Democratic Transitions in East Africa

F. Wafula Okumu

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN:
  9781138619326
• eBook ISBN:
  9780429557477
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Originally published in 2004. Genocide in Rwanda, massive floods of refugees and displaced people in the Horn of Africa, violent civil wars in the West African countries of Sierra Leone and Liberia - these are testimonies to the tremendous cost to grassroots communities when the authority and legitimacy of national political systems and leaders are called into question. The consolidation of democracy represents one tangible strategy to restore authority and legitimacy of political rule, providing the peace and security necessary for political enfranchisement and economic opportunity. This volume explores the factors that are crucial to the emergence of democratic political systems on the African continent, specifically focusing on Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. It highlights the political challenges facing these countries during this crucial transition period, and provides insights that are applicable to other countries engaged in this process in Africa and beyond.

Chapter 1
The Challenges of Democratic Transition in East Africa

Paul J. Kaiser and F. Wafula Okumu

Genocide in Rwanda, massive floods of refugees and displaced people in the Horn of Africa, and violent civil wars in the West African countries of Sierra Leone and Liberia are testimonies to the tremendous cost to grassroots communities when the authority and legitimacy of national political systems and leaders are called into question. The transition to and consolidation of democracy represents one tangible strategy to restore authority and legitimacy of political rule, providing the peace and security necessary for political enfranchisement and economic opportunity. The essays in this volume represent an attempt to explore the factors that are crucial to the emergence of democratic political systems on the African continent, specifically focusing on the East African countries of Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda.

The past decade has been a period of political transition for these East African countries. This transition has been influenced by local, national, and international factors that include the historical legacy of colonialism, the establishment of political parties/party systems, political leadership, constitutionalism, civil society, the economic reform process (with particular emphasis on the role of international financial institutions), the international community (particularly donor countries), and regime legitimacy. These factors have played different, yet instrumental roles in establishing and/or subverting an enabling environment for democracy to flourish, and they also serve as explanatory variables for understanding how and why there is sub-regional differentiation in the transition process. This edited volume highlights the political challenges facing Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda during this crucial transition period, and it also provides insights that are applicable to other countries engaged in this process in Africa and beyond.

The Case of Kenya

For more than three decades, Kenya was heralded as a success story in a region rife with political instability and chaos. After over twenty years of authoritarian rule by the country's first President, Jomo Kenyatta, Vice President Daniel arap Moi assumed the presidency and he remained in power until December 2002. The country experienced relative stability until 1992, when multi-partyism was introduced. The Kenyan government eventually accepted the multi-party system after much prodding from local opposition forces and Western donors. President Moi's Kenya African National Union (KANU) government successfully manipulated this transition for a decade, with the incumbent president remaining in power for two consecutive elected terms despite pre-election, government-orchestrated regional violence, and opposition claims of repeated and systematic registration and electoral irregularities. The December 2002 election of National Rainbow Coalition (NARC) presidential candidate Mwai Kibaki heralds a new chapter in Kenya's protracted transition. However, it remains to be seen if this alternation of power will ultimately lead to a stable and predictable democratic environment.

The Case of Tanzania

After Tanganyika achieved its independence in 1961 (and subsequently merged with Zanzibar in 1964 to form Tanzania), President Julius Nyerere soon became disenchanted with the system that he inherited from the British. This led to the establishment of a political and economic order based on his personal vision of African socialism, or ujamaa, that was articulated in the 1967 Arusha Declaration. After approximately twenty years of Nyerere's African socialism, economic and political stagnation led elected successor President Ali Hassan Mwinyi to cautiously steer the country toward economic and political reform. Tightly managed by the ruling Chama cha Mapinduzi (CCM) party, Tanzania mainland and Zanzibar islands CCM presidential candidates won the relatively peaceful 1995 and 2000 elections amidst accusations by local organizations, opposition political parties, and a wide array of international observers, that the electoral processes were marred by a combination of coercion, organizational ineptitude, and planned electoral fraud. Contention was especially pronounced in Zanzibar, where the opposition Civic United Front (CUF) was defeated by CCM in 1