Category: Africa

Authoritarianism and Labour Repression in the Middle East and North Africa: Reflections on the 2025 ITUC Global Rights Index

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The International Trade Union Confederation鈥檚 (ITUC) was released on 2 June. The report presents a sobering picture of escalating violations of workers鈥� rights globally. Based on data from 151 countries, the Index reports that 87% of countries violated the right to strike, 80% restricted collective bargaining, and over 70% impeded union registration or denied access to justice. These trends, the report argues, reflect a 鈥渃oup against democracy鈥濃�攁n ongoing assault on core labour rights driven by repressive governments, emboldened corporations, and a broader authoritarian and conflict-ridden global capitalism.

The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region once again emerges as the most repressive in the Index (with an overall score of 4.68; a score of 5 indicates no guarantee of rights), with all countries in the region found to have violated fundamental rights to organise and collectively bargain, as well as registration of unions. The right to strike was suppressed in 95% of countries in the region, while over half of MENA states arbitrarily arrested or detained workers (p.28). The list of the ten worst countries for working people is composed mainly of Global South countries, with MENA cases including Egypt, Tunisia, and T眉rkiye. Over the past few years, my research has focused on the political economy and labour relations of these three countries[i], and below I briefly discuss them with insights drawn from the ITUC report.

However, before turning to these cases, it is important to highlight some potential limitations or problems in the ITUC report. While its findings are grounded in substantial and credible documentation, the non-contextualised regional framing of the Global Rights Index risks reproducing a familiar issue regarding the Middle East: the tendency to isolate MENA as uniquely authoritarian or culturally predisposed to repression. By highlighting MENA as the 鈥渨orst region鈥� without sufficiently situating its labour regimes within broader historical and structural dynamics, the Index could be seen to implicitly (albeit unintentionally) reinforce exceptionalist interpretations that have long shaped conventional understandings of the region.

When considering the Global South in general, and the MENA region in particular, we must not overlook the dynamics inherent to uneven capitalist development, such as persistent global and regional inequalities, the imperatives of cheap labour in hierarchical global production networks, IFI conditionalities, and the long-term consequences of war, occupation, and imperialist intervention. In countries like Egypt and Tunisia, and historically in Turkey, for example, the role of the IMF and World Bank in shaping labour markets through austerity, privatisation, and deregulation has been central to the weakening of collective rights. The region is also the most unequal in the world by income and wealth, according to the 鈥攁 fact that reinforces the political utility of repressing labour as a force of potential redistribution and mobilisation.

While specific political regimes certainly shape labour practices, and domestic political agency is not insignificant, these conditions should not be viewed as 鈥榓nomalies鈥� within an otherwise democratic capitalism. That countries like the United States and the United Kingdom (major centres of 鈥榣iberal democratic capitalism鈥�) are both rated as systematically violating workers鈥� rights (with a score of 4, p.21) should caution against any simplistic division between 鈥渁uthoritarian鈥� and 鈥渄emocratic鈥� regimes under capitalism. Rather, what we are witnessing is a global pattern of labour repression under crisis-ridden global capitalism.

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Renewing Dependency Theory: The Case of Walter Rodney

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The failure of mainstream development policy to deliver on the promise of eradicating global poverty is increasingly difficult to deny (World Bank 2024). As a result, theories of global development are opening to alternative and critical approaches. In this context there has been a renewal of interest in dependency theory as a rich heterodox tradition of political economy (Kvangraven 2021; Chilcote and Sal茅m Vasconcelos 2022; Antunes de Oliveira and Kvangraven 2024). In a , I turned to one of the foundational scholars of dependency, Walter Rodney (1942-1980), to work through some of the strengths and limits of dependency theory for contemporary studies (Johnson 2023).

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Back to the White Elephants 鈥� the West鈥檚 new development strategy in Africa

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“Europe鈥檚 new external investment strategy needs to reconnect with historical business models we are going back to white elephants of 1970s 鈥� because that鈥檚 what partners want“

– G7 official in a speech on Trade and Finance.

“The era of Western dominance has indeed definitely ended“

– Josep Borrell (2024).听

On 28 January 2024, three members of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso, announced their withdrawal from ECOWAS.  Created in 1974, ECOWAS is a regional economic community serving as a large trading bloc, to enhance the regional integration and economic cooperation of its 15 member countries.  The three countries鈥� decision to leave the trade-bloc so forthrightly, was related to a series of ECOWAS-imposed sanctions on their military governments and the countries鈥� objection to French influence in the bloc. Long-standing dissatisfaction with the ECOWAS was also an overarching factor; member countries include some of the most resource-rich nations, but on the whole members barely made any progress on socio-economic indicators linked to the ECOWAS promise of prosperity through regional integration.

