Abstract
Africa is a continent that is divided by many countries, literally. It is one of the most tumultuous places in the planet thanks to the numerous eruptions of civil wars and episodes of unrest just in the past decades. That number only increases if the timeframe gets adjusted to the past hundreds of years. Africa and countries within it like Nigeria are rich in natural resources. However, because of the long history and apparently unstoppable occurrence of civil wars and other forms of armed conflict, they are prevented from benefiting from that advantage. In this paper, the author discusses and answers the question on how conflict impedes development in Africa as a whole and Nigeria on a smaller scale, emphasizing the economic aspect. The hypothesis is that economic development gets derailed as a result of conflict mainly because investors want a stable and peaceful environment where they could do their business, something which countries like Nigeria consistently fail to offer.
Background and Introduction
Africa is technically one of the most instable continents in the planet. It has been riddled with decades of death, conflict, and tragedy . This is one of the major reasons why countries in the African continent are taken for granted by the international community when it comes to financing for economic development and aid.
The strength of the western democratic countries’ private sector relies on continuous development by means of strong bilateral partnerships between a host country and an investing party . A multinational corporation looking into expanding its business overseas, for example, would have to be able to forge a stable and trust-based relationship with the government of the host country, or in this case Nigeria or any other country in Africa. This serves as a form of assurance that any investment the multinational corporation may pour into the country would simply not go to waste just because of a misunderstanding or in the case of Nigeria, political strife and conflict.
Some of the conflicts involving Nigeria in the past one hundred years include, but may not be limited to the Congo Crisis, the Nigerian Civil War, the First Liberian Civil War, the Sierra Leone Civil War, the war in the Niger Delta, the Boko Haram Insurgency, and the war in Northern Mali . It can be noted that majority of the conflicts were civil wars within or at least involving Nigeria. This only shows how incapable the government has been in maintaining peace and stability within and around the country, something which has always been deemed important by local and foreign investors. The truth is that no one would one to setup a business or expand into a country that is constantly under threat of civil war and unrest and one of the best examples of this is Nigeria .
Literature Review
According to a report published by the African Bank in 2008, the consequences of conflict in Africa, involving Nigeria, can be systemic. It affects the countries’ social, economic, political, and cultural systems, not to mention the unnecessary deaths that ensue. Legacy effects have also been discussed; suggesting that wars affect people’s lives even long after the fighting has already stopped. Among the more specific consequences of political strife and conflict they mentioned in the report were violence, displacement, and death . In a separate report published by the United Nations Environment Program (2016), it focused on the long and short term effects of armed conflict in African countries like Nigeria, citing that “conflict impacts human well-being reducing quality of life, the capabilities of people to live the kinds of lives the value, and the real choices they have” . In this paper, however, the author focuses more on the economic consequences of conflicts in countries like Nigeria. Shah (2010) in a global issues report that she authored suggested that conflicts in African countries create a positive feedback mechanism that only leads to further conflicts which in turn leads to even higher levels of impedance on economic development .
Research Questions
This proposed study aims to address the open ended research question on “how conflict impedes development in Africa”. As mentioned earlier, economic development would be the focus although other tenets of development may also be touched provided that relationships between such tenets and economic development may be identified.
Methodology
The proposed study is intended to make use of a qualitative research design. A systematic review of previously published literatures would be conducted. The individual studies that would be used in the review should be directly related to the existing topic. No publication date-based filters are to be utilized in the selection of previously published studies because some of the best and most reliable sources have been published some ten to even more than two decades ago, which makes sense considering how long the history of conflicts in countries like Nigeria has already been. The main purpose of utilizing this kind of methodology is to have a more holistic understanding of the effects of conflict on the development in Nigeria and other African countries. As a result of the study, the author would most likely be able to find the root causes of the conflicts as he finds the interconnections between one conflict and another. Finally, the author would generate conclusions based on the review that was conducted. The resulting conclusion would most likely be reliable considering how only academic and peer-reviewed sources were used in the study.
Conclusions
Bibliography
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