The Southern African Customs Union: A Reappraisal
Abstract The paper attempts to evaluate, as far as possible quantitatively, the costs and benefits to the countries of the ‘Southern African periphery’ (Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland) of participation with South Africa in the current customs union agreement. On balancing the agreement's measurable effects (on industrial development, exports, government revenue and the cost of living) against one another, it appears that on sanguine assumptions only, there would be a substantial benefit to Botswana and a much more moderate benefit to Lesotho if the customs union were dismantled and replaced by separately protected national markets. Such a calculation, however, neglects what may be the most important benefit and cost to the ‘peripheral’ countries of leaving the customs union, namely the increase of ‘economic independence’ and the risk of South African retaliation respectively: themes which are explored in the final section.
The Eldest: The Southern African Customs Union
The world’s oldest surviving customs union—the Southern African Customs Union (SACU)—located in the southern tip of Africa, has received little attention in the comparative integration literature. Celebrating its 100-year anniversary in 2010, the SACU began with plutocratic structures and then switched to intergovernmental in 2004. Until 1994, all five conditions were met. From its 1910 birth and to this day, South Africa is the clear regional plutocrat. From 1910 to 1969, it was Britain that delegated policy making to South Africa, on behalf of its three Territories. Although Britain was not undergoing an economic crisis, the Liberal Party that came to power in London in 1906 had campaigned strongly on the position that Britain should leave its colonies. The Territories would thus have faced economic collapse had Britain not found a way to fund their governments. Having South Africa set policy in exchange for administering the customs union seemed a good deal for Britain. The customs union offered easily obtained tariffs. As in the Prussian accords, this was the immediate and chief way of assessing if the member states were gaining from the customs union.
The development of biological systematics : Antoine-Laurent de Jussieu, nature, and the natural system
A reevaluation of the history of biological systematics that discusses the formative years of the so-called natural system of classification in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Shows how classifications came to be treated as conventions; systematic practice was not linked to clearly articulated theory; there was general confusion over the "shape" of nature; botany, elements of natural history, and systematics were conflated; and systematics took a position near the bottom of the hierarchy of sciences.