A world of differentials: Africa pay structures in a transitional context. Regia Abdin et al. Hodder and Stoughton, London, 1983, 152 pp
| Date | 01 October 1984 |
| Author | H. N. Nwosu |
| Published date | 01 October 1984 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1002/pad.4230040418 |
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391
between growth, investment and the basic needs approach. The necessity of growth and
investment for the economy as
a
whole is acknowledged and although it would be maintained
in
a
basic needs context it would ‘be differently composed, distributed and measured than in
the past’ (p.
181).
Implied in this statement is the fact that
a
basic needs approach sets out not
to be capital intensive but to promote alternative forms of service at low cost. For example,
the promotion
of
primary health care at village level using ‘barefoot’ doctors rather than
advocating high levels of investment in sophisticated urban-based hospitals. This would be
representative of an overall shift in public investment towards the lower income groups
so
as
to raise their productivity. In sifting through the evidence of successful basic need
‘performers’, it is still ambiguous whether growth causes the fulfilment of basic needs
or
vice
versa. The conclusion is not clear and the reader, despite his partiality towards the approach,
is left very much with the dilemma of the chicken-and-the-egg. The interdependence between
growth, which provides the public investment capacity, and the implementation of basic
needs strategies could also be argued more explicitly.
The second controversial point is that of financing a global programme of meeting basic
human needs. The additional cost of rudimentary basic needs programme for the poorest
countries is estimated at
$40,000
million per year at
1976
prices, from
1980
to
2000.
However,
total aid flows from OECD countries to developing countries as a whole only amounted to
$22,000
million
(1978).
The minimum additional amount of aid required would be
$20,000
million per year for twenty years to launch a basic needs programme in the poorest countries.
In-country contributions of capital and recurrent expenditure on
a
one-for-one basis
presuppose investible surpluses of an order that exceeds the capacity of the poorest countries
for the foreseeable future. And even if the resources were available, competing alternative
investments and political considerations could possibly divert their use away from basic needs
programmes. This crucial consideration deserves more than one page in the last chapter.
Humanitarianism may have returned to the centre of the development stage in the persona
of meeting basic human needs, but, it is hoped, not to play to an empty auditorium if the
entrance tickets are too highly priced.
JOSEPH
MULLEN
Department
of
Administrative Studies
University
of
Manchester
A WORLD
OF
DIFFERENTIALS: AFRICA
PAY
STRUCTURES IN A TRANSITIONAL
CONTEXT
Regia
Abdin
et
al.
Hodder and Stoughton, London,
1983, 152
pp.
Using seven selected countries: Egypt, Ghana, Nigeria, Tanzania, Morocco, Sudan and
Kenya, Regia Abdin and his four co-authors set out to investigate the patterns of change these
countries have experienced in their public-sector salary and wage structures.
Their task was made particularJy difficult because
of
the amount and quality
of
data
needed to support their findings and because of the immense problems involved in comparing
top-bottom salary differentials as some states, including the ones covered in the sample, draw
the line differently between salary and allowances.
In spite of the difficulties that confronted Regia and his co-authors, their empirical and
penetrative study has enhanced
our
knowledge about the patterns of variations in the public
sector salary and wage structures. From their study, we now know that there is a spectrum in
the patterns of variations with low and rapidly narrowing differential Tanzania and Egypt at
one end and Kenya at the other.
The explanation for this does not lie in the usual simplistic assumptions. Rather, Regia and
his co-authors provide very plausible explanations. These include the market forces,
differences in historical legacy and political opposition to it, the weight and role
of
the private
sector and of multinational corporations within it, and the use made of internationally
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