Browsing by Author "Esterhuyse, Harrie Willie"

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    African regional economic communities engagement with China
    (2014-09) Esterhuyse, Harrie Willie; Cisse, Daouda; Anthony, Ross; Burgess, Meryl
    The development of effective African Regional Economic Communities (RECs) stands to benefit African countries immensely. Transnational free trade regions, single customs unions, single markets, single currencies and other forms of political and economic integration have the potential to strengthen both inter-regional and international trade as well as creating more robust solutions to issues of food, climate, health and political security. Nevertheless, implementation has proved a formidable challenge: lack of adequate economic and political structures, institutions and policies has impeded progress. The ability to strengthen many aspects of RECs are up to member states: agreeing on a set of political and socio-economic strategic priorities at the core of regional integration, implementing mechanisms for cooperation and integration as well as ensuring compliance are all challenges which need to be negotiated internally. A crucial aspect is formulating coherent policy on how to engage with external actors. Along with the European Union and the United States of America, China is now an undeniably influential actor with regards to all African RECs. With a co-ordinated China policy, RECs can effectively foster regional integration through both increased trade capacity and infrastructural development. This policy brief focuses on three RECs - SADC (Southern African Development Community); ECOWAS (Economic Community of West African States) and the EAC (East African community) – as illustration of how Chinese investment has been harnessed.
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    A comparative study of governance and state development in post-colonial Botswana and Zaire/ DRC
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2012-03) Esterhuyse, Harrie Willie; De Jager, N.; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Political Science.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The aim of this research was to explore the interaction between governance and development in post-colonial Africa. The departure point of the thesis was the understanding that the state remains a pre-eminent actor in the international system. Keeping this assumption in mind, the study made use of a comparative analysis; comparing governance and development in Botswana with governance and development in Zaire/the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), focusing on the post-colonial era. The importance of this research lies in its contribution to the debate on the role of the state in post-colonial Africa. It explores the influence of institution formation and policy implementation by governments (in other words, governance) on development. Understanding the effect of governance on development can have invaluable lessons for other African states in their efforts to develop further. The research question, which guided the thesis thus, was: in the era of the pre-eminence of the state, making use of a comparison between Botswana and Zaire/DRC, what is the influence and effect, of state institution formation and policy implementation (governance) by governments, on state development in terms of economical-, political- and social development? The two main variables were governance and development. Development was sub-divided into three indicators: political, economic and social development. Governance was evaluated in terms of being seen as poor or good governance, as per the World Bank’s definition and understanding of governance. Zaire/DRC, as an example of a failed state, was analysed first, followed by Botswana, selected for its arguably “best practice” experience. For each country the analysis was subdivided into three phases as per the theoretical framework of Chazan, Lewis, Mortimer, Rothchild, and Stedman’s book, Politics and Society in Contemporary Africa (1999). Their book describes three stages of change in African state development in the post-colonial era (Chazan-framework). This framework uses the Chazan-framework and thus subdivides the post-colonial era into: the concentration (centralisation) phase, the elaboration phase, and finally the reconsideration of state power phase. The research found that Zaire/DRC followed a process of state collapse in the post-colonial era, whereas in sharp contrast Botswana experienced positive state development. Since independence Zaire continuously practised poor governance whilst Botswana largely practiced good governance. This was true in all three phases of the Chazan-framework. At the same time, or perhaps due to poor governance, Zaire continuously experienced negative development in all three development categories whilst Botswana continuously experienced positive development in all three development categories, again perhaps due to good governance. The research concludes that even though Botswana is not necessarily an example of a perfect state, it is special in an African context, because of its good governance record. This study does not draw direct relationships between good governance and development, but finds that Botswana probably benefited greatly in development due to the implementation of good institutions, good government policies and general good governance. The research also found that states benefit when their governments practice and adopt policies that are anti-corruption, pro-democracy, pro-competition, pro public-private partnerships, and pro market-orientated economics. In addition, the following are also conducive to good governance: leadership with integrity, peaceful and regular leadership changes, clear distinction between government (party) and the state, and empowered government oversight institutions that act, even against the government itself when needed. The practice of good governance is thus shown to be supportive of long-term development.
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    Understanding the societal impact of research through productive interactions and realist theory-based evaluation: Select cases of agricultural research in South Africa
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2019-12) Esterhuyse, Harrie Willie; Boshoff, Nelius; Mouton, Johann; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Geography & Environmental Studies.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The study explored the concept of societal impact of research (SoIR) in four agricultural research projects in South Africa, as well as in a survey of the two commodity companies that funded those projects. Three objectives guided the study: (1) to investigate the SoIR by focussing on the productive interactions and effects as identified through the SIAMPI approach; (2) to use the logic of realist evaluation to assign value to productive interactions by using them to build theories of change, impact pathways and indirectly context-mechanism-outcome (CMO) configurations; and (3) to view the productive interactions and effects through the lens of research impact literacy. The study relied on four conceptual underpinnings, namely the SIAMPI approach, realist evaluation, theories of change and impact literacy. The SIAMPI approach uses productive interactions to understand the effecting of research impact. Realist evaluation is concerned with understanding social programmes through CMO configurations. Theories of change are instruments that visualise the logic of how a programme builds impact. Lastly impact literacy looks at how impact works through the combination of ‘what’ is being aimed for (final impact), ‘how’ it is to be achieved, and ‘who’ will be engaging in activities to achieve ‘what’. The research followed an exploratory sequential mixed methods design, comprising three phases. In the first phase, four agricultural research projects, funded by the two commodity companies, were selected as case studies. As part of the case study execution, semi-structured interviews were conducted with case study participants. Project-specific documents were also collected and analysed. From these productive interactions were identified. The second phase involved the development of a theory of change for each of the four case studies, built from the productive interactions. From the theories of change, research impact pathways were identified. Follow-up semi-structured interviews with the primary investigators were used to validate the accuracy of the theories of change and to explore the impact pathways further. The third phase of the research made use of the theories of change, coupled with the concept of impact literacy, to explore the understanding of SoIR among research funders. A survey was used to assess research funders’ views on SoIR. The findings were used to develop a Classification framework for research impact and to show the viability of building CMO configurations from the data produced through SIAMPI. It was found that productive interactions can be used to develop coherent visualisations of research processes through theories of change. This showed that it is possible to make use of SIAMPI as a method within realist evaluation, though it is not recommended due to the myriad of possible different productive interactions that would need to be tested. Arguably most importantly the research showed that CMO configurations applicable to research can be constructed based on information gathered through the SIAMPI method. Productive interactions can be used to build an understanding of the context in which research impact is effected (along with the outcomes and impacts) allowing for the development of CMO configurations. Finally, the research produced the Classification framework for research impact. It provides a novel way of ‘defining’ research impact. The research recommends that, based on the value of productive interactions demonstrated in the dissertation, funders of research should consider including instruments in research reporting that are able to capture research interactions.