Insights & Analysis — Dr. Boris Houenou

Economics, AI, energy markets and policy in Africa and emerging markets.

• Bank Mergers Keep Lending to the Poor, Even When No One Is Watching — A study of 76,622 US bank examinations finds that banks keep serving low-income borrowers a full year after a merger closes, when the regulatory incentive to impress examiners has passed. That has direct lessons for how African regulators price inclusion into bank consolidation.
• What Governments Are Actually Buying When They Buy Sovereign AI — Sovereign AI is not a race to the frontier. It is an option to walk away, priced by the seller. New modelling puts the waste at tenths of a percent of GDP a year, and says the fix is a treaty on price, not a bigger subsidy.
• Seven Country-Years: What the ECOWAS Convergence Record Says About the Eco — In twelve years of ECOWAS surveillance data, full compliance with the convergence criteria occurs in 7 of 180 country-years. Every one is a WAEMU member, in a single year. The test for joining a currency union is being passed by countries that already share one.
• L'Intelligence Artificielle Va Refaire les Modèles Politiques en Afrique– Sous Stéroïdes — How artificial intelligence will reshape political models across Africa with unprecedented acceleration
• Progress Requires Strategic Adversaries, African Countries Have None — Examining why strategic competition is essential for progress and what Africa lacks in this regard
• A Pragmatic View on Africa's Continental AI Strategy — A practical analysis of Africa's approach to artificial intelligence development and implementation
• Overregulation Kills Innovation–Unless Substance Overtakes Structure — How excessive regulation stifles innovation and what needs to change for meaningful progress
• Law and Order in Unstable Democracies: A Path to Stability or a Road to Ruin? — Analyzing the complex relationship between law enforcement and democratic stability in developing nations
• We Are Not Born Free, We Are Born Alive — A philosophical examination of freedom, liberty, and the human condition in modern society

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