IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ebl/ecbull/eb-07c40004.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Oil rents and the tenure of the leaders in Africa

Author

Listed:
  • Omgba Luc Désiré

    (CERDI, Université d'Auvergne)

Abstract

It is often underlined that African oil producing countries are politically unstable as a result of this natural resource. Based on the data relating to the duration in office of 101 heads of States exercises of power of 26 African countries (North Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa), our study finds that: this instability does not appear in the executive branch of the state. Conversly, using survival analysis including non-parametric and parametric estimators, and controlling for many factors which affect the leader's tenure, our results suggest a positive link between oil rents and the duration in office of the leader. While other minerals rents do not appear to have the same effect. An interpretation of these results is that oil has a strategic aspect that other mining products do not have. Hence, no matter what the type of political regime is in country, the international community is tempted to exert fewer pressures for the change of the leader in an oil producing State.

Suggested Citation

  • Omgba Luc Désiré, 2007. "Oil rents and the tenure of the leaders in Africa," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 3(42), pages 1-12.
    • Handle: RePEc:ebl:ecbull:eb-07c40004
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.accessecon.com/pubs/EB/2007/Volume3/EB-07C40004A.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Paul Collier & Anke Hoeffler, 2005. "Resource Rents, Governance, and Conflict," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 49(4), pages 625-633, August.
    2. Paul Collier & Anke Hoeffler, 2004. "Greed and grievance in civil war," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 56(4), pages 563-595, October.
    3. Anke Hoeffler & Paul Collier, 2005. "Democracy and Resource Rents," Economics Series Working Papers GPRG-WPS-016, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    4. Block, Steven A., 2002. "Political business cycles, democratization, and economic reform: the case of Africa," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(1), pages 205-228, February.
    5. Benjamin Smith, 2004. "Oil Wealth and Regime Survival in the Developing World, 1960–1999," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 48(2), pages 232-246, April.
    6. Paul Collier & Anke Hoeffler, 2002. "Greed and Grievance in Civil War," Economics Series Working Papers WPS/2002-01, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    7. Fearon, James D. & Laitin, David D., 2003. "Ethnicity, Insurgency, and Civil War," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 97(1), pages 75-90, February.
    8. Geerd Wurthmann, 2006. "Working Paper 84 - Ways of Using the African Oil Boom for Sustainable Development," Working Paper Series 219, African Development Bank.
    9. Beck, Thorsten & Clarke, George & Groff, Alberto & Keefer, Philip & Walsh, Patrick, 2000. "New tools and new tests in comparative political economy - the database of political institutions," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2283, The World Bank.
    10. Paul Collier & Anke Hoeffler, 2000. "Greed and Grievance in Civil War," CSAE Working Paper Series 2000-18, Centre for the Study of African Economies, University of Oxford.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. repec:ebl:ecbull:v:3:y:2007:i:42:p:1-12 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. James D. Fearon, 2005. "Primary Commodity Exports and Civil War," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 49(4), pages 483-507, August.
    3. Bodea, Cristina & Higashijima, Masaaki & Singh, Raju Jan, 2016. "Oil and Civil Conflict: Can Public Spending Have a Mitigation Effect?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 1-12.
    4. Wegenast, Tim, 2010. "Inclusive Institutions and the Onset of Internal Conflict in Resource-rich Countries," GIGA Working Papers 126, GIGA German Institute of Global and Area Studies.
    5. John Narh, 2025. "The resource curse and the role of institutions revisited," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 27(4), pages 8187-8207, April.
    6. Yu, Jiangli & Wang, Shuo & Yang, Wantong, 2023. "Natural resources governance and geopolitical risks: A literature review and bibliometric analysis," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 86(PA).
    7. Matsumoto, Mitsuko, 2016. "Three strands of explanations on root causes of civil war in low-income and weak states in sub-Saharan Africa: Implications for education," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 1-10.
    8. Limi Kouotou, Hibrahim & Atangana Ondoa, Henri, 2023. "Africa's natural resource curse: Does the arrival of new heads of state break the spell?," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    9. Noula Armand Gilbert & Ghamsi Deffo Salomon Leroy & Mofow Neville Zoatsa, 2020. "Exploitation of Mineral Resources and Economic Growth in CEMAC: The Role of Institutions," International Journal of Business and Economic Sciences Applied Research (IJBESAR), Democritus University of Thrace (DUTH), Kavala Campus, Greece, vol. 13(2), pages 19-29, September.
    10. Robert MacCulloch & Silvia Pezzini, 2010. "The Roles of Freedom, Growth, and Religion in the Taste for Revolution," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 53(2), pages 329-358, May.
    11. Farzanegan, Mohammad Reza & Lessmann, Christian & Markwardt, Gunther, 2018. "Natural resource rents and internal conflicts: Can decentralization lift the curse?," Economic Systems, Elsevier, vol. 42(2), pages 186-205.
    12. Kjetil Bjorvatn & Alireza Naghavi, 2010. "Rent seekers in rentier states: When greed brings peace," Center for Economic Research (RECent) 039, University of Modena and Reggio E., Dept. of Economics "Marco Biagi".
    13. Ang, James B. & Gupta, Satyendra Kumar, 2018. "Agricultural yield and conflict," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 92(C), pages 397-417.
    14. Tuki, Daniel, 2023. "Violent conflict and hostility towards ethno-religious outgroups in Nigeria," SocArXiv 2er9a, Center for Open Science.
    15. Kevin K. Tsui, 2010. "Resource Curse, Political Entry, And Deadweight Costs," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(3), pages 471-497, November.
    16. Mehrdad Vahabi, 2017. "A critical survey of the resource curse literature through the appropriability lens," CEPN Working Papers 2017-14, Centre d'Economie de l'Université de Paris Nord.
    17. Horatiu A. Rus, 2012. "Environmental Depletion, Governance, and Conflict," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 78(4), pages 1305-1332, April.
    18. Mehlum, Halvor & Ove Moene, Karl, 2011. "Aggressive elites and vulnerable entrepreneurs - trust and cooperation in the shadow of conflict," Memorandum 16/2010, Oslo University, Department of Economics.
    19. Adewale Samuel Hassan & Daniel Francois Meyer & Sebastian Kot, 2019. "Effect of Institutional Quality and Wealth from Oil Revenue on Economic Growth in Oil-Exporting Developing Countries," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(13), pages 1-14, July.
    20. Andersen, Jørgen Juel & Aslaksen, Silje, 2013. "Oil and political survival," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 100(1), pages 89-106.
    21. Vusal Musayev, 2016. "Externalities in Military Spending and Growth: The Role of Natural Resources as a Channel through Conflict," Defence and Peace Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 27(3), pages 378-391, June.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;

    JEL classification:

    • C4 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods: Special Topics
    • D7 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ebl:ecbull:eb-07c40004. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: John P. Conley (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.