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The politics of adjustment in Kenya and Zimbabwe: The state as intermediary

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Abstract

In considering the selection and implementation of adjustment strategies in Africa, it is critical the analyze the role of the state as the main intermediary between international creditors and domestic societal interests. The state is at the locus of interaction with the former in identifying a debt management strategy as a means to protect state interests and with the latter in assessing and distributing the costs of adjustment. With this role of the state in mind, an adjustment strategy becomes a series of state-enacted policies that are molded by the interaction of domestic political groups and international creditors as they seek to control the costs of adjustment in a highly polticized environment. In order to identify and explain the selection of adjustment strategies in Kenya and Zimbabwe, this article examines the state's relationship with societal interests, the financing of adjustment from international creditors, and the distributive consequences of adjustment.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Political Science, University of Utah, 252 Orson Spencer Hall, 84112, Salt Lake City, UT

    Howard P. Lehman

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  1. Howard P. Lehman
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Professor Howard P. Lehman received his Ph.D. in 1987 from the University of Minnesota and is assistant professor of political science at the University of Utah. His research interests include international political economy, international debt negotiations, and African development. He has published articles on the South African political economy and the Brazilian debt rescheduling negotiations. The latter article is forthcoming next year inPolitical Science Quarterly. He is finishing a book-length manuscript entitledIndebted Development: Strategic Bargaining and Economic Adjustment in the Third World.

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Lehman, H.P. The politics of adjustment in Kenya and Zimbabwe: The state as intermediary. Studies in Comparative International Development 25, 37–72 (1990). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02687179

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