Process
Status Items Output None Questions None Claims None Highlights Done See section below
Highlights
id576815889
While the CFA franc provides some economic order and interstate financial convenience, its value, inflation-rate, and volatility are determined by the behavior of people playing in markets on a completely different continent. The absence of monetary sovereignty within the region puts constraints on the kinds of domestic policies that local governments can pursue. In 2019, the Brookings Institution, a conservative think tank, conceded that although the CFA franc ensured currency stability, it limited intra-regional trade, encouraging the emergence of economies reliant on the export of primary commodities, and made more difficult the development of an independent industrial policy.
✏️ An example of colonial power long after the colonist leaves. Monetary dependence is a powerful one that forces a nation to make deals with its colonizer instead of becoming self-sufficient and self-reliant (or reliant together with the local region of countries) 🔗 View Highlight
id576815882
French security in exchange for CFA loyalty is the tacit geopolitical agreement here, but the former colonial power has long failed to uphold its side of the bargain and quell the unrest in the remote regions of the Sahel. As a result, governments fall to coups, and French troops are forced to withdraw, as they did in Mali and Burkina Faso. As a result, regional powers turn to Russia and the Wagner Group for security.