The conclusion of the article is interesting:

> 'The unit of analysis for "why is X poor" may be the political coalition, not the country.'

So maybe the real question here is not about the absolute poverty, but the derivative: "Why hasn't Malawi seen meaningful growth for 30 years?" — And the answer could be surprisingly related to first-world countries like Finland that also have experienced decades of stunted growth.

Like Malawi, Finland has functional and stable multiparty politics. Like Malawi, Finland's politicians have spent decades locally optimizing for minor benefits towards their preferred flavor of the median voter (right wing cuts taxes a bit, left wing improves benefits a bit, nobody offers anything transformative).

Too much stability at the wrong time might be a slow curse.

Finnish GDP per capita is growing much, much faster than Malawi's: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.PCAP.PP.CD?locat...

Is Finland doing that badly? It seems like a good place to live