Science, Technology, and Public Policy

The power of Pan-Africanism as a guiding vision for the continent’s development is widely studied, mostly as an aspirational phenomenon. At worst, Pan-Africanism has often been seen as a poor imitation of American federalism or European integration. Both of these perceptions do not reflect the profound nature of the role that the ideology of Pan-Africanism played in shaping the continent’s economic transformation. 

"Africa's economic diplomacy will be dramatically shaped by the Continental Free Trade Area (CFTA) negotiations that will conclude in 2017. This builds on the Tripartite Free Trade Area covering 26 countries with 650 million people and a GDP of US$1.5 trillion. The CFTA will comprise a billion people with an initial GDP of $3 trillion. The foundations of the agreement include free trade, infrastructure development and industrialisation. This is a grand opportunity that will shape Africa's relationships with the UK, Europe and the rest of the world."

For a summary of Prof. Juma's Twitter Q&A on this topic, click here. #AskCJuma

"Much of Africa's diplomatic agency in its relations with China is mediated through development learning. One obvious area of interest for Africa is the role of state capacity in promoting economic development. African governments are learning how to engage with China through FOFAC and other collaborative ventures. These lessons are being deployed when negotiating with other countries."

"Along with punishment and denial, entanglement is an important means of making an actor perceive that the costs of an action will exceed the benefits.  Entanglement refers to the existence of  interdependences which makes a successful attack simultaneously impose serious costs on the attacker as well as the victim. This is not unique to cyber. For example, in 2009, when the People's Liberation Army urged the Chinese government to dump some of China's massive holdings of dollar reserves to punish the United States for selling arms to Taiwan, the Central Bank pointed out that this would impose large costs on China as well and the government decided against it."

"African leaders would like to escape the colonial trap of being viewed simply as raw material exporters. But their efforts to add value to the materials continue to be frustrated by existing EU policies."

Africa's economic transformation through innovation is within reach. But this cannot be effectively pursued while continuing to be hobbled by the untenable view that industrial diversification needs to start with adding value to the continent's materials.

"For US regulators, 2014 was a banner year for collecting fines against sanctions violators, according to The Economist. In June, BNP Paribas—France’s largest bank, and one of the largest in the world—agreed to shell out $9 billion to the US Department of Justice for violating sanctions against Cuba, Iran, and Sudan. This past month, US regulators slapped Germany’s Commerzbank—the country’s second-largest bank, with a similar global presence—with a $1 billion fine, after launching an investigation into its dealings with sanctioned countries. The increases in fines have signaled an aggressive, zero-tolerance policy toward violators, as well as a willingness to use the extraterritorial provisions of sanctions, which allow regulators to punish foreign-based banks..."

"To harness the globally available technologies, African leaders will need to take into account the multisectoral dimension of African agriculture and pay particular attention to the urgency of investing in rural infrastructure, higher agricultural training and creation of regional markets."