Governing with or against the grain? Challenges confronting African governments and foreign players in Africa’s extractives sector

ABSTRACT

This article introduces a special issue which contributes to the governance debates pertaining to the extractive sector in Africa, where the EU seeks a major role. Better governance is clearly required to meet the objectives of the Africa Mining Vision and the EU’s Raw Materials Initiative; however, there is growing recognition that better formal regulations on paper will not necessarily result in better outcomes on the ground. Greater awareness of the potential unintended negative consequences of some governance initiatives is necessary. Companies involved in natural resource extraction in African countries must consider their roles in the governance question in far deeper terms than mere corporate social responsibility or attaining a social licence to operate. Similarly, at the EU level, more attention has to be paid to what happens beyond efforts to create greater levels of transparency, especially in the effort to stop illicit financial flows.

KEYWORDS:

• African extractives
• European Union
• AMV
• RMI
• IFFs

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Ross Harvey is a senior researcher in the Governance of Africa’s Resources Programme at the South African Institute of International Affairs. His training is in Public Policy and Economics. He has specialised in extractive industry governance since 2013 and is currently awaiting the results of his PhD examination with the University of Cape Town, South Africa.

ORCID

Ross Harvey http://orcid.org/0000-0003-2385-5530

Notes

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2. On the strength of the abstracts submitted, the South African Institute of International Affairs hosted a workshop on the side-lines of the annual Investing in African Mining Indaba in Cape Town in February 2019. The workshop was designed to explore the findings of the research papers in the presence of EU Commission and AU Commission delegates, along with civil society. This also created an opportunity for delegates attending the Indaba and the Alternative Mining Indaba (AMI), which happen in parallel, to be in the same room. The event was co-funded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union, and SAIIA is grateful for its generosity. SAIIA also commends the authors, who have had to pass through a gruelling blind peer review process.

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Additional information

Funding

This special issue has been produced with the support of the European Union’s Erasmus+ Programme as a Jean Monnet Activity, through the project The European Union’s Normative Role in African Extractives Governance, implemented by the South African Institute of International Affairs. The European Commission support for the production of this publication does not constitute an endorsement of the contents which reflects the views only of the authors, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.