Issues in Interdisciplinarity 2020-21/Evidence in the Resource Curse and democratic instability in Africa

Introduction In this chapter, we explore how two disciplines rely on different types of evidence, which leads to contradicting conclusions on whether the "Resource Curse" is the main contributing factor to the continued democratic instability in Africa. thumb|300px|Countries by GDP (Nominal) in 2014 The economist Richard Auty introduced the idea of the “Resource Curse” and investigated countries that were rich in natural resources, but failed to grow economically.Sustaining development in mineral economies : the resource curse thesis Auty, R. M. (Richard M.) 0-415-09482-8 Routledge 1993 London https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/26633308 26633308 The “curse” describes how these countries often experience increased secessionist conflicts, poverty and reduced GDP growth, and anti-democratic effects. These components interact: authoritarian governments will be less able to resolve domestic conflicts, leading to an increased chance of conflict within the state; meanwhile, the reduced economic growth makes it harder to resolve such conflicts, and the impacts of conflict generate further economic chaos and decline.Does Oil Hinder Democracy? https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S0043887100020153/type/journal_article World Politics 2001-04 0043-8871 325–361 53 3 10.1353/wp.2001.0011 en Michael L. Ross The widespread effects of this vicious cycle impact many African states. Political science In political science, research on the "Resource Curse" and democratic instability has been focused on utilising quantitative evidence, such as statistical analyses and models. In 2001, the political scientist Michael Ross performed a quantitative analysis to investigate whether oil impedes democracy. He used pooled time-series cross-national data from 113 states between 1971 and 1997 and considered how the two independent variables, Oil and Minerals, impacted the Regime of a country. He used the control variables: Income, Islam, OECD membership, Regimet-5, and 26 dummy variables, which account for unique factors from each year such as the effects of the Cold War. This study concluded that the oil-impedes-democracy claim is “both valid and statistically robust”. Ross confirmed the validity of this conclusion with the support of his statistical evidence. A review of the developments in evidence since Ross' study shows the widespread quantitative evidence which supports this claim.Does Oil Wealth Affect Democracy in Africa? https://ideas.repec.org/a/adb/adbadr/2114.html African Development Review 2014 15–37 26 1 en John Anyanwu Andrew E. O. Erhijakpor Statistical models confirmed the relationship between natural resource wealth and political survival,Power struggles and the natural resource curse https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Power-struggles-and-the-natural-resource-curse-Caselli/4f773b0db556b8505aa007855aca08e3a3a815f3 2006 2020-12-10 en F. Caselli as well as this effect being dependent on the strength of the initial political power in place.Resource rents, balance of power, and political stability https://www.jstor.org/stable/24557465 Journal of Peace Research 2015 0022-3433 758–773 52 6 Kjetil Bjorvatn Mohammad Reza Farzanegan Following panel data analysis, the idea of a "conditional resource curse" was presented, providing evidence for the long term effect of oil wealth.More Oil, Less Democracy: Evidence from Worldwide Crude Oil Discoveries* https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1468-0297.2009.02327.x The Economic Journal 2011 1468-0297 89–115 121 551 10.1111/j.1468-0297.2009.02327.x en Kevin K. Tsui In 2012, Anderson and Ross responded to criticisms concerning the short timespan covered by the data in previous studies Do Natural Resources Fuel Authoritarianism? A Reappraisal of the Resource Curse https://www.jstor.org/stable/41480824 The American Political Science Review 2011 0003-0554 1–26 105 1 10.2307/41480824 Stephen Haber Victor Menaldo by stating that oil wealth only began to have an anti-democratic effect in the 1980s, when developing country governments began to capture previously foreign-owned oil rents, thus accumulating wealth for themselves.The Big Oil Change: A Closer look at the Haber-Menaldo Analysis https://papers.ssrn.com/abstract=2104708 2012 Rochester, NY en Michael L. Ross Jørgen Juel Andersen Further studies have suggested that British