Pathways of Development

Abstract

This chapter offers an introduction to the main pathways of development that have taken place in Sub-Saharan Africa during the last 50 years (1960–2010). It discusses how conflicting political economy paradigms have shaped the ambiguous forms and contradictory limits of economic and social development. As it is impossible for social scientists to predict the future (our future will be based on the past but will certainly not be its exact replication), the chapter draws special attention to trajectory dynamics, with the goal of improving understanding of possible future trends.¹ Potential path-departing, path-breaking and path-creating moments of institutional innovation are investigated because they are considered important critical junctures capable of hindering or fostering future modernization steps. For the sake of clarity, a developmental pathway is defined here as a corridor or passageway of reforms, which, stemming from a specific path-departing or path-breaking moment (an incremental paradigmatic transformation or a more abrupt critical juncture), allows for the creation (path-creation) of a new course of development. To be more precise, a ‘developmental path-way’ is, in this case, a bit more than a simple linear ‘reform trajectory’ in the sense that not only are timing and sequencing of reforms examined in order to understand the possible direction of change (Pierson 2004), but also the width and the length of the transformation, whether incremental or abrupt, small or large, in the creation of a peculiar road of institutional change are studied.