Institutional Quality and Sustainable Energy Access as Drivers of Inclusive Economic Development in Sub-Saharan Africa: Evidence from a System GMM Approach

This study utilizes a balanced panel dataset covering 46 Sub-Saharan African countries over the period 2000 to 2023, yielding a total of 1104 country-year observations. The key variables include the Inclusive Development Index (IDI) as the dependent variable, with institutional quality (INSTQ) and sustainable energy access (ISENACI) as the primary explanatory variables. Additional covariates include foreign direct investment (FDI), trade openness, population growth, and gross domestic product (GDP) growth, which serve as controls to account for macroeconomic and structural factors influencing inclusive development. Data were sourced from reputable international databases such as the World Bank’s World Development Indicators (WDI), Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGI), and Sustainable Energy for All (SE4ALL). Institutional quality was measured as a composite index derived from six WGI dimensions, while sustainable energy access reflects access to electricity, clean fuels, and renewable energy share. All variables were harmonized and cleaned for consistency, and relevant transformations (e.g., logarithmic scaling) were applied where appropriate to ensure robust estimation using the System GMM technique.