On the State of Business: Trade, Entrepreneurship and Real Economic Governance in South Sudan

This PhD thesis analyses how business activity and economic regulation in South(ern) Sudan was governed before and during the 2012 economic austerity period following the political decision to shut down all oil production. The analyses focuses on the modalities of real economic governance, warranting an empirically-grounded ethnographic view of governance from the perspective of everyday practices and interactions between and within groups of economic and state actors. It argues that in an environment where formal state institutions are fragmented, contested and rivalled by non-state ordering mechanisms, business practice and regulation is governed by socio-political relationships that are negotiated between powerful groups and individuals both inside and outside the domain of the state.