THE GLOBAL SHIFT TOWARDS DEMOCRACY

According to Samuel Huntington1, five discernible factors lay behind the world-wide shift from authoritarian political systems to democratic ones.

Non-democratic regimes are confronted by the inherent problems of legitimacy, a consequence, largely, of their inability to provide for the security and material economic needs of their citizens. This was especially so during the economic depression of the 1970’s.



In contrast, while the stagnation of the 1970’s weakened authoritarian politics, the twenty years of extraordinary economic development prior to 1974 had produced the financial and social bases for the introduction of democratic systems in many other parts of the world. World-wide, and especially in Southern Europe and Latin America, many societies had become more wealthy, better educated and had developed a thriving middle class. Most of the states that made the transition to democracy in the 1970’s and 1980’s were at the upper-middle level of economic development.



The process was hastened and given added impetus in the first number of states to democratise, through the role played by the Roman Catholic Church, which by the early 1970’s had emerged as the most effective opponent to dictatorship and tyranny of both the left and the right.



In addition, outside actors such as the European Union (EU) countries and the USA helped the process to gather extra momentum in those parts of the world where they had influence (EU in Portugal, Spain, Greece and Turkey; the USA in Central and South America).



Added to the above is what might be called the snowballing or domino phenomenon, of democratisation becoming "contagious" and spreading from one country to the next.

The dramatic shift towards a global new order, and especially the rapid displacement of seemingly entrenched and highly repressive regimes in Eastern and Central Europe, had profound repercussions for Africa, albeit somewhat belated. They served as catalyst in the demands for democratic pluralism and an end to single-party domination. Thus, in an era that has been dubbed Africa’s "second liberation", a confident but deeply disillusioned civil society has confronted and ousted many of the continent’s military and one-party dictatorships. This unprecedented opposition to the authoritarian yoke has been underpinned by countries forming part of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), who regard the implementation of multi-party politics and open government as a requirement for structural adjustment and economic improvement. As a consequence of these pressures no less than thirteen African leaders lost their positions during the period 1991 to December 1994, the highest turnover since the Organisation for African Unity (OAU) was created in 1963. More widely, political changes since 1989 have led to a three fold increase in the number of multi-party states, from ten to thirty four by late 1994, with elections being held in almost all of them.

AFRICA’S ECONOMIC CRISIS

These political upheavals have been timely. The continent’s litany of economic woes is of staggering proportions:

"Africa’s economic growth rate is 1,5 percent - the world’s lowest - and it claims 32 of the bottom 40 countries on the UN annual development index ... Food production is 20 percent lower now than it was in 1970, when the population was half the size ... Population, meanwhile, continues to grow at a rate of 3,2 percent annually versus the 2,1 percent for Latin America and 1,8 percent for Asia." 2

The continental crisis is further characterised by related economic afflictions:

steadily worsening terms of trade;



drastic reductions in social welfare programmes;



the ravages of Aids and other pandemic diseases (of the world’s twelve million HIV-infected adults, eight million live in Africa);



rapidly deteriorating infrastructure;



rising unemployment;



rampant corruption and economic mismanagement by various forms of oligarchies;



environmental degradation and drought;



protracted inter-communal conflicts that have uprooted millions of families (half of the world’s refugees are African, most of them fleeing famine or civil war or both); and



a debilitating and insupportable debt burden.

By 1992, the continent’s total debt of $290 billion had increased by two and a half times since 1980, while sub-Saharan Africa’s debt more than tripled. To honour its debts, Africa paid $26 billion to its creditors in 1991 alone, amounting to a net "outflow" of resources, despite aid from donors. Moreover, the continent’s debt amounts to ninety per cent of its Gross National Product (GNP). For sub-Saharan Africa, the figure is 110 per cent of GNP. The wider socio-political ramifications of this burden becomes all too clear if it is considered that Africa spends four times more on debt-servicing than on the provision of health-care facilities to its population of some 600 million.3

