Book contents
- Business and Social Crisis in Africa
- Business and Social Crisis in Africa
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Acknowledgements
- Abbreviations
- 1 Doing Business Like a State
- Part I Business, HIV/AIDS and the Provision of Public Health
- Part II Business, Political Crisis and the Provision of Broader Social Stability
- Bibliography
- Index
1 - Doing Business Like a State
The Response to Social Crisis
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 November 2019
- Business and Social Crisis in Africa
- Business and Social Crisis in Africa
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Acknowledgements
- Abbreviations
- 1 Doing Business Like a State
- Part I Business, HIV/AIDS and the Provision of Public Health
- Part II Business, Political Crisis and the Provision of Broader Social Stability
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Forty years ago, Colin Leys asked “how far the class that has the greatest interest in surmounting and resolving the problems confronting capitalist development … [has] identified these problems or shown itself able to tackle them?” An examination of the business response in four African countries (Kenya, Uganda, Botswana and South Africa) to two kinds of crises (HIV/AIS and political violence) provides surprising answers: African businesses can be key responders to crisis, on occasion responding well in advance of the state and in welfare-enhancing ways that assist the society more widely to resolve the underlying crisis. Large, home-grown, diversified business groups are prominent in the ranks of the constructive responders to crisis, acting in surprising and counterintuitive ways.
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- Business and Social Crisis in Africa , pp. 1 - 46Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2019