The southern African Development Community’s pursuit of developmental integration

The Southern African Development Community (SADC) is regarded by some as an example of a developmental regional integration scheme because its stated primary goal is to eradicate poverty. The organisation adopted two overarching policies in the SADC’s Regional Indicative Strategic Development Plan (RISDP) and the Strategic Indicative Plan for the Organ (SIPO) focused on economic and social development, both as an end in itself (RISDP) and as a means to ensure security and stability (SIPO). It also has many protocols in various policy areas of development cooperation with a potential to stimulate a high level of regional development. 1 The SADC has also tried to open policy space for civil society participation in its programmes through public participation and stakeholder engagement initiatives, such as the SADC National Committees, with a view to place citizen’s well-being at the centre of the regional integration process. Even the institutional reforms that took place at the SADC in the late 1990s, and again in 2003–2004, were meant to enhance the organisation’s ability to achieve its overarching goal of eradicating poverty. Therefore, these were reforms in pursuit of improving the lives of people of the region.