New Estimates of Capital Flight from Sub-Saharan African Countries: Linkages with External Borrowing and Policy Options

Even as African countries became increasingly indebted from 1970 to 2004, they experienced large-scale capital flight. Some of this was legitimately acquired capital fleeing economic and political uncertainties; some was illegitimately acquired wealth spirited to safer havens abroad. This paper presents new estimates of the magnitude and timing of capital flight from 40 sub-Saharan African countries and analyzes its determinants, including linkages to external borrowing. Our results confirm that sub-Saharan Africa is a net creditor to the rest of the world, in that the subcontinent