Political uncertainty in the trade-bloc further deteriorated in mid-February 2024, when the Senegalese President Macky Sall, unilaterally postponed the country鈥檚 presidential elections and was later ousted. Faced with such existential challenges, ECOWAS lifted sanctions on Niger and other countries within a month of their imposition. While the potential breakdown of ECOWAS and the general trajectory of some African countries into authoritarianism, may not seem like a radical shift in the continent鈥檚 history, the incendiary global context, which compelled ECOWAS to lift sanctions is unprecedented. The neo-colonial drivers of the current crumbling political order in Sudan and the Congo as well as the ongoing genocide in Palestine, indelibly expose the reality that we are entering into an era of naked colonial violence. Backlash to US-centred imperialism is growing. In March 2024, Niger suspended all military relations with the US, citing issues related to US encroachment upon its sovereignty. Embedded in this evolving situation, the episodic and ad-hoc de-linking of Global South countries from Global North countries and their dominance in blocs such as the ECOWAS is representative of a broader shift in Africa鈥檚 resistance against political and economic subordination to G7 countries.

Against this background, the Western powers鈥� new and evolving development strategy in Africa offers important insights into how the G7 countries are failing to register the transformative changes in Africa.  In a closed-door speech on investment, trade and finance forum, a G7 official described Europe鈥檚 new external investment strategy as one that harkens back to the White elephants of the 1970s. While the speaker was using the term 鈥榃hite Elephant鈥� to signify the EU鈥檚 interest in funding hard infrastructure, imbued with a promise of investment and growth for recipient countries, he clearly failed to grasp its meaning. A 鈥榳hite elephant鈥� is an overly expensive infrastructure asset, which fails to generate value for the economy.

Considered in light of the correct definition of the term, the West鈥檚 new development strategy does seem to be going towards expensive infrastructure projects, spurred by a reactionary, performative but ultimately imagined competition with China. I make this point through a comparative analysis between the G7s contemporary development strategy vis-脿-vis the Chinese development model as it unfolds within the broader demise of US-led imperialism.

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The white saviour industrial complex and global AI governance

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In the realm of听, the 鈥榳hite saviour鈥� trope has long been a subject of听. This phenomenon, often rooted in colonialist attitudes, positions Western individuals or entities as benevolent rescuers of non-Western communities, usually without acknowledging or addressing systemic multidimensional inequalities, colonial/racial privilege, and local agency of indigenous communities. The white saviour complex has not only perpetuated听听but has also听听the efforts and voices of those it claims to help.

As artificial intelligence (AI) has emerged as a global force to potentially , we see a new manifestation of the white saviour industrial complex within emerging global AI governance.

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Copper and Economic Sovereignty

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By Robrecht Declercq & Duncan Money

7 January 1968 was a day of celebration across the Congolese Copperbelt, marked with marches and festivities in the mining towns, bonuses for mineworkers and medals for those who had labored many years in the industry. All this marked the one-year anniversary of the foundation of G茅camines, the state-owned company that was established when the Congolese government nationalized the operations of Union Mini猫re du Haut Katanga (UMHK).

Early in 1967, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) had decided to nationalize the largest and most powerful colonial company that still operated on its soil, after a dispute about where the headquarters of the company should reside. But deeper concerns stemmed from the fact that a former colonial business still controlled the most important natural treasures of the newly independent Congo. The Congolese had high hopes that the new company would propel economic growth through significant expansion of production. Ultimately, these hopes met with bitter disappointment.

It was not only Congolese people who entertained such hopes, however. What happened in Congo was part of what we term a post-colonial world of copper (1960-1980) in our edited collection . The book is a history of the global production of copper, its labour relations, technologies and the international political economy across the 19th and 20th century. The transition, and ultimately, failure of this unique albeit brief episode of postcolonial control is one of the focuses of the book. We assert that the national fragmentation of copper production in the postcolonial world, was in fact deeply intertwined with transnational influences and exchanges. It expressed an agenda that was shared in the Global South: to straighten out the huge economic imbalances with the Global North.

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Where is Ethiopia going after the deal with the IMF?

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The agreement recently negotiated between the Government of Ethiopia and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) not only imposes austerity on the government, but also risks destroying the country鈥檚 model of economic development.

Ethiopia, Africa鈥檚 second-most populous country, has featured tremendous progress in its economic development in the past twenty years. A developmental state driving public investment while imposing tight regulations on the financial sector, a managed exchange rate, and capital controls, achieved a significant decline in hunger and malnutrition, and improvements in literacy and other relevant human development indicators.