colonialism has had a positive influence on democracy. British rule was considered a “learning experience” for subsequent democracy,The Social Requisites of Democracy Revisited: 1993 Presidential Address https://www.jstor.org/stable/2096130 American Sociological Review 1994 0003-1224 1–22 59 1 10.2307/2096130 Seymour Martin Lipset due to the introduction of reforms that facilitated democracy such as bureaucratic structures or the rule of law. Statistical analysis showed that there is a significant positive association between former colonial influence and democratic tendency, as well as countries with democratic historical backgrounds being less prone to democratic collapse. History thumb|300px|Map of European colonies and the modern African borders thumb|300px|A comparison of the distribution of ethnic groups in 1880 vs a map of European colonies after the Berlin Conference In history, evidence is based on the analysis of primary and secondary sources.Goldstein, L., 1962. Evidence and Events in History. Philosophy of Science, [online] 29(2), pp.175-194. Available at: <https://www.jstor.org/stable/186544?seq=3#metadata_info_tab_contents>. This results in a narrative formed by particular historical events, thus the research methods and evidence produced are essentially qualitative. Looking at qualitative evidence from the historical past of many African countries, we see that the natural resources of a state do not induce or inhibit political instability,Beekers, D. T., & van Gool, S. M. (2012). From patronage to neopatrimonialism: Postcolonial governance in Sub-Sahara Africa and beyond. (ASC Working Paper; Vol. 101). African Studies Centre. https://openaccess.leidenuniv.nl/bitstream/handle/1887/19547/WP101.pdf?sequence=4 but rather the instability is a result of historical and cultural factors such as colonialism, ongoing conflicts, corruptionShumetie A, Watabaji M. Effect of corruption and political instability on enterprises’ innovativeness in Ethiopia: pooled data based. Journal of Innovation and Entrepreneurship [Internet]. 2019 [cited 7 December 2020];8(1). Available from: https://innovation-entrepreneurship.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s13731-019-0107-x#citeas and economic recession.Englebert, P., & Ron, J. (2004). Primary Commodities and War: Congo-Brazzaville's Ambivalent Resource Curse. Comparative Politics, 37(1), 61-81. The ongoing conflict results from the differences of ancestral, religious, and language backgrounds between ethnic groups. Historical analysis of the General Act of the Berlin conferenceGeneral Act of the Berlin Conference on West Africa. Berlin; 1885. Available from: https://www.thoughtco.com/general-act-of-the-berlin-conference-4070667 shows that the dissimilarity within countries is owed to the “Scramble for Africa”, in which 13 European nations drew arbitrary borders as seen in an attempt to keep one another’s colonies in check.Fischer H. 130 years ago: carving up Africa in Berlin [Internet]. DW.COM. 2015 [cited 8 December 2020]. Available from: https://www.dw.com/en/130-years-ago-carving-up-africa-in-berlin/a-18278894 There was no acknowledgement of native African territories or ethno-regional factors (shown in the comparative maps).Michalopoulos S, Papaioannou E. The Long-Run Effects of the Scramble for Africa. American Economic Review [Internet]. 2016 [cited 8 December 2020];106(7):1802-1848. Available from: https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/aer.20131311 This engendered conflicts,Blanton, T. R., Mason, D., & Brian, A. (2001). Colonial Style and Post-Colonial Ethnic Conflict in Africa”. Journal of Peace Research, 38(4), 473–491. as previously, dispersed communities had checks and balances to limit authoritarian power, but were then grouped together in an unprecedented environment of corruption and authoritarianism.KAMPALA L. Why Africa’s borders are a mess [Internet]. The Economist. 2016 [cited 8 December 2020]. Available from: https://www.economist.com/the-economist-explains/2016/11/17/why-africas-borders-are-a-mess Furthermore, qualitative surveys have shown the long-term civil, economic and emotional consequences of ethnic partitioning. Oppressive colonial governments hindered the introduction of the values of democracy, by not holding elections Fisher J, Cheeseman N. How colonial rule committed Africa to fragile authoritarianism [Internet]. Quartz Africa. 