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Periodical article | Leiden University catalogue | WorldCat |
Title: | The Balance Sheet on External Assistance: France in Africa |
Author: | Grey, Robert D. |
Year: | 1990 |
Periodical: | Journal of Modern African Studies |
Volume: | 28 |
Issue: | 1 |
Period: | March |
Pages: | 101-114 |
Language: | English |
Geographic terms: | French-speaking Africa Subsaharan Africa France Africa |
Subjects: | economic development development cooperation defence Inter-African Relations Politics and Government Economics and Trade |
External link: | https://www.jstor.org/stable/160903 |
Abstract: | This paper tests the proposition that there are substantial benefits to African States from close relationships with one or more external powers, as well as costs, by determining the impact of France, first on the security of African States, and subsequently on their development and autonomy. An examination of appropriate data demonstrates that African States with defence treaties with France, and especially those with French bases on their soil, have been relatively free from both external aggression and internal unrest. However, there is a substantially greater propensity for coups among the francophone States. In the economic sphere, there is evidence of a positive albeit weak relationship between French aid and trade and higher rates of economic growth prior to the 1980s. Thereafter, however, the relationship between aid and growth disappears, while that between trade and growth becomes strongly negative. The most obvious additional costs of dependency stem from a lack of State autonomy. Notes, ref. |