The Importance Of Economic Liberalism In Africa

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“Prosperity requires liberty: to be productive we must be free”.
- Wollstein, Jarret B.-
According to Woodward (1992) Economic liberalism encompasses the processes, including government policies, that promote free trade, deregulation, elimination of subsidies, price controls and rationing systems, and, often, the downsizing or privatization of public services.
With empirical evidences, reputable organizations, experts and erudite scholars have written a vast body of literature on economic liberalism as a fundamental tool for economic growth and prosperity. Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson in their fact-based book, Why Nations Fail, noted that developed countries such as the United States, Japan, the United Kingdom; developed by liberalizing …show more content…

People in economically free societies live longer. They have better health. They are able to be better stewards of the environment, and they push for¬ward the frontiers of human achievement in sci¬ence and technology through greater innovation”
Africa is one of the world’s most endowed continents with abundant human and natural resources. She is the second-largest and second most populous continent on earth with an estimated population of 1.033 billion people. There are practically vital mineral deposits and abundant workforce in all the nations of the continent. Despite all these enviable endowments, most African countries languish at the bottom of the World Bank’s “Doing Business” index. Its reason being the low level of economic liberalization within the continent.
DIGGING DEEEP: THE ANCHILLES HEELS OF RESTRICTED …show more content…

It is the reason why an African will spend a whopping amount of money and valuable time to process traveling documents before entering a neighboring African nation for business transactions. It is the reason why farmers can’t afford to go through the ineffable rigors of exporting their products and make good living, thereby discouraging agriculture. It is the reason why the industries have been deprived the gains of comparative advantage. It is the wet bucket which has dampened the innovative and zealous spirit of prospective entrepreneurs as they don’t have money to acquire mountainous and most times irrelevant documents required by government before establishing business in the continent. It is the reason for the low level of foreign investment in the continent as a result of uncertainties in business rules and frameworks created by Keynesian politicians who are in dire need of their name in daily tabloids without considering the impact of such policies on entrepreneurs and industrialists. All these accumulate to high rate of unemployment, poverty and underdevelopment in the

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