Previous page | New search |
The free AfricaBib App for Android is available here
Periodical article | Leiden University catalogue | WorldCat |
Title: | African socialist ideologies and the IMF policies for economic development: the case of Zambia |
Author: | Mijere, Nsolo N.J. |
Year: | 1988 |
Periodical: | The African Review: A Journal of African Politics, Development and International Affairs (ISSN 0856-0056) |
Volume: | 15 |
Issue: | 1 |
Pages: | 41-59 |
Language: | English |
Notes: | biblio. refs., ills. |
Geographic terms: | Zambia Central Africa |
Subjects: | socialism IMF economic policy Economics, Commerce African socialism International Monetary Fund economic development |
Abstract: | This paper discusses the implications of the capitalist structures of dominance for African socialism, and the implications of International Monetary Fund (IMF) policies for the economic restructuring of African socialist economic developmental policies. The study focuses on the IMF conditions imposed on Zambian socialism. Does the Zambian government have to dismantle its twenty-year old socialist economic policies to earn IMF loans? Can Zambia pursue IMF conditions for economic restructuring to qualify for IMF loans and yet remain a socialist country? The year 1985 will be remembered as a watershed for Zambian socialism. Several capitalist instruments proposed by the IMF, such as the auctioning system, the decontrol of prices and bank interest rates and control of wages were introduced. Furthermore, government control on the economy was loosened. The author concludes that the 1985 restructuring of the Zambian economy has meant the reintroduction of a capitalist political economy, and that the fundamental instrument undermining Zambian socialism was the auctioning of foreign exchange, which has eroded the buying power of workers. Ref. |