Botswana A Modern Economic History

Together with Mauritius, Botswana is often categorized as one of two growth miracles in sub-Saharan Africa. Due to its spectacular long-run economic performance and impressive social development, it has been termed both an economic success story and a developmental state. While there is uniqueness in the Botswana experience, several aspects of the country’s opportunities and challenges are of a more general nature. Throughout its history, Botswana has been both blessed and hindered by its natural resource abundance and dependency, which have influenced growth periods, opportunities for economic diversification, strategies for sustainable economic and social development, and the distribution of incomes and opportunities. Through a political economy framework, Hillbom and Bolt provide an updated understanding of an African success story, covering the period from the mid-19th century, when the Tswana groups settled, to the present day. Understanding the interaction over time between geography and factor endowments on the one hand, and the development of economic and political institutions on the other, offers principle lessons from Botswana’s experience to other natural resource rich developing countries.

Essay from the year 2007 in the subject Politics - International Politics - Region: Africa, grade: 78, Stellenbosch Universitiy, course: Comparative Political Economy, language: English, abstract: Botswana is described as the "African miracle" (Samatar, 1999), as an "exception" (Good, 1992), or as "a rare example of an African state that used its bonanza of mineral riches wisely" (Meredith, 2006:285). However, critique verbalized by Taylor (2003) and Good (1992) has shown that Botswana's economic history is not a pure success story; even it illustrates a positive example of African development compared to almost all the other African countries. To analyze Botswana's economic history I will date back to the beginning of the 1900s. At this time, Botswana's eight main chiefdoms dominated regional African trade. The indigenous elite welcomed trade with European settlers who arrived in this period. While Botswana's neighbor countries experienced the process of incorporation into the modern world-economy already, Botswana started to shift into the external arena of the global economy. This essay will show how Botswana is and has incorporated into the modern worldeconomy referred to Immanuel Wallerstein's modern world-system theory. I will start with an overview about Botswana's actual trade situation to be able to locate the country within the global division of labor. Afterwards the paper analyses the history of Botswana's shift into the external arena of the modern world-system followed by its incorporation. Furthermore, I will illustrate Botswana's economic development since the incorporation. A second part of Botswana's history deals with the economy-based class structure and how it shaped the political history since Botswana achieved political independence in 1966. I will argue that the class structure, as already indicated, has to be understood in the context of pre-colonial and colonial development. After all, I will point out what important contemporary political-

Together with Mauritius, Botswana is often categorized as one of two growth miracles in sub-Saharan Africa. Due to its spectacular long-run economic performance and impressive social development, it has been termed both an economic success story and a developmental state. While there is uniqueness in the Botswana experience, several aspects of the country’s opportunities and challenges are of a more general nature. Throughout its history, Botswana has been both blessed and hindered by its natural resource abundance and dependency, which have influenced growth periods, opportunities for economic diversification, strategies for sustainable economic and social development, and the distribution of incomes and opportunities. Through a political economy framework, Hillbom and Bolt provide an updated understanding of an African success story, covering the period from the mid-19th century, when the Tswana groups settled, to the present day. Understanding the interaction over time between geography and factor endowments on the one hand, and the development of economic and political institutions on the other, offers principle lessons from Botswana’s experience to other natural resource rich developing countries.

Economic and social development, political development, Botswana - history, independence, local governments, land tenure, water supply, livestock, rural development, political system, political partys, foreign policy, Africa south of Sahara, regional cooperation trends. References, statistical tables.

A new edition of the leading textbook on the economic history of Britain since industrialization. Combining the expertise of more than thirty leading historians and economists, Volume 2 tracks the development of the British economy from late nineteenth-century global dominance to its early twenty-first century position as a mid-sized player in an integrated European economy. Each chapter provides a clear guide to the major controversies in the field and students are shown how to connect historical evidence with economic theory and how to apply quantitative methods. The chapters re-examine issues of Britain's relative economic growth and decline over the 'long' twentieth century, setting the British experience within an international context, and benchmark its performance against that of its European and global competitors. Suggestions for further reading are also provided in each chapter, to help students engage thoroughly with the topics being discussed.

The development of Tswana 'merafe' (kingdoms) and the arrival of Christianity and colonialism -- Tswana consolidation within the colonial State: development of a postcolonial State embryo -- Cattle, diamonds and the "grand coalition"--The State and indigenous authority structures : ambiguities of co-optation and confrontation -- Tswana domination, minority protests and the discourse of development -- Anti-politics and questions of democracy and domination -- Governmentalization of the State: on State interventions in the population -- Escalating inequality: popular reactions to political leaders.

Why has Africa remained persistently poor over its recorded history? Has Africa always been poor? What has been the nature of Africa's poverty and how do we explain its origins? This volume takes a necessary interdisciplinary approach to these questions by bringing together perspectives from archaeology, linguistics, history, anthropology, political science, and economics. Several contributors note that Africa's development was at par with many areas of Europe in the first millennium of the Common Era. Why Africa fell behind is a key theme in this volume, with insights that should inform Africa's developmental strategies.

"The first volume of The Cambridge Economic History of the Modern World traces the emergence of modern economic growth in eighteenth century Britain and its spread across the globe. Focusing on the period from 1700 to 1870, a team of leading experts in economic history offer a series of regional studies from around the world, as well as thematic analyses of key factors governing the differential outcomes in different parts of the global economy. Topics covered include population and human development, capital and technology, geography and institutions, living standards and inequality, international flows of trade and labour, the international monetary system, and war and empire"--

Essay from the year 2013 in the subject Politics - Topic: Globalization, Political Economics, grade: 1,0, Indiana University (Department of Political Science), course: Politics of International Development, language: English, abstract: Botswana is a landlocked country in southern Africa with a population of about 2 million people. It used to be one of the poorest countries in Africa, but after it gained independence from the United Kingdom in 1966, it went on a transformation to a middle-income country with a per capita GDP of $16,800 in 2012 (cf. Central Intelligence Agency 2013). Today, Botswana is a multi-ethnic and multi-party representative democracy with “inclusive institutions” and the least corrupt country in Sub-Saharan Africa (cf. Transparency International 2012). It is ranked by Freedom House as “Free” and has a very high HIV rate of 24.8%. Botswana has been framed as an exceptional economic success story in Africa and the following essay will explore whether institutions are the only cause of Botswana’s economic success and if Botswana is experiencing modern economic growth.