Democracy in Africa: No Time to Forsake It

Africa's mixed record of democratization, including the emergence of a large number of hybrid regimes committed to effective governance and real economic development but not Western-style democracy, has led some analysts and foreign policy makers to question the wisdom of promoting democracy as a core theme of U.S. Africa policy. Lately, the focus has been on the leaders who have come to power in Central Africa and the Horn -- Meles Zenawi of Ethiopia, Isaias Afwerki of Eritrea, Yoweri Museveni of Uganda, Paul Kagame of Rwanda, and Laurent Kabila of the former Zaire (Dan Connell and Frank Smyth, "Africa's New Bloc," March/April 1998).

Attention has focused on these five because upon taking power all inherited economic basket cases, and some the legacy of civil war. What sets this group apart is not their newness or cohesiveness as a bloc, but what they are against. All are committed to sweeping away the failures of the past, including the political class associated with those failures. All want to assert African control of the continent's destiny, and thus reject a deferential attitude toward outsiders and their advice. All are also impatient with leaders of neighboring states who do not share these objectives and whose regimes threaten their own. The conventional wisdom about the new leaders is that all have embraced economic reform, reestablished political stability, and reduced human rights abuses, but have resisted multiparty democracy -- a strategy that has achieved dramatic results. In this view they deserve, and indeed have received, the support of the international community because they are committed to putting their own houses in order.

NOT SO NEW

On closer inspection, one finds considerable variation among the chosen five. The so-called "new" leaders of Africa are not all new. Museveni has been in office for more than a decade; Meles and Isaias are approaching seven years. None plans to retire anytime soon. With respect to economic reform and the establishment of a strong free-market economy, all are pragmatic and have given up most of their earlier commitments to Marxism. Only Museveni, however, has delivered a comprehensive set of economic reforms. The others still distrust capitalists.

Are these regimes really stable? Only Isaias governs a truly stable country with broad-based political support. While Meles and Museveni have brought peace to their countries, they have not yet secured legitimacy among large sections of the population. Kagame rules a country that remains at war. Kabila has yet to reestablish a national political system for Congo, and there are doubts about whether he has the ability or the inclination to do so. Ethiopia and Uganda have set up decentralized structures of governance to manage ethnic conflict more effectively, but whether power will devolve to subnational governments remains to be seen. The new leaders' attitudes toward democracy also differ. Uganda has held free and fair elections -- although the candidates could not run as representatives of political parties -- in which Museveni was returned to power and a new parliament was elected. Elections in Ethiopia have not been free, while Eritrea is for practical purposes a one-party state.

DEMOCRACY: IT WORKS

The new leaders do believe, as conventional wisdom has it, that economic development must precede democracy. They reject the view that democratization and development are mutually supportive. Yet the African countries with the highest long-term growth rates have been Botswana and Mauritius, which also have the longest records of democratic rule. More recently, positive growth has returned to Benin, Ghana, Mozambique, and South Africa, where the resurgence of democracy has been strongest. Growth is also positive in Cote d'Ivoire, Tanzania, and Malawi, where democratic transitions are still at an early stage. Africa's worst performers during the 1990s -- Kenya, Nigeria, and the former Zaire -- are cases not of failed democratization but failed authoritarian rule. The views of the new leaders notwithstanding, the clear lesson from Africa is that economic renewal and democratization go hand in hand.

For U.S. policy, the implication of this relationship is that countries in different stages of democratic transition must be treated differently. African regimes can be divided into four categories. First are a handful of states with strong and potentially enduring commitments to both free-market economies and democratic governance but that are not yet consolidated democracies. In this category are Benin, Botswana, Mali, Madagascar, Mauritius, Namibia, and South Africa. Second are those that have demonstrated a modest to strong commitment to macroeconomic reform and have embarked on democratic transitions by holding multiparty elections or have carried out a significant degree of political liberalization. Included in this group are Burkino Faso, Cote d'Ivoire, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Senegal, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia. Third are those that have embraced macroeconomic reform but seek to promote development without democracy. In this group are Burundi, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Gabon, Gambia, Niger, and Rwanda. Fourth are those that either resist both economic reform and democratic rule or are unable to exercise authority across their territory due to civil war or state collapse. In this group are Angola, Cameroon, Congo, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Somalia, and Sudan.