Region-Building in Africa

This landmark book is the first of its kind to assess the challenges of African region-building and regional integration across all five African subregions and more than five decades of experience, considering both political and economic aspects. Leading scholars and practitioners have come together to analyze a range of entwined topics, such as the theoretical underpinnings that have informed Africa's regional integration trajectory; the political economy of integration; the complexities of integration in a context of weak states; the increasing salience of Africa's relationships with rising extra-regional economic powers like China and India; and comparative lessons from non-African regional blocs. A core argument of this book is that region-building must be recognized as a political project as much as-if not more than-an economic one; successful region-building in Africa will need to include the complex political tasks of strengthening state capacity, resolving long-standing conflicts over resources and political dominance, improving democratic governance, and developing legitimate and inclusive transnational political structures.

Daniel H. Levine is Attendance Mediation Coordinator at Community Mediation, Baltimore, MD, USA, and a Research Fellow at the Center for International and Security Studies at Maryland, USA.

Dawn Nagar is Researcher at the Centre for Conflict Resolution, South Africa.