It is evident that the new international order has had reverberations on the African continent, most notably within the spheres of political pluralism and economic liberalisation. These developments have raised the hope that Africa will be better governed which, in turn, is fundamental to any chance of sustained economic recovery. But the surge towards democratisation and the medicine inherent in structural alterations to the economy will inevitably mean a painful and extended period of adjustment - with parallel problems relating to domestic and regional security. The dynamics behind the new African working arrangement are relatively easy to quantify. However, the crucial questions remain: will Africa be able to sustain the drive toward representative government? Is it possible to control, contain and end violent conflict? In short, can democracy be nurtured to survive? These questions are intimately tied up with a number of other issues, namely:

changing notions and approaches to state sovereignty in the new international system;


the debate concerning the so-called global marginalisation of the African continent;

the impact of external political, economic and other related factors;

ethnic conflict, secessionist trends and border adjustments; and

foreign intervention and conflict.

All of these interrelated topics are relevant to the questions posed above and will be briefly addressed in the broad discussion which follows.

MARGINALISATION: FACT OF FICTION?

For Africa, the resumption of friendly relations between superpowers during the late 1980’s and the subsequent conclusion of the Cold War, represent something of a mixed blessing. The end of major power confrontations on the continent, with the warning of Africa’s geopolitical significance, has brought some measure of comfort. But the relaxation of East-West tensions has ushered in well-founded fears that Africa is drifting off the map of world concern and that sub-Saharan Africa in particular has become peripheral to the international agenda. To quote Stephen Rosenfeld, an editor of The Washington Post, the West has lost "interest by virtue of having won the Cold War ... [Africa] stands a fate worse in some respects than being fought over - being ignored".4 In short, the collapse of Soviet communism and recent developments within the international system, already appear to be having far-reaching consequences for the continent.

The reasons for Africa’s growing marginalisation can be summarised as follows:

When measuring economic and political indicators, Africa’s dismal performance to date is increasingly perceived as negative by external powers. The continent is seen as a bottomless pit and a lost cause for Western financial largesse. In short, Western disillusionment with Africa has engendered a profound sense of aid fatigue.



Such stereotypes are mirrored in the economically impoverished countries of the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, from where African aid has diminished to a trickle. Deprived of global purpose, the former Socialist Bloc is seeking to escape from its costly overseas commitments, especially in Africa.



Linked to the above is the fact that the situation in the former socialist states is turning out to be a far larger challenge for the West than was anticipated. As one observer has noted: "The massive transfer of capital from Western Europe to Eastern Europe is not merely an investment in the economic future of these countries. It is also an investment in Europe’s peace and security which will be endangered if the present economic decline in the East ... and the rise in ethno-nationalism ... continues". 5



The relaxation of relationships between superpowers ended the lucrative arrangements by which states were able to play off East against West in an ideological war that gave many Third World countries an unrealistic influence which they exploited for economic gain. This option is no longer available.



Significant progress in the Middle East peace process, against the backdrop of the Gulf War, implies additional claims on scarce foreign aid budgets. Vietnam and Cambodia are also knocking on the donors’ doors.



It is already clear that the much-awaited "peace dividend", in the form of resources released for use in the Third World by the ending of the Cold War arms race and disarmament in Europe, ironically will be directed, not towards the impoverished South, but back towards the very region with which the West had been involved in a major ideological struggle.6

All these developments, and the fact that the traditional flow of assistance is being diverted to humanitarian emergencies, such as Somalia and the drought in Southern Africa, have pushed Africa far down the list of Western priorities. In short, competition for resources has never been greater and countries that cannot demonstrate the effective use of aid, implying good management coupled with sensible economic policy, will lose it.