Nonetheless, Ethiopia is facing serious macroeconomic challenges including high inflation of close to 30 percent, a current account deficit, foreign exchange shortage, and slowing growth, jointly with domestic conflicts and climate change impacts. This situation has forced the country into negotiations with creditors on its external debt, even though Ethiopia鈥檚 external debt stock compared to GDP is less compared to other low-income countries. International financial institutions see government budget deficits as the main culprit in causing inflation and an overvalued real exchange rate that causes trade deficits and balance-of-payments problems while crowding out private investment in the country. End of July 2024, the Government of Ethiopia and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) concluded an agreement on policy action to be taken for a stepwise release of a loan of USD 3.4 billion from the IMF, starting with the immediate release of USD 1 billion, as well as additional grants and loans from the World bank. The agreement is built on the following : 1) floating the exchange rate; 2) modernizing the monetary policy framework going from reserve targeting to interest rate targeting; 3) ending monetary financing of the government budget via the National Bank of Ethiopia (NBE) and exiting financial repression; 4) improving mobilization of domestic government revenues; 5) debt restructuring with external creditors; 6) strengthening the financial position of state-owned enterprises.

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The state in Africa is a colonial state

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Map of Africa from 1583

The default unit of analysis for many economists when dealing with national economics is the state. Yet, in economics textbooks 鈥榯he state鈥� is often assumed to be a neutral actor exogenous to economic processes. It is assumed to be the same 鈥� in essence – everywhere. This conception is based on a Eurocentric view of the state, which assumes all states are ahistorical Westphalian nation states based on Enlightenment principles. However, states are not neutral, but deeply shaped by historical processes. Analyses of 鈥榮tates鈥� in economics – country analyses, country data, evaluations of so-called 鈥榤acroeconomic fundamentals鈥� – must be rethought by taking the complexities of the state in Africa into account in their conceptualisations, analyses and policy proposals. In this piece, I unpack how the African state evolved as a colonial project and the implications of it being mischaracterized as neutral state.

A state like no other

The state in Africa has been mischaracterized as a neutral institution devoid of a problematic history which affects its present. In its simplest terms, the state is an institution of governing, i.e., a political organization whose main aim is to establish and maintain security, law and order within its geographic jurisdiction. In economics, the state is discussed and perceived as a one size-fit-all institution, one that is and must be similar in Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas. The African state, in particular, has been presented as if it is similar to other states, especially in Europe and the United States of America to which it must aspire.

Moreover, the African has been evaluated and judged on the basis of other perceived progressive states, especially those on the western hemisphere. That states are the same is both untrue, misleading, and ahistorical. African states are very different from other states as they are products of conquest, colonialism, genocides, epistemicides and slavery. It was created to support these processes and it still dispenses them mainly through violence. Those who colonised African countries did so not only to access markets and raw materials, but to displace epistemologies and decentre the colonized; and in the process they centered the colonising countries as the centre of knowledge production and essence of humanity. This is the origin of the superiority of liberal economics as the dominant way of understanding and doing economics in Africa.

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On recentring people鈥檚 voices to decolonise FinTech narratives

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In 2009, I was interested in studying the phenomenon of M-Pesa as a legal scholar鈥攋ust a year after its launch and intense rollout. My standpoint enabled me to see the initial regulatory paradoxes that M-Pesa presented. In 2010, I began my PhD, exploring what a regulatory framework should look like. My analysis focused on the complexities presented by the storage and transfer of customer funds within mobile money systems. Central to were themes of financial regulation, consumer rights, financial stability, conceptualising 鈥榝inancial inclusion鈥�, and the meaning of 鈥榖anking the unbanked鈥�. At the time, the study was significant, in understanding the contractual tensions between mobile money users and Safaricom, a non-bank entity, which provided services akin to a traditional bank鈥檚 deposit system鈥攜et did not appear to be subject to the same regulatory restraints as conventional banks. Crucially, banks and financial institutions had historically dominated much of the financial system, through practices due to colonialism. Therefore, M-Pesa caused much upheaval to established banks, but simultaneously provided hope for the excluded. Various actors extended this new hope, in the 鈥榮uccess鈥� narrative of M-Pesa. Its beneficial use as a storage and transfer system was extolled as , and the restatement of its trajectory was and continues to be modelled across the developing world. The global development and digitalisation agenda have subsumed M-Pesa鈥檚 pervasive influence, both valorising the pathways to 鈥榙evelopment鈥� and 鈥榠nnovation鈥� through FinTech with a singular aim of 鈥榝inancial inclusion.鈥�

As a result, Kenya has become the site of contestation for overwhelming empirical research, interest, and knowledge production, particularly by Western scholars and institutions. A 鈥榞old rush鈥� has emerged, and the scramble for knowledge extraction has intensified across academic disciplines and across methodologies. Studies from Ghana, Senegal and Kenya dominate. The study of 鈥榙evelopment鈥� in all its iterations has gained a new development. However, much of the ways in which mobile money (M-Pesa) and FinTech are discussed and framed demonstrates a Western understanding of the everyday lives of the Kenyans who use it. Scholars, activists, and proponents often situate the premise of its use as being between two paradigms: advancing through the enhancement of global development aims, and its function as a tool that includes Kenyans in extractive cycles of financialisation. Both of these are true.

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