Extractive Industries and Changing State Dynamics in Africa

"By focussing on the processual rather than the categorical Extractive Industries and Changing State Dynamics in Africa destabilises the narratives that have dominated thinking in policy and academic circles on the nature of Africa’s extractive industry and its interactions and role with the state. It makes an important and compelling case for looking to the negotiated, contested and contingent nature of the state, and the extractive sector." — Patience Mususa, The Nordic Africa Institute, Sweden

"Africa’s historic dependency on primary commodities is once again in focus as prices have tailed off. While the days of "Africa rising" may be over, African states continue to renegotiate their position and seek to deal with the problems and potential of natural resource endowments. The very notion of what the state is and what it should do is continually discussed and reformed, ever more so under current conditions. Under pressure from both domestic and external constituencies, the evolving functions, competences and power of the state continues to evolve – processes that are ably captured in this important volume." — Ian Taylor, Professor in International Relations and African Political Economy at the University of St Andrews, UK, and Chair Professor in the School of International Studies, Renmin University of China

"In recent years there has been a burgeoning literature on the role of extractive industries in African economies. But there are few critical analyses that probe how these industries affect state formation, particularly the relations between elites and masses. Going beyond the popular conceptions of the state in Africa, this book provides an elegant examination of the intersection among multiple actors in the extractive industries and various African states. In addition to excellent conceptual chapters, comparative perspectives from Cameroon, Ghana, Mozambique, and South Africa illuminate an area of growing academic and policy significance." — Gilbert M. Khadiagala, Jan Smuts Professor of International Relations, University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa

Extractive Industries and Changing State Dynamics in Africa, edited by Jon Schubert, Ulf Engel

and Elísio Macamo, uses various extractive industry projects from across Africa as heuristic

devices to investigate how political power and the state in Africa are being reconfigured at

the juncture of national political competition and globalised transnational capital. The

authors use extractive industry projects to explore state-making processes in the state–corporation

connection. They thus attempt to comprehend how African political agents bargain with

private capitalist actors, and hence redefine perceptions and the performance of sovereignty.

This is primarily done through the establishment of legal, regulatory and fiscal standards.

Ian Taylor (2019) REVIEW ESSAY: Understanding Africa’s -- Extractive Sector, South African Journal of International Affairs