WESTERN CONDITIONALITIES

The West, especially the former colonial powers,has long-standing historical and ethical commitments to Africa. In addition, there are signs of a growing cultural and political awareness of the continent among African-Americans. As far as South Africa itself is concerned, there is a genuine desire in Western European countries to see the RSA fully resuming its natural role as the engine-room for growth and regeneration on a dying continent. Finally, the changing criteria for assistance in economic development clearly suggest that the outside world will not disengage, as long as the contentious, but admirable, principle of linkage between foreign assistance and political/ economic reform is maintained. External donors are confronted with three choices in this regard:

they can provide no aid at all, which would be "an abrogation of their responsibility to the peoples of Africa";



they could provide "aid on a no-questions-asked basis, which may well make them accomplices in the most appalling abuses of human rights"; or



they can channel assistance with specifications attached, thereby laying "themselves open to charges of interference in domestic politics. In practical terms, the last of these is the only option open".7

To summarise, it would seem that as long as African governments embrace externally encouraged programmes /guidelines for democracy, human rights, security expenditures and good gover-nance, the dire predictions of a massively marginalised Africa will not materialise and if so, not soon.

The main external emphasis, however, will continue to focus on thorough management as the vital factor in supporting economic reform. The World Bank first raised this theme in its 1989 study, Sub-Saharan Africa: From crisis to sustainable growth, which concluded, amongst others, that underlying Africa’s desperate plight is a crisis of governance. The Bank’s definition of the term emphasises the following:

accountability of government officials and the civil service in the control of public funds;

transparency in procedures, investment decisions and appointments;

predictability in public policy;

open access to information; and

respect for the rule of law by governments and institutions.8

However, this is not to say that Western donors are intent on imposing immutable yardsticks and specifications irrespective of local circumstances and conditions. In this regard, the West is already showing a degree of flexibility in its approach to Africa. The Nairobi Bureau Chief of Time magazine has noted:

"France made it clear this year [1992] in several West African countries that democracy is relative and that Paris would not promote chaos over stability. The British seemed to prefer stability as well. US Ambassador Smith Hempstone’s relentless three-year drive for multiparty democracy in Kenya had British diplomats irate over its ‘naiveté’ ..."9

ETHNIC CONFLICT, SECESSIONISM AND BORDER ADJUSTMENTS

The prospects for peace and stability in Africa are still strewn with obstacles. Many observers foresee a continent wrecked with ethnic strife, borders being challenged and civil wars becoming a growing problem. The very existence of many African states, it is commonly argued, will be threatened by the centrifugal forces of ethnicity. The genocidal blood-letting in Burundi following the 21 October 1993 coup, and the massacres in Rwanda, provide the most recent evidence for such fears. There are apprehensions, too, that instability and economic decline will also encourage the rise of radical political Islam, as is evident in Egypt, Sudan and Algeria.

At an international level, very few problems threaten world peace more than ethnicity and nationalism. Tribal and religious conflicts are as bitter and protracted as racial warfare.

Race and ethnicity are merely different shades of a common human tendency to categorise and discriminate. In the former Soviet Union and elsewhere, release from oppression and enforced ideology has unleashed a torrent of nationalist sentiment and resentment, as seen, for instance, in the fighting between Armenians and Azeris in Nagorno-Karabakh and in the Russian assault on the breakaway republic of Chechnya. The bitter conflict in Yugoslavia, frozen for half a century by a socialist system, also reflects a world-wide awakening of nationalism and sub-nationalism, across international boundaries. In Czechoslovakia, Slovak secessionism divided the state into two separate countries at midnight on 31 December 1992; and in Canada, the Quebec separatists have recently become the second most powerful body in the Canadian parliament. The widespread reawakening and resurgence of pre-existent identities across the globe is also reflected in Africa where, as in Central and Eastern Europe, the authoritarian lid has been or is being lifted. Similar to the former Socialist Bloc, there is a chance that Africa’s "second liberation" will unleash forces which will challenge, and in some cases alter, the continent’s colonially imposed and mostly unchanged, international borders. For three decades, the OAU cultivated the view that, if only one secessionist group was successful, it would herald the dissolution of many other states. In such an event, chaos and disorder would sweep through Africa on an unprecedented scale. There is barely a state in Africa whose leadership have not been plagued by the problem of regional disaffection and dismembership.

