Incidence de l'ouverture économique et de la libéralisation financière des pays de la Communauté Économique des États de l'Afrique de l'Ouest sur leurs activités économiques[Impact of economic openness and financial liberalization of the Economic Community of West African States on their economic activities]

This paper analyzes the effects of the high economic openness of West African economies coupled with liability dollarization, on their economic activities. By using a dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model in a small open economy framework, and performing an experiment based on a case of moderate economic openness and another case on the high economic openness, we find that the high economic openness of west african economies constitutes a brake for their economic progress. This external constraint annihilates the effects of the economic policies implemented to stimulate economic growth, and consequently create macroeconomic imbalances. For small countries like those in West Africa, a moderate economic openness would be advantageous because it would allow them to develop a domestic market that presents many economic advantages and above all, to protect it from foreign competition. It is necessary to decrease now this dependency in order to avoid a polarization of economic blocks after the creation of a Currency Union in West Africa.