A Critical Theoretical Analysis of the Political Economy of Shipbuilding Industry Development in Nigeria: Constraints, Pathways, and Policy Implications

The development of a domestic shipbuilding industry represents a strategic objective of Nigerian maritime policy, yet despite multiple policy initiatives spanning several decades, the industry remains nascent. This study conducts a critical theoretical analysis of the political economy constraints and enabling conditions governing shipbuilding industry development in Nigeria, contributing an original political economy framework for understanding industrial policy failure and potential policy reform in the maritime manufacturing sector. The research employs a critical political economy methodology combined with a structured historical institutionalist analysis of shipbuilding policy in Nigeria from the pre-independence period to the present. Primary data were collected through ninety-one in-depth interviews with shipyard operators, maritime industry associations, government officials, financial institution representatives, and foreign shipbuilding investors. Comparative analysis draws on the successful shipbuilding industry development trajectories of South Korea and Turkey as instructive comparators. The original theoretical framework developed by the study proposes that Nigerian shipbuilding policy failure is best understood as the product of three interacting political economy mechanisms: predatory rent-seeking in the allocation of policy benefits, coordination failure between complementary industrial policies including steel production and technical education, and institutional amnesia that prevents policy learning across government transitions. The framework advances the maritime industrial policy literature by embedding shipbuilding development analysis within a structurally explicit political economy account rather than attributing failure to technical or financial factors alone. Keywords: shipbuilding industry, political economy, industrial policy, institutional analysis, Nigerian maritime policy