced similar problems. Many, for instance, have drawn on relatively recent East Asian experience for lessons that might be applicable to other developing countries aspiring to equivalent suc- cess ; even an Africa that, on the face of it, has very different initial conditions, has often been urged to try to emulate that experience. Similarly, efforts to build appropriate agricultural technology for Africa regularly draw on the his- tory of Green Revolution research in Asia for inspiration. It is always worth casting about the rest of the world for ideas and policy lessons from others with comparable experiences and difficulties. This paper explores the possibility that Sub-Saharan Africa might draw some lessons from Latin American exper- ience. This particular intercontinental comparison has not received attention - perhaps because Latin American countries have not typically been as ‘ success- ful ’ as those to whom African policymakers are usually directed for lessons. A relatively poor performance record need not argue, however, for the diminished relevance of their experience.

This essay consists of two parts. The first addresses a range of policy issues in which Latin American experiences may offer lessons, at a fairly general level, for African development policymakers. What, if anything, can African economic decision-makers and economics students in the crisis circumstances of the 1980s learn from earlier Latin American experience? The second part contains a somewhat crude, yet still cautious, exploration of the possible utility of sel- ected country-level comparisons that might permit Latin American experiences to be drawn upon in Sub-Saharan Africa. In what ways are particular African economies similar to or essentially different from the historical (or, for that matter, current) Latin American ones? I offer only the briefest of conclu- sions.