Dr. Christopher Zambakari
Founder & CEO, The Zambakari Advisory
Hartley B. and Ruth B. Barker Endowed Rotary Peace Fellow
Assistant Editor, Bulletin of The Sudan Studies Association
Sudan is a country in northeast Africa that has been marred by violence and conflict for several decades. The ongoing conflict in Sudan has resulted in countless deaths and displacement of millions of people. The conflict has also had a devastating impact on the country’s social and economic fabric, leaving the country in a state of turmoil. This article explores the social historical context of the conflict in Sudan, how it came to be, and what led to the violence. Also discussed is what the international community, United Nations, African Union, and Arab League can do to bring the violence to an end.
Nichola Mandil Ukeil
South Sudan journalist,
Instructor, Starford International University, South Sudan
Conflict in Sudan? You may wonder which conflict, which war, which collision of arms and general butchery it is that has most recently caught the international community’s attention. The latest test of wills is a war not a month old and commanded by generals. Commanded by generals, in fact, who have been comrades in “arms and fate” for nearly four years since former Sudanese President Omar El-Bashir was ousted in 2019.
Professor Erik Reinert, Technology Governance and Development Strategies, Tallinn University of Technology
‘This tendency to Diminishing Returns was the cause of Abraham’s parting from Lot, and of most of the migrations of which history tells’ wrote the founder of neo-classical economics, Alfred Marshall, in the first edition of his textbook Principles of Economics(1890). In a footnote he refers to the Bible’s Genesis xiii : 6: ‘And the land was not able to bear them that they might dwell together; for their substance was great so they could not dwell together’. (Marshall 1890: 201).
Marshall’s observation also applies to today’s migration patterns: from countries where most activities are subject to constant or diminishing returns to countries whose key economic activities are subject to increasing returns to scale. Diminishing returns occur when one factor of production is limited by nature, which means that it occurs in agriculture, mining, and fisheries. Normally the best land, the best ore, and the richest fishing grounds are exploited first, and – after a point – the more a country specialises in these activities, the poorer it gets. OECD (2018) shows how this occurs in Chilean copper mining: every ton of copper is produced with a higher cost than the previous ton.
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