The Alliance of Sahel States: Initial Difficulties as a Resource for Development

... “courage” in creating a full-fledged three-state federation. Putting aside the inevitable revolutionary rhetoric sputtered by the leadership of the three states during the early years of their governance, a pragmatic line emerges as the mutually beneficial minilateralism is fostered as opposed to the multilateralism of ECOWAS. One of the Alliance’s upsides is that it may benefit from narrowly focused cooperation mechanisms (FX operations, border security, logistics corridors, technology transfer) and intensive inter-ministerial consultations as opposed to cumbersome ...