Special economic zones in Southern Africa: white elephants or latent drivers of growth and employment?: The case of Zambia and South Africa

The successful use of special economic zones as economic tools for export-led industrial development in East Asia propelled a wave of similar initiatives across Africa. In Southern Africa, Zambia and South Africa instituted special economic zones in their respective legal and institutional frameworks in the 2000s as mechanisms for catalysing industrialization and employment creation by means of domestic and foreign investments.