2019 [cited 7 December 2020]. Available from: https://qz.com/africa/1741033/how-colonial-rule-committed-africa-to-fragile-authoritarianism-2/ and creating a legacy of autocratic rule.Bayeh E. THE POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC LEGACY OF COLONIALISM IN THE POST-INDEPENDENCE AFRICAN STATES [Internet]. Ambo, Ethiopia; 2015 [cited 7 December 2020]. Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/273577309_THE_POLITICAL_AND_ECONOMIC_LEGACY_OF_COLONIALISM_IN_THE_POST-INDEPENDENCE_AFRICAN_STATES#:~:text=Colonialism%20has%20impacted%20the%20political%20and%20economic%20conditions%20of%20the%20contemporary%20Africa.&text=African%20states%20adopted%20the%20more,ethnic%20based%20exclusion%20and%20marginalization Imperialist regimes also made it hard for post-colonial rulers to establish authority democratically. During the post-colonialist era, bureaucracies emerged, which worsened the negative impacts of pre-colonial clientelism. As a result, post-colonial, modern bureaucracies transformed into neopatrimonial states.Bach, D.C., & Gazibo, M. (2011). L’ État néopatrimonial: Genèse et trajectoires contemporaines. Ottawa: University of Ottawa Press. In this context, the extraction of natural resources was principally directed to benefit the patrimonial rule in power (personalised state) under the cover of an impersonal bureaucratisation. In consequence, the evidence highlights how, from a historical perspective, political instability has appeared as an inevitable outcome of inheriting a flawed system from colonial rule, which had a greater impact on political instability than oil wealth and the "Resource Curse". Conclusion Political Science generally maintains the view that oil wealth hinders democracy and supports this with statistical evidence, while History speculates that there are other factors to acknowledge, such as colonialism, supported by more qualitative evidence. While experts from each discipline will agree that both oil wealth and colonialism play a part, the conflict arises in the weighting of these factors as the different causes for Africa's political instability. This problem cannot be solved by simply comparing the evidence produced, because one approach offers a qualitative exploration of history whereas the other utilises a quantitative method of calculation, leading to a conflict in evidence. Methods exist that attempt to quantify qualitative data by calculating the frequencies of particular themes from the set of data.Ellens R. Converting Qualitative Data Into Quantitative Data [Internet]. GP Strategies. 2016 [cited 7 December 2020]. Available from: https://www.gpstrategies.com/blog/qualitativedata/ This quantification has benefits, such as ease of analysis, providing answers to questions such as “To what degree ...?”, and allowing some comparison with quantitative data.Marias R. Can Qualitative Data Be Quantified? - Green & Write – College of Education – Michigan State University [Internet]. Michigan State University College of Education. 2017 [cited 7 December 2020]. Available from: https://education.msu.edu/green-and-write/2017/can-qualitative-data-be-quantified/Pope C. Qualitative research in health care: Analysing qualitative data. BMJ [Internet]. 2000 [cited 7 December 2020];320(7227):114-116. Available from: https://www.bmj.com/content/320/7227/114.short However, it cannot be taken as the sole result of a qualitative investigation as it can undermine the impact of qualitative data Wojatzki M, Mohammad S, Zesch T, Kiritchenko S. Quantifying Qualitative Data for Understanding Controversial Issues [Internet]. Miyazaki, Japan; 2018 [cited 7 December 2020]. Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/324941747_Quantifying_Qualitative_Data_for_Understanding_Controversial_Issues, due to the differences in research methods and the data produced. Understanding the main contributing factors to the continued democratic instability in Africa is important for creating a stable political environment, and so will be of interest to a number of parties. However, the differing evidence on this topic may lead to contradictory findings and incompatible attempts to resolve the issue. Here, we have recognised that the conflicting opinions arise from different types of evidence in History and Political Science, which are quantitative and qualitative respectively, and thus inherently incomparable by nature. Although they cannot be compared directly, we hope this chapter stimulates discussion on how both can be incorporated in both the recognition and resolution of problems. References