The effect of foreign direct investment on economic growth in South Africa

The effect of FDI on economic growth is not a straight jacket. Literature has shown that the effect of FDI on economic growth can be either positive or negative. The positive effects of FDI can be caused by increase in output stimulated by new technological innovations and increase in capital flows. The negative effects could result in a ‘crowding out’ effect on domestic investments, external vulnerability and dependence, destructive competition of foreign affiliates with domestic firms, and market stealing effect due to poor absorptive capacity.This treatise will attempt to shed light on the effect foreign direct investment has on economic growth in South Africa in order to ascertain whether a positive or negative relationship exists between these two variables. This study thus aims to investigate, analyse and estimate the extent to which FDI impacts economic growth in South Africa. The findings of this research will provide policymakers, commercial businesses and scholars with relevant updated theoretical and empirical results that will assist relevant government policy makers in generating effective measures of attracting FDI if it proves to be beneficial for the host country. If the results of the study prove that FDIs do not generate positive spill over effects then the policymakers are thus obliged to formulate policies that will discourage FDIs from penetrating the host country’s economy

Uneven development and scale politics in Southern Africa: what we learn from Neil Smith

Southern Africa is probably the most unevenly developed region on earth, combining the most modern technologies and an advanced working class with the world’s extremes of inequality and social militancy. The two most extreme countries, both with settler–colonial populations and accumulation processes that created durable class/race/gender distortions and extreme environmental degradation, are South Africa and Zimbabwe—both of which Neil Smith visited in 1995. His contribution to our understanding of political economy, before and after, was exemplary. We consider in this article how Smith’s theory assisted in the understanding of crisis-ridden financial markets within the framework of capital overaccumulation and intensified spatial unevenness; the politics of scale, difference and community; and the ways that class apartheid and durable racism in the two countries together fit within contemporary geopolitical economy.IS

Tasks of the African Progressive Movement

Abstract: I would like to insist that the task to achieve the fundamental social transformation of our Continent – its renaissance – belongs to the African people as a whole

Order and disorder : exploring the implications for Africa

Abstract: We need that reconstruction of that progressive voice. Without it we are not going to be able to take advantage of this new opening against unipolarity

Health and economic growth in Vista countries: An ARDL bounds test approach

The present study examined the relationship between health and economic growth in the VISTA countries (Vietnam, Indonesia, South Africa, Turkey and Argentina). The study employed time series data covering the period between 1990 and 2016. Labor and capital were incorporated in the model to form a multivariate framework. The ARDL bounds test approach was used to determine the presence of the long run relationship among the variables. The findings posited that there is long run relationship between economic growth, health, capital and labour in all the countries except for Argentina. There were mix results in terms of the long run and short estimates. It was established that in Vietnam, Indonesia and South Africa, there is evidence of a long run positive and significant relationship between economic growth and health while in Turkey a negative relationship was established. Therefore, the findings of the study have different implications for the different countries

Commodification of transformation discourses and post-apartheid institutional identities at three South African universities

Using mission statements from the UCT, UWC and Stellenbosch University (South Africa), we explore how the three universities have rematerialised prior discourses to rebrand their identities as dictated by contemporary national and global aspirations. We reveal how the universities have recontextualised the experiences and discourses of liberation struggle and the new government's post-apartheid social transformation discourses to construct distinctive identities that are locally relevant and globally aspiring. This has led to the semiotic refiguring of universities from spatial edifices of racially based unequal education, to equal opportunity institutions of higher learning, and to the blurring of historical boundaries between these universities. We conclude that the universities have reconstructed distinct and recognisable identities which speak to a segregated past, but with a post-apartheid voice of equity and redress.IS

Health and economic growth in Vista countries: An ARDL bounds test approach

The present study examined the relationship between health and economic growth in the VISTA countries (Vietnam, Indonesia, South Africa, Turkey and Argentina). The study employed time series data covering the period between 1990 and 2016. Labor and capital were incorporated in the model to form a multivariate framework. The ARDL bounds test approach was used to determine the presence of the long run relationship among the variables. The findings posited that there is long run relationship between economic growth, health, capital and labour in all the countries except for Argentina. There were mix results in terms of the long run and short estimates. It was established that in Vietnam, Indonesia and South Africa, there is evidence of a long run positive and significant relationship between economic growth and health while in Turkey a negative relationship was established. Therefore, the findings of the study have different implications for the different countries

Dynamics of Indian Ocean slavery revealed through isotopic data from the colonial era Cobern Street Burial site, Cape Town, South Africa (1750-1827)

The Dutch East India Company (VOC) intended the Cape of Good Hope to be a refreshment stop for ships travelling between the Netherlands and its eastern colonies. The indigenous Khoisan, however, did not constitute an adequate workforce, therefore the VOC imported slaves from East Africa, Madagascar and Asia to expand the workforce. Cape Town became a cosmopolitan settlement with different categories of people, amongst them a non-European underclass that consisted of slaves, exiles, convicts and free-blacks. This study integrated new strontium isotope data with carbon and nitrogen isotope results from an 18 th -19 th century burial ground at Cobern Street, Cape Town, to identify non-European forced migrants to the Cape. The aim of the study was to elucidate individual mobility patterns, the age at which the forced migration took place and, if possible, geographical provenance. Using three proxies, 87 Sr/ 86 Sr, δ 13 C dentine and the presence of dental modifications, a majority (54.5%) of the individuals were found to be born non-locally. In addition, the 87 Sr/ 86 Sr data suggested that the non-locally born men came from more diverse geographic origins than the migrant women. Possible provenances were suggested for two individuals. These results contribute to an improved understanding of the dynamics of slave trading in the Indian Ocean world

Financial development and economic growth in Brazil: A Non-linear ARDL approach

Financial intermediation through the banking system plays an important role in economic development through the allocation of savings, thus improving productivity, and ultimately increasing the rate of economic growth. This paper examines the interrelationships between financial development and economic growth using the Nonlinear Autoregressive Distributed Lag (NARDL) model for Brazil. The time component of the study’s database is 1985 – 2015 inclusive. The study focused on the banking sector and stock market indicators of financial developments. The empirical results suggest that the banking sector measures of financial development have a negative relationship with economic growth while the financial development indicators representing stock market development are positively related to economic growth. The study also established an evidence of a long run and short run asymmetric relationship between financial development and growth. The empirical results open new insights for policy makers for long run and sustainable economic development