Coevolutionary Development: Nigeria as Demonstration
Term
Coevolutionary Development: Nigeria as Demonstration
Idea level
Application: Development
Definition
Coevolutionary Development: Nigeria as Demonstration refers to Yuen Yuen Ang’s use of Nigeria to illustrate how markets can emerge through informal, normatively weak arrangements in the absence of strong state capacity, demonstrating the generalizable logic of Coevolutionary Development beyond China.
In How China Escaped the Poverty Trap (2016), Ang shows how widespread piracy in Nigeria’s film industry functioned as informal distribution at a challenging, market-building phase, before demand for formal institutions of regulation and intellectual property protection arose.
Definition of “Coevolutionary Development” (generic theory)
Coevolutionary Development is a theory developed by Yuen Yuen Ang in 2016 that explains political-economic development as a non-linear (mutually adaptive) process in which the economy, governance, or institutions evolve together over time, through zig-zag causal chains, rather than in a linear sequence.
Ang has demonstrated this theory across cases and historical periods: China, Europe, Nigeria, and the United States.
Sources
Empirical demonstration:
Ang, Y.Y. (2016) How China Escaped the Poverty Trap. Chapter 7, Section “Coevolutionary Dynamics in the Unlikely Rise of Nollywood” [Webpage] [Chapter: Introduction]
Theoretical synthesis:
Ang, Yuen Yuen. “Adaptive Political Economy: Toward a New Paradigm.” World Politics (2024).
Genealogy
[Paradigm] AIM (Adaptive, Inclusive, Moral Political Economy)
→ [Pillar] Adaptive Political Economy (APE)
→ [Pillar] Inclusive: development pathways need not conform to Western institutional templates (strong intellectual property rights as precondition)
→ [Theory] Coevolutionary Development
→ [Concept] Normatively Weak, Functionally Strong
→ [Application: Development] Nigeria’s Nollywood as demonstration (informal market-building through film piracy)
Quotes
“In this concluding chapter, though, I present further evidence that development is a coevolutionary process, not only in China but also in other parts of the world and in recent and historical periods.”
— Ang, How China Escaped the Poverty Trap (2016), pp. 222
“If we look carefully within developing countries, we can find pockets of coevolutionary change in the most unlikely places, hidden in plain sight. One extraordinary instance is the rise of the filmmaking and creative industry in Nigeria—known as Nollywood—within a burst of twenty years.”
“Given rampant piracy and the absence of formal distribution channels, how could producers turn a profit on projects in which they had invested their own money? The answer was to make movies quickly and cheaply and then distribute them widely through informal channels… As operations readapted to environmental shifts, Nollywood entered a phase of market bifurcation and consolidation… As Nollywood evolved toward formalization, demand for stronger enforcement of IPR stepped up among regulators and top-tier producers.”
While the particulars of Nigeria’s industry-specific case and China’s political-economic transformation since 1978 obviously make up two different worlds, a comparison of the two reveals striking parallels in coevolutionary dynamics and market-building strategies.
First, both the Nigerian and Chinese cases reveal a process of market coevolution that may be divided into three distinct stages: building, consolidation, and expansion. In Nollywood, the domestic market for a movie industry was built over the 1990s, bifurcated and consolidated over the 2000s, and then expanded to regional and international audiences in the 2010s. Recalling the coevolutionary paths of coastal locales in China (Forest Hill and Blessed County), we find a similar pattern… In each of these stages, functionally and qualitatively different institutions were employed to promote markets.
Second, in both the rise of Nollywood and China’s capitalist economy, preexisting weak institutions were adapted to build markets.”
Third, regional connections spurred development in both the Nigerian and Chinese cases. Nollywood benefited from the transfer of outdated technology (VHSs and VCDs) from Asia to Africa.”
— Ang, How China Escaped the Poverty Trap (2016), “Coevolutionary Dynamics in the Unlikely Rise of Nollywood,” pp. 232-7
“As many developing countries feature highly fragmented state power… we are likely to find coevolutionary processes only in pockets of these political economies, as in the case of Nigeria’s movie industry.
Why did donated T-shirts hurt the textiles market while exported cheap tapes sparked the film market? Because those free T-shirts were donated under the false presumption that Africans lacked shirts to wear or could not make their own shirts… Asian exporters were not trying to ‘help’ when they sold tapes cheaply to African markets… For African traders, the tapes they bought were cheap but not free. So like market actors everywhere, they were motivated to add value to the tapes to sell them for profits. This is why, ironically, while business as usual may stimulate growth opportunities, charitable gifts may end up inadvertently disrupting fragile markets in the Third World. In other words, no charity could be better than thoughtless charity.”
— Ang, How China Escaped the Poverty Trap (2016), “Coevolutionary Dynamics in the Unlikely Rise of Nollywood,” pp. 232-8
Concept Constellation
Across Ang’s work, Coevolutionary Development: Nigeria as Demonstration consistently co-appears with the following concepts and analytic themes:
Using what you have
Non-state-led market formation