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Regional Trade Arrangements Of Africa And Their Motives Essay

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2. Regional Trade Arrangements in Africa and Their Motives Regionalism has become one of the buzz words in international trade diplomacy nowadays. There is almost no country in the world which does not have membership in one or two regional economic integrations, and the coverage and scope of these arrangements have grown more than ever before. Different authors have used different approaches to define the concept of regional integration. Therefore, it is important to discuss the definitions of economic integration according to the most prominent authors in the field of regional integration before taking on the theoretical and empirical literatures of the concept. One of the widely accepted definitions of economic integration is that of Balassa (1961), which is defined as “the abolition of discrimination within an area”. Another very important definition of economic integration relevant to developing countries is that of Kahnert, P. Richards, Stoutjesdijk, and Thomopoulos (1969). According to these authors, economic integration is “the process of progressive removal of trade discriminations which occur at national borders”. Furthermore, Machlup (1977) defines economic integration as a process of merging separate economies into a larger economic region with the objective of realizing the efficient utilization of all potential opportunities of the division of labor. From the above definitions, it can be inferred that all the definitions spin around one central point; and

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