Regional Integration in Southern Africa

In response to changing global economic and political trends, the worlds regions are moving towards greater cooperation and integration. African countries, and in particular, Southern African countries are no exception. As in the rest of the world, regional integration has over the years been viewed as an indispensable part of development strategy in Southern Africa (Schiff and Winters 2003: xii). As Soka (2008: 56) notes, “regional integration has been considered as a means to achieve sustainable economic growth and development and to overcome the regions structural problems.”

However, as noted by Van Rooyen (1998:125), “a critical question that has for the past years been at the centre of debate is: What is the best approach for regional integration in Southern Africa?” Is it market integration, regional cooperation or development integration? Which one of these can enhance development of the Southern African region as a whole? As the debate for a relevant regional integration approach rages on in the region, many academicians, politicians and writers seem to be vacillating among the three theories. This paper joins this contested debate and it makes the proposition that development integration approach of regional integration is the most appealing and relevant to Southern African region. This is largely because Southern Africa as a region is meeting numerous challenges and in order to overcome them, there has to be an overarching and a comprehensive approach to regional integration not just one that focuses on trade as an end in itself.

In order to dwell further on these deeper kinds of terrain of regional integration, it may be useful to raise a few critical explanations so as to proceed with some clarity and be able to comprehend better the key issues of regional integration. At the outset, it should be noted that there are three approaches to regional integration. These are market integration, regional cooperation and development integration. According to Van Rooyen (1998:128), market integration “involves the lowering and removal of trade barriers between states in a region in order to increase trade between them.” Market integration therefore sees trade as an engine of economic growth and development. Lee (2003) gives the various forms of market integration, which include Free Trade areas (FTAs), customs union, common markets, economic unions and total economic integration.

Regional cooperation, on the other hand, refers to the execution of joint projects between two or more countries. The basic idea of regional cooperation is that cooperation in one sector of the economy will eventually “spur and necessitate” further cooperation, integration and development between the countries in ‘marriage’ (Van Rooyen 1998:129). The third and final approach to regional integration [which this paper subscribes to] is development integration. According to Van Rooyen (1998:129), “development integration is the response to the shortcomings of the market integration approach.” It is based on the understanding that industrialization must be advanced before market integration is considered. Furthermore, it is multi-dimensional in the sense that it deals with all structures that affect development whether political, social, ecological and economical. It comes from this brief background that development integration is the most appealing and relevant to Southern African countries.

Perhaps mention must be made that any ideal approach to regional integration and development must be “flexible, pragmatic, adaptable and inclusive” (ibid: 126). When one looks at the three theories, one can safely argue that it is only development integration, which largely has these attributes. To say the least, neither market integration nor regional cooperation is appealing and relevant to Southern Africa. This, as already stated in this discussion, is mainly because of the fact that the thrust of market integration is on trade. The fact that market integration sees trade as a catalyst that can have a spill over effect to development should be a major cause for concern in Southern Africa. In fact, this assumption, to say the least, is erroneous. Market integration, of course, can spur economic growth, but it is imperative to note that not all development problems, for example, epidemics such as HIV/AIDS, can be solved through trade. This means that market integration is a necessary evil in the SADC region.

Another problem with market integration is that it was primarily developed with and for industrialized economies such as those in the First World. However, almost all Southern African states (excluding South Africa) are in the Third World or are referred to as developing countries. Many, lack industries and a majority, have a historic reliance on exporting primary products (SADC 2000:16). Market integration cannot thus work in a region where the level of industrialization is distinctly low and at different levels. As Van Rooyen (1998:128) observes, “the potential for successful market integration improves once the members are on the same level of industrial development.” This clearly is not the case with Southern African economies. For instance, Soka (2008:56) notes that “the region’s economy is overwhelmingly dominated by South Africa…which apparently produces 80 per cent of the Southern Africa’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).”

Market integration is also not appealing to Southern African economies because of the fact that the Southern African economy is similarly structured, in that it produces, consume, import and export essentially similar products (Ciliers 1995:13). Therefore, instead of complementing each other, history has it that, Southern African Countries have ended up competing with each other. This has rendered the chances of market integration almost impossible since there is a minimal amount of trade that happens amongst these countries.

