The implications of the emergence of the alliance of Sahelian States for regional integration, stability and development in Africa
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Despite growing acceptance of regional cooperation as a key development model, Africa has struggled to maintain a viable framework for regional integration due in part to diverging visions of regionalism. Although a considerable amount of research has addressed the resulting structural fragmentation, less attention has been given to the underlying disagreements over the form, content, direction and pace of regionalism. These disagreements contribute to fragmented and duplicative frameworks that undermine unity, political stability, security and development. This study argues that the recent exit of Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger from ECOWAS to form the Alliance of Sahel States (AES) reflects this often-overlooked dimension of African regionalism. Rather than viewing the AES solely as a political rupture, this article interprets its creation as a product of deeper historical dissensus over regional integration. It highlights the unresolved challenge of crafting effective strategies to address external influences and political instability, particularly in the Sahel. Drawing on qualitative analysis of historical narratives, economic trends, and institutional comparison, the study contends that the AES exemplifies these unresolved tensions at the heart of African regionalism. It examines the implications for development within ECOWAS. By situating AES in the broader context of Africa’s fragmenting regionalism, the article offers insights into the obstacles to cohesive integration and emphasises the need for inclusive and coordinated frameworks to tackle shared developmental and security challenges.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.004 | 0.006 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.006 | 0.010 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.005 | 0.004 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.006 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.002 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".