Abstract:
The quest for regional integration in Africa has seen the transformation of the continent’s premier umbrella organisation, the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) into the African Union (AU). In spite of that transformation however, skeptics have continued to express doubt about the capability of the new organization to achieve improved regional integration. Such commentators fear that the challenges that militated against the effectiveness of the former organization have remained largely undiminished and are therefore likely to hamper the performance of the new one. Whereas a number of studies have attempted an assessment of the performance of the AU in this regard, such studies have been by no means exhaustive. The current effort therefore aims to contribute to the earlier efforts in order to enhance understanding of the subject matter. To do this, the study posed two research questions and proposed two corresponding hypotheses. It anchored its analysis on the theory of developmental regionalism as espoused by Margaret Lee. Data for the study was gathered and analyzed using the qualitative descriptive data generation/analysis technique. It found that the transformation of the OAU to the AU has not contributed to a meaningful improvement of intra-African trade but that the implementation of the AU good governance and democratic principles has somewhat enhanced democratization in many African countries. It then made a number of recommendations of how AU can help achieve meaningful integration and also consolidate on the gains made in the democratization project in Africa.
