Research On The Economic Integration Of ECOWAS

ECOWAS is one of the largest regional integration organizations in Africa. The purpose of ECOWAS is to promote the economic, social and cultural development and cooperation of member countries, and its ultimate goal is to realize the very region’s economic integration. Even though West Africa is rich in natural resources, mineral resources and abundant agricultural resources, still West Africa remains a poor backward area. Poverty and backwardness as well as slow economic development, all of these factors urge the West African leaders to begin to think seriously about regional integration and cooperation. After the World War II, with the in-depth development of economic globalization, and tortuous development of the world multi-polarization, ECOWAS’s integration has entered a new stage of development. However in the process of integration, the West African countries met with various difficulties and twists and turns, their efforts of integration attained gratifying achievements, at the same time it had been haunted and hampered by the disadvantages of many historical and systematical defects. The study of the integration of ECOWAS is to help us make clear of the history and status quo of the economic cooperation and political game of countries in West Africa, in the hope of promoting economic collaboration between China and the West African countries.This article mainly comprises four parts. The first section carries out the comprehensive exploration from the perspective of the background of the organization’s founding and its formal establishment of ECOWAS and the present development status, with the focus on the third part, which, through the study and summary of two key aspects——monetary integration and the integration of tariff of ECOWAS, introduces the status quo of the level of the ECOWAS integration. The second section and the third section are the study of the pros and cons of ECOWAS integration development condition. This paper not only expounds the common factors influencing the integration that ECOWAS shares with other integration organizations on the road of integration, such as the huge gap between the member countries’ development level, the favorable influence of integration thoughts, etc., also explores its own "personal factors", like the ties with the former colonial power. The last section involves a few problems that this paper contends ECOWAS should handle properly to better accelerate the process of integration in future, such as the mechanism reform and strengthening the political cooperation and other issues.This paper argues that the process of integration of both the developed areas like Europe and poor regions such as West Africa, has always been full of difficulties. After more than30years of development, ECOWAS has made big progress in its integration, but at the same time, we all can see there are obstacles and disadvantages. Goal is ambitious, the road is tortuous. But as long as all the member countries keep the faith of integration firmly, believing that a higher level of integrated organization can bring a better future, avoiding disadvantages, strengthening coordination and cooperation, constantly fighting against the adverse factors, the ambitious goal of the realization of complete integration will certainly come true. And ECOWAS, as Africa’s largest integrated organization, will play an important role in this continent’s development.