But in the new world order, the OAU and its constituent members will have to accept some negotiated adjustment to the continent’s frontiers as an option infinitely more preferable to decades of debilitating civil war. Indeed, the process is already underway: on the one hand, there was the birth of Africa’s 53rd independent state, Eritrea, on 24 May 1993; and on the other, there was the agreement for the 1994 incorporation of Walvis Bay into Namibia. There is also the declaration of independent sovereignty by the predominantly Issaq Somali National Movement (SNM) in the Republic of Somaliland (formerly British Somaliland). The main trend in Africa seems to be an increase in the number of countries via division; but a countervailing trend also exists which may reduce the number of states or their size by possible incorporation or annexation, for instance Western Sahara by Morocco, Cabinda by Congo, northern Chad by Libya, and maybe Lesotho and Swaziland by a strongly confident black South African government. Although the great majority of the continent’s existing frontiers will, in all likelihood, remain the same, there will be some instances "where divorce along the lines of the Bangladesh secession" provides a solution. In other cases, opposition movements "may retain tacitly accepted control over its home region, because the central government cannot conquer it and the insurgents cannot gain formal recognition of independent statehood". 10

Apart from those already mentioned, further changes and secessionist declarations are most likely to occur in the following African countries.

Zaire Shaba/Katanga, Equateur du Nord;

Tanzania Zanzibar;

Sudan North/South division;

Somalia Patchwork of clan-based statelets;

Angola Cabinda, North/South separation; and

Nigeria Division into two, three or more states.

Two final points should be made regarding the global renaissance of ethnic / nationalist sentiments. Firstly, the concern of African leaders over the polarising impact of multi-party politics cannot be readily dismissed, given the apparent importance of ethnic particularism in Africa. Secondly, when border delineation is considered, the notion of introducing semi-boundaries within African countries such as federal structures, should be kept in mind, "as a means of disaggregating centralised state power, balancing competing ethnic claims on economic resources, and protecting freedom of association". In this manner, federal administrations "may find that national political loyalties can be strengthened rather than weakened by diffusing autocratic power and providing cultural autonomy".11 On the other hand, it has been noted that efforts to solve the problems of ethnic plurality via a federalist dispensation have exacerbated, rather than stabilised, the segmentation of political society, as is the case in Nigeria.12

FOREIGN INTERVENTION AND CONFLICT RESOLUTION

One of the major problems in Africa during 1960-1990 were civil wars born of tribal or ideological conflict, many of which had Cold War implications. In the past four years, some of these conflicts have been resolved, but in other cases, centuries-old ethnic and religious feuds have reappeared with a vengeance, posing a formidable threat to the stability of the newly established multi-party states.

For several decades, Western and East Block intervention in Africa was motivated, primarily, by geographical interests. But with the end of the Cold War, these strategic considerations have all but disappeared. The world-wide containment of communism, as the guiding force behind American and Western European intervention, has disappeared. However, this is being replaced, at least to some extent, by new imperatives: global humani-tarianism, fostering of democracy and the promotion of global security.

In the new world order, the international community has begun to insist that human interests come before the interests of states.13 The question of intervention is thus closely linked to that of state sovereignty, an issue that received sharp focus with the end of the Gulf War and as a result of events in Bosnia, Somalia and Iraq. The decision by Washington, London and Paris to intervene in Northern Iraq to establish a separate Kurdish state, constituted both a direct challenge to the sovereignty of Baghdad, as well as an unprecedented innovation in the policy of external humanitarian intervention. This moral justification, which may be linked to other motives, bases its legitimacy in Article 24 of the UN Charter which obliges the Security Council to "assume primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security", an impossible task in the days of the Cold War.

