Repository logo

Doctoral Degrees (Economics)

Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/10413/6939

Browse

Browsing Doctoral Degrees (Economics) by Author "Freund, William Mark."

Filter results by typing the first few letters
Now showing 1 - 2 of 2
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    South Africa's international financial relations, 1970-1987 : history, crisis and transformation.
    (1989) Padayachee, Mahavishnu.; Freund, William Mark.
    This thesis examines South Africa's relations with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and private international banks in the period 1970-1987. The thesis is written in the language, and uses the conceptual tools, of 'regulation theory', an approach whose emphasis on 'time-changing' empirically-grounded explanations of a country's global interactions, it is suggested, represents an advance over modernisation and dependency approaches. The thesis traces the altered circumstances of the international financial system since the early 1970s. It points to the struggle by the IMF to come to terms with these changes in harmonising a new international financial system. The IMF has, however, increased its supervisory power in relation to most countries in the developing world, especially after the oil-price hike of 1973. The basis for, and implications of, the explosion in private international bank lending in this period is also examined. This analysis is followed by an examination of the crisis in the South African political economy since the early 1970s and of the way this crisis was influenced by global events. It is argued that South Africa's international economic relations were transformed by both global and domestic forces and came to be dominated by issues of international finance. The second part of the thesis examines South Africa's relations with the IMF and private international banks. This relationship was supportive of the apartheid state's development strategy for most of the period 1970-1985. It is argued that until the 1980s, the relationship also benefited the western industrialised countries who profited both materially and strategically, from their economic relations with South Africa. However, in 1983, the US imposed restrictions on its support for IMF loans to South Africa. By mid-1985 a combination of political and economic changes within South Africa forced some foreign banks to withdraw their normal credit facilities to South Africa. These events precipitated a dramatic change for the worse in South Africa's international financial relations. It is argued that although there has been some improvement in these relations since 1987, the country's relations with the IMF and banks have not returned to their previous mostly supportive character. A combination of international, regional and domestic economic and political factors has ensured that the current crisis in South Africa's international financial relations is already deeper, more prolonged, and more damaging to growth prospects, than the crisis of the mid-1970s.
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    The South African commodity plastics filiere : history and future strategy options.
    (1994) Crompton, Roderick de Brissac.; Freund, William Mark.
    The world chemical industry is one of the most basic and important manufacturing businesses globally. Petrochemicals have played a pivotal role in industrial modernisation. In the 1970s and 1980s South Africa developed an unusually large chemical industry as Import Substitution Industrialisation was conveniently extended into military/strategic apartheid policy. These policies steered the industry away from conventional crude oil and natural gas based feedstocks into a uniquely coal based chemical industry. The shift from oil to coal based petrochemicals also narrowed the slate of petrochemicals available. Pricing is critical in the commodity plastics filiere. Coal based production contributed to a higher cost structure than crude oil based producers and a 'missing link' in the production chain, the petrochemical intermediate naphtha. This facilitated the introduction of a pricing mechanism which concentrated the benefits amongst upstream producers at the expense of downstream plastic converters, stunting growth in this higher value added and more labour intensive sector. Ironically a 'sunk costs' approach and recent developments allow SASOL's to produce coal based petrochemicals at low cost. In a significant change the traditional pillars of the local chemical industry, agricultural and mining chemicals, were supplanted by plastic raw materials as the major sector of the industry during the 1980s despite its coal base. Trade patterns also reflect these developments. A significant shift in employment from blacks to whites in Industrial Chemicals and Refineries accompanied this reordering of the major sectors. Providing mass housing, electrification and other basic wage goods will require industrial policies, embracing the entire filiere, which are significantly different from previous policies. Such policies should facilitate the development of higher value added and more labour intensive sectors within a broadly conceived framework of redistribution of political and economic opportunity. This will require lowering chemical intermediate input costs as well as a range of nurturing and facilitative policies for the filiere. These will help to reduce the current anti-export bias. The process of implementing such policies is as important as the direction itself. To facilitate national reconciliation and empowerment of previously disadvantaged groups transparent tripartite policy making institutions are recommended.