The viability of market integration in Southern Africa is also questionable since for market integration to be successfully implemented there has to be a number of prerequisite conditions that have to be taken into consideration. For example, the region has to be politically stable and the security has to be tight. In addition, macro-economic stability has to be in place. However, when one looks at the Southern African region, a majority of these conditions are not in place. If there are there, then they are very patchy. For example, cases of armed robbery activities and other growing insecurities are the order of the day. Malawi and South Africa are classic examples. Other transnational crimes such as car-hijacking, money laundering, drug and human trafficking, small arms and the influx of refugees from other regions are serious challenges that have beset the region (SADC 2000:24). On macroeconomic stability, the situation of many countries in the region is very disheartening. Many countries suffer from macroeconomic instability and their economies are characterized by high budget deficits, high inflation rates, high interest rates and exchange rate instability that have thwarted trade and foreign investment (ibid). Zimbabwe, in particular, is a case in point.

There are also other factors that have compounded the problem of market integration. For example, geographically, six of the countries in the SADC region are landlocked (SADC 2000:35). These are Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Swaziland. As a consequence, economic integration within the region has proven to be difficult since other transport systems such as roads and railway lines are also poor. Further to the above point, the population size of a majority of countries in the region is very small. As a result, the SADC Human Development report of 2000 notes that, “the cost per capita of providing infrastructure individually is high” (ibid). All these challenges point to the fact that market integration is not relevant and appealing to Southern African region.

However, regional cooperation is not appealing and relevant to the region either. Much as regional cooperation is easily achievable, “it has minimal advantages as compared to development and market integration especially when significant disparities exist among participating countries” (Ciliers 1995:14). Furthermore, the fact that regional cooperation overlooks other serious and growing challenges such as the political environment of other countries makes itself to be more irrelevant and less appealing in the SADC region. Many countries in the region have nascent democracies that need to be nurtured and guided. Moreover, if links between democracy and economic development are anything to go by, then regional cooperation should be greatly discouraged since it undervalues the importance of deep integration. Another shortfall of regional cooperation is that it disregards to a greater extent core issues such as trade in regional markets. The fact that this paper is saying market integration is not appealing in the region, does not necessarily and sufficiently mean that issues that deal with trade have to be completely disposed of. All what this paper is saying is that trade issues have to be properly taken into account in the region and this has to be coupled with other development agendas. To undermine the importance of trade in economic growth and development, it to be totally disingenuous. No any region in the world can develop without the influence of trade.

Development integration is therefore needed in Southern African region since it is the only approach that encompasses all issues that the SADC region is currently facing. These issues range from trade, health, and politics to environment. Millions of people in SADC live in conditions of abject poverty as evidenced by low quality houses, high levels of illiteracy, and high incidences of infant, child and maternal mortality rates (SADC 1998: xiii). The HIV prevalence rates in the region are extremely alarming and many people are dying from the AIDS scourge. For example, Botswana, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Namibia have an average HIV prevalence rate of 24.8 per cent (UNDP 2008:276). It is not only HIV/AIDS that is ravaging many lives, some curable diseases such Tuberculosis and Malaria continue to blight the lives of many people in the region. Furthermore, the Southern African region is characterized by high levels of unemployment (ibid). To clinch it all, the Southern African region is comparatively underdeveloped and is meeting many long and growing challenges.

What is thus needed is an approach that recognizes these challenges and addresses in a pragmatic manner by fighting these challenges on all fronts not by only looking at trade of which has proven to be difficult in the region. Since development integration, theory is human development oriented, then it augurs well for the development of the SADC region. The southern African region should not follow what the industrialized economies are doing in their regional integration efforts by liberalizing their trade anyhow. This can further marginalize the region’s weaker economies. As Van Rooyen (1998:131) succinctly puts it, “the Southern African region should approach regional integration with realism and caution.” This means it should take into consideration the social, political, ecological, and economic realities of the region and focus much on human development not trade per se.

In conclusion, this paper has assessed the three theories of regional integration on their relevance and appeal to the Southern African region. These theories are market integration, regional cooperation and development integration. On the whole, the main message that emerges from this discussion is that development integration approach is relevant and most appealing to Southern Africa. This is so because it addresses the contemporary challenges that the Southern African region is facing and that it is comprehensive.


























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