The "activist" policy followed by the West, and especially by the USA, in Africa, which implies engagement in conflict prevention and resolution, is likely to be co-ordinated with a number of other policy dimensions:

It will be coupled with greater emphasis on assistance for indigenous peace-making mechanisms via the OAU. The State Department foresees co-operation with the OAU in regional conflict resolution and argues that Washington should support African initiatives to enhance OAU capabilities. It is assumed that any such mechanism under OAU auspices will be short of funds and under-equipped. Because of this, the USA can be expected to assist the OAU to develop a modest communication and logistics infrastructure for use in monitoring cease-fire, demobilisation and election scenarios. The Clinton administration’s "reality therapy" in Somalia has already resulted in much talk of "African solutions for African problems", but assisted by Washington and the UN wherever possible. It should be noted, however, that the USA’s activist policy is endangered by a growing mood of retreat and disengagement in Congress.



Secondly, for both political and economic reasons, the USA’s involvement in programmes to reduce and rationalise the continent’s military establishments will be broadened and deepened. These activities should be regarded as one facet of the United States’ desire to promote "core values" (i.e. democrati-sation). South Africa will also be subject to such pressures, but it will be alleviated by the West’s interest in seeing South Africa take up its rightful role and obligations as a regional superpower. On the other hand, Pretoria’s place in African peace-keeping could be undermined by regional fears that the SANDF is the largest and best-equipped force on the sub-continent.



A third dimension of American military policy in Africa will include the maintenance of access to a number of air and naval facilities for US contingency operations in the Middle East.



Finally, whilst Washington’s activist role in conflict resolution does "not preclude possible border adjustments", the USA and its European allies will not encourage self-determination to be applied continually until it reaches its lowest common denominator. That is seen as a recipe for chaos.

CONCLUSIONS: PROSPECTS FOR PEACE AND DEMOCRACY

The majority of Africa’s 53 countries remain in some sort of political transition. In some states, however, free choice has been deferred; and in a number of others opposition to political pluralism could be prolonged almost indefinitely. It thus seems clear that the era of one-party and military rule in Africa has seen its heyday and is coming to an unsteady end. Multi-party elections monitored by the international community have become the accepted formula for transformation. For the fore-seeable future at least, the drive towards more accountable forms of government seems virtually irreversible. But despite the promise of reform, formidable obstacles remain to the spread of democracy on the continent.

For instance, the political excesses and gross human rights abuses of authoritarian single-party systems have been accompanied over decades by rising economic difficulties. For the public at large, the clamour for change has been an expression of discontent not only with political structures, but also with economic performance. In other words, political freedom has taken on the profile of the ultimate remedy for all the causes of popular discontent. Herein lies the danger. If democracy fails to deliver material prosperity, there could be a rapid return to the disenchantment that leads logically to the re-establishment of dictatorship. "It is therefore important to put the democracy movement and what it can realistically achieve in perspective. The economic underpinnings of politics will be the crucial, if not the deciding, factor in whether democracy will prevail." 14



Secondly, and more widely, is the fact that even if the democratic process does produce competent, honest and open administrations, the African continent can do little by itself to alter its unfavourable international economic circumstances (terms of trade, debt burden, dependence on commodity exports, etc.).



Another major hurdle is disputed electoral results, an issue that looms large in Angola, where the transition was disrupted following UNITA’s rejection of the September 1992 presidential and legislative elections, and in Nigeria, where the military government cancelled the June 1993 presidential election (apparently won by Moshood Abiola of the Social Democratic Party), while Mozambique must still translate its election results into practical governmental terms.



In the fourth place, many African governments’ public acceptance of the need to democratise, has not been accompanied by an equal commitment to encourage or permit the various forms of freedom upon which democracy rests: tolerance, a free and vigorous press and freedom of assembly and speech. As is evident in Kenya and Cameroon, it is quite possible to have a multi-party system in which the opposition parties and press are intimidated and therefore rendered largely ineffective.



In the fifth place, many African governments continue to maintain strong military and paramilitary forces whose loyalties, often ethnically reinforced, lie primarily with the ruling civilian elite. These units are frequently resistant to democratic trends - as was so graphically demonstrated in Burundi by the October 1993 coup attempt by a faction of the 1 500-strong rebel Tutsi-dominated army.



