The Impact of Monetary Union on Macroeconomic Integration: Evidence from West Africa

Data from 19 African nations is used to investigate the hypothesis that monetary union-represented in this case by the CFA Franc Zone-augments the extent of macroeconomic integration. The paper covers two key dimensions of integration: the volume of bilateral trade, and the magnitude of cross-country business cycle correlation. Restricting our attention to a part of the world in which (for historical reasons) monetary union membership is exogenous to economic characteristics, we can test whether the large single-currency effects claimed by A. Rose apply within a sample of less developed countries. Copyright (c) The London School of Economics and Political Science 2005.