Recommended Reading for Some African Leaders

A number of nations on the African continent have been independent for half a century now. In that time, very few of these nations have had an unbroken series of hand over of political authority. Also instructive is that a good number of the individuals with economic clout have an existing or past connection with the governments. Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson have a book that explains by trawling through history how and why societies have generated economic prosperity and political stability. In their view, societies are either extractive or inclusive. Extractive societies are those in which political institutions channel power and wealth from the majority towards the minority while inclusive institutions exist where there is pluralism that allows for participation in public affairs and reduces monopoly in both markets or political power.

"However, in most cases of sub-Saharan Africa and many in Asia, the post-independence governments simply took a page out of Robert Michel's book and repeated and intensified the abuses of their predecessors, often severely narrowing the distribution of political power, dismantling constraints, and undermining the already meager incentives that economic institutions provided for investment and economic progress."  In, Why Nations Fail, Pages 112-113.