The colonial vertical-integration trade model persists despite reoriented trading partners

Evidence

Things didn’t improve for the former African colonies after France joined the eurozone. In fact, a nasty cocktail has emerged with the ongoing currency arrangements, merging with the neoliberal austerity bias of the eurozone to further limit hopes for African prosperity. The unseemly colonial resource grab thus morphed, later, into a neoliberal regime that maintained the extraction mechanisms and increased inequality. But it was a creeping process. — Fanny Pigeaud_ Ndongo Samba Sylla, Africa’s Last Colonial Currency, 28 (#expands, via linked claim)

An evolution occurred in 1967: with the restoration of full convertibility in France, the French franc became once again freely convertible into other currencies and with it, indirectly, also the CFA franc. Since then, the franc zone no longer exists as a common monetary defence zone, but can be considered an area of ‘monetary cooperation’, whose membership entails the opening of an ‘operations account’, which we will analyse in detail. Despite this shift in France’s exchange rate policy, the general functioning of the CFA system continues to be based on four interrelated principles: the fixed exchange rate, the free movement of capital, the free convertibility of the currency and the centralisation of the foreign exchange reserves. — Fanny Pigeaud_ Ndongo Samba Sylla, Africa’s Last Colonial Currency, 96 (#exemplifies, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: French development economics inherited colonial premises about exporting African cash crops; The colonial resource grab morphed into a neoliberal regime that maintained extraction mechanisms — Fanny Pigeaud_ Ndongo Samba Sylla, Africa’s Last Colonial Currency, 28; Colonial-era monetary system survived into independence as four interlocked principles — Fanny Pigeaud_ Ndongo Samba Sylla, Africa’s Last Colonial Currency, 96 (+2 more)

Related

• Colonial-era monetary system survived into independence as four interlocked principles (similarity 0.92)
• The colonial resource grab morphed into a neoliberal regime that maintained extraction mechanisms (similarity 0.85)
• Portugal replicated France’s currency cooperation model with Cabo Verde. (similarity 0.85)
• The cooperation agreements preserved the CFA franc across former colonies. (similarity 0.85)
• Pouemi classified African currencies into four levels of monetary sovereignty. (similarity 0.84)
• France alone preserved its monetary empire after its African colonies gained independence (similarity 0.84)
• An overvalued CFA franc was engineered to reorient colonial trade toward France (similarity 0.84)
• African states have effectively paid the French Treasury to hold their reserves. (similarity 0.84)
• CFA franc’s real aims were draining colonial wealth into France, not African progress. (similarity 0.84)
• France avoided needing dollars to buy from CFA-zone countries. (similarity 0.84)
• The CFA franc persists because French and African elites both profit from it (similarity 0.83)
• The new Republic’s economic survival hinged on continued colonial aid (similarity 0.83)
• Former African colonies adopted national currencies upon independence. (similarity 0.83)
• France granted African states nominal monetary rights while denying them in practice (similarity 0.83)
• A strong CFA franc forced colonial trade to flow through metropole markets. (similarity 0.83)

Broader Connections

• The colonial resource grab morphed into a neoliberal regime that maintained extraction mechanisms #expands (0.60) — Fanny Pigeaud_ Ndongo Samba Sylla, Africa’s Last Colonial Currency, 28
• French development economics inherited colonial premises about exporting African cash crops #exemplifies (0.55)
• Colonial-era monetary system survived into independence as four interlocked principles #exemplifies (0.50) — Fanny Pigeaud_ Ndongo Samba Sylla, Africa’s Last Colonial Currency, 96