Related to the above is the thorny question of demobilising both government and rebel troops and reconstituting a unified army, one of the most difficult, but most important, conditions for free elections. The status of demobilised soldiers, many of whom have abandoned commitment to ideology for a life of crime, is closely connected to another legacy of the Cold War, namely the accumulated proliferation of infantry weapons. Many parts of the continent are literally awash with arms. What makes matters worse is that conventional disarmament in Europe has produced a second wave of cheap weapons world-wide, which could cause further disruptions in view of the apparent resurgence of economic and ethnic conflicts in Africa.



Finally, the drive for democracy has led to polarisation of particularistic groupings as parties crystallise mostly on the basis of tribal, regional and religious interests instead of coalescing around common ideology or political principles, all of which jeopardises the unity and stability of the state. Or as one observer puts it: "All endeavours of economic and democratic transformation ... will fail if a far more basic malaise is not overcome: the division, even antagonism, between the modern territorial state and ethnicity ... One may even say that ethnicity is well and alive whereas the African state is not." 15# And once ethnic conflict gets out of hand, it has the potential to plunge the state into full-scale civil war in which thousands are killed and entire communities are internally or externally displaced. Such wars break up the country’s physical infrastructure and seriously disrupt the vital agricultural sector which provides for the livelihood of most African families. It is crucial to stress that mass starvation in Africa owes more to warfare than to drought. Indeed, famine has never occurred on the continent unless warfare has coincided with drought. For all the above, a glimmer of light on the "Dark Continent" can be detected. Africa’s "second liberation" has been set in motion and the global community has not written Africa off altogether. Free or relatively free elections, of which there have been almost two dozen recently, constitute a key element in the process of transition; however, they are not in themselves sufficient. But while one can point to some successes in Africa during the past few years, these economic and political gains can still be reversed. In short, the transition to democracy and development has begun, although its success is by no means guaranteed. For the remainder of the century, one of the hardest tasks will be that of maintaining support for policies which will inevitably make most people poorer without simultaneously destroying the ambition and will to succeed in the years to come. At the same time, Africa will have to come to terms with, and reconcile, the contest between the forces of fragmentation and the imperative of integration: "The search for freedom ... tends toward fragmentation in the political realm, while the search for prosperity tends toward integration in the economic realm." 16

Notes

Press report on Huntington’s address, HSRC, July 1993. Financial Mail, 30 July 1993.



Marguerite Michaels, Retreat from Africa, Foreign Affairs, vol 72, no 1, pp 95-96.



For further details, see Baynham, Africa’s debt crisis, Africa Institute Bulletin, vol. 33, no. 4, pp. 1-4.



Quoted in Africa Recovery, vol. 4, no. 3/4, October - December 1990, p. 10.



Winrich Kühne, Africa and the end of the Cold War, Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik, Ebenhausen, December 1990, pp. 40-41.



Disarmament in the North will not free resources for economic development in the South because of the cost, i.e. the systematic destruction of heavy weapons, and "the conversion of the military industrial complex, is much more difficult and expensive than realised before", ibid., p.38.



Christopher Clapham, The African state in the post-Cold War era. Paper presented at the African Studies Association of South Africa (ASASA) biennial congress, Magaliesberg Conference Center, 17-18 June 1993, p. 6.



Whitney Schneidman, Africa’s transition to pluralism: Economic and investment implications. CSIS Africa Notes, no. 142, November 1992, p. 3.



Quoted by Marguerite Michaels, op cit., pp. 97-98.



Christopher Clapham, The African state, paper at the Royal African Society on sub-Saharan Africa: The Record and Outlook, St John’s College, Cambridge, 14-16 April 1991, p. 19.



Whitney Schneidman, op cit., p. 2.



Winrich Kühne, op cit., p. 31.



Stephen Stedman, The new internationalists, Foreign Affairs, vol. 72, no. 1, 1993, p. 16.



West Africa, 6-12 January 1992, p. 5.



Winrich Kühne, op cit., pp. 30-31.



Johan Gaddis, quoted in The Economist, 22 August 1992, p. 72.