The Imperatives of Moral Economy Considerations for Designing Industrial Policies in sub-Saharan Africa

If there is one aspect of development that analysts agree on, it is the need of industrialization for a sustainable economic growth (J. Brasseul, 1993). This paper seeks to show why we should integrate moral economy in industrialization policies. It provides some pathways to an adequate industrialization policy involving moral economy for subsaharan African countries because we consider industrialization as an essential tool for the economic, social and sustainable development of a country. James C. Scott's work on moral economy of the peasants of Southeast Asia at the beginning 1980s engaged in some researchs around economic logic and social mobilization in rural areas of developing countries. According to the response he got from farmers, the market is structured by some conception of social justice. This is what he calls an "ethics of subsistence". Here, we are building a strategy which can jointly handle agriculture, industry and social justice in term of incomes. De Janvry and Sadoulet (2010) emphasized the need for complementarity between the agriculture and industry sectors. They argued that the development of the agricultural sector can contribute to the creation of a competitive advantage in industry. There is an answer to reduce poverty in agricultural population. When agricultural production and incomes rise as a consequence of increase in agricultural productivity, it leads to increased demand for industrial consumer goods and agricultural inputs. Through their reflections, they denounced the failures of past industrial policies but do not design a new policy to address the failures. This paper proposes to fill this gap through a new strategy that focuses primarily on the growth and enrichment of agriculture, trade, and industry which impact social development by decreasing inequalities.