Can central bank independence (CBI) help to reduce fiscal balances? In this paper, we answer this question using novel measures of CBI based on the turnover rate of central bank governors (TOR) and the Garriga measure of legal independence for 30 African countries for the period 1990–2017. Our novel measures of CBI capture the degree of alliance between the fiscal authority and the monetary authority which can potentially lead to debt monetization and higher fiscal balances. Thus, we classify central bank governor changes into ally changes or non-ally changes; in addition to that, we decompose our full sample into CFA zone countries and non-CFA zone countries to capture the effect of currency union membership. Our results show that for CFA zone countries, central bank autonomy, when proxied by the turnover rate of central bank governors, is associated with a decrease in fiscal balances and replacing a central banker with a non-ally, is negatively and significantly associated with fiscal balances.

中央银行独立性（CBI）可以帮助减少财政平衡吗？在本文中，我们基于中央银行行长的周转率（TOR）和1990-2017年期间30个非洲国家的法律独立性的Garriga度量，使用新颖的CBI度量来回答这个问题。我们针对CBI采取的新颖措施体现了财政当局与货币当局之间的联盟程度，这有可能导致债务货币化和更高的财政余额。因此，我们将央行行长变更分为盟友变更或非盟友变更。除此之外，我们将全部样本分解为CFA区国家和非CFA区国家，以了解货币联盟成员资格的影响。我们的结果表明，对于非洲金融共同体地区国家而言，如果中央银行行长的周转率得到支持，那么中央银行的自治权，