3. Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETDs) - All submissions
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Item Measuring the effect of regional integration on economic efficiency in the Southern African development community(2018) McGraw, Benjamin PatrickThis research report concerns the exploration of the efficiency effects of regional economic integration at the level of each member country. In specific, the question addressed is: does regional economic integration improve the economic efficiency of member countries? This broad question is narrowed down by focusing on the Southern African Development Community (SADC) and by focusing on the integration index created recently by the three continental institutions of Africa: the AU, AfDB and UNECA. Efficiency will be measured using stochastic frontier, a parametric methodology that allows the estimation of a country’s production possibility frontier. Efficiency is thus estimated according to how close to its production possibility frontier an economy produces its output. The program used will be FRONTIER Version 4.1: http://www.uq.edu.au/economics/cepa/frontier.php.Item Integration and leadership in Southern Africa: South Africa's strategy, opportunities and limitations(2018) Mamphogoro, Rabelani DanielAfter South Africa experienced a political transition in 1994, the regional integration dynamic in southern Africa also went under a considerable change. The new South Africa became a natural member of the Southern African Development Community (SADC), and also adopted the Southern African Customs Union (SACU). South Africa’s accession into SADC and its membership in SACU raised questions about its capability to lead and strengthen regional integration in the southern African region. Also central to this question was the debate around the best institutional framework that South Africa should use to promote regional integration in southern Africa. However, since the 1994 political transformation, South Africa has maintained a neutral policy position and strove to prove its capacity to lead and integrate the southern African region using both SADC and SACU. Thus, South Africa’s policy position has inspired two postures that are evoking that Pretoria should take a decisive policy position that will reflect on the path that it is has chosen to promote regional integration in southern Africa. However, despite the evocations from these two perspectives, South Africa has not yet taken either side of the policy positions on its approach to regional integration in southern Africa. Therefore it is against this background that this study seeks to engage into the argument of these perspectives, however, driven by the main objective of assessing South Africa’s capacity to lead, drive and strengthen southern African regional integration in the post-1994 era.Item State sovereignty and regional integration in Southern Africa, 1980-2015(2016-10-10) Notshulwana, MxolisiThis research is demarcated according to two modes, one conceptual – state sovereignty - and two - distant proximity – the ideal of regional integration. When these are juxtaposed in the state sovereignty-regional integration complex, they resemble a complex picture of what is under construction. The nation state currently exists, so it is an important variable. The research examines what happens to the nation state variable, in respect to its policy preferences, interests and ideational content as the process of regional integration evolves. Put differently, does the nation state remain indivisible or is it evolving as the process of regional integration deepens? The research has found that the policy preferences and interests of states in Southern Africa converge and/or diverge not so much based on the SADC objectives and norms. The convergence and/or divergence of policy preferences among states in SADC is informed by the constant negotiation and engagement among states - yielding not so much a zero-sum regional integration arrangement nor is it leading to the demise of the nation state – but around a range of factors including: perceived economic gains and losses; persuasion and influence among state and non-state actors; political solidarity among state actors; external and internal political and economic pressures. The notion of state sovereignty is invoked by many states when all the factors above have yielded inadequate results for the particular state. The research has found that a constructivist process of co-determination and co-constitution and solidarity, albeit very loose and not legaly binding, is taking place in Southern Africa. This process, the research has found, is pointing to an intergovernmental regional integration arrangement wherein certain policy areas or competencies reside at the regional level and some at the nation state level. The process of inter-state action and behaviour, the dissertation has found, is underpinned by the interests, preferences and choices of states in their discursive relationship to one another in the process of regional integration.