DIIS seminar: Forvaltning af naturressourcer og investeringer i Afrika

The DIIS seminar series on the Political Economy of Natural Resource Investments explores the impact of natural resources on economics, politics, development, foreign aid, conflict, and geopolitics in Africa.

The seminars seek to highlight the global-local dimension of natural resource extraction and governance in Africa.

They also consider how new resource-rich countries, particularly in East Africa, can harness this wealth towards broad economic development and poverty reduction to avoid the negative economic and political consequences of the “resource curse” experienced elsewhere on the continent.

Increased investment in the mining sector in Africa is often presented as a key strategy to leverage growth, development and poverty reduction on the continent. Massive investment has taken place.

This seminar sheds light on the actual outcomes. Two scholars present their recent publications on resource governance and African mining.

Bonnie Campbell, in her new edited book, Modes of Governance and Revenue Flows in African Mining focuses on the disappointing results of investment in crucial areas such as sustainable economic and social development.

These outcomes are most frequently attributed to dysfunctional internal governance processes, mismanagement and corruption.

Much attention has been given in recent years to the issue of “the poor resource governance” in mineral rich countries. In her presentation Bonnie Campbell aims to achieve a better understanding of these issues by proposing a renewal of approaches.

France Bourgouin, is the co-editor of the new book, Resource Governance and Developmental States in the Global South, which explores the mining reforms of the last three decades across Africa, Asia, and Latin America.

The book challenges the long held views about the ways natural resources shape political and economic outcomes.

Through an examination of the specific features of the resource sector and its particular dynamics of policy change, the book’s authors point to the range of development options for the Global South that move beyond adopting unregulated, open extractive markets.

Speakers