Brief Paper 1/1998: Construccíón Democrática y Gobernabilidad en Africa

Abstract:

African political players are today faced with a double challenge: building democratic regimes and, at the same time, equipping them with governments capable of managing the transformations necessary for development. A close look at this phenomenon reveals that democracy building has generally privileged the electoral dimension of the process rather than the underlying social and political dynamics. Moreover, the adoption of Western democratic standards has generated a certain determinism based on the belief in a linear evolution of African societies towards a model of universal democracy. In this sense, it seems necessary to make a clear distinction between democratic principles and the universality of the model. Accepting the existence of a series of democratic principles of unequivocal validity does not, of course, imply the affirmation of the validity of a model applicable to all societies. Confusion between these two dimensions seems to be at the root of certain tensions, such as that between indigenous forms of political participation and those adopted by constitutional and legislative texts based on Western sources. On the basis of the African democratic experiences of this decade, it is interesting to question the validity of the so-called “Western model” for Africa. Communication at the CESA 1997 Seminar: The Problematic of Development – History and a Transdiciplinary Perspective, Conference Construção Democrática e Contributos Actuais numa Governance em África (Democratic Construction and Current Contributions to Governance in Africa), 23 May 1997.

Quotation:

Comunicação no Seminário CEsA 1997: A Problemática do Desenvolvimento – Historicidade e Contributos Actuais numa Óptica Transdiciplinar, Conferência “Construção Democrática e ‘Governance’ em África”, 23 de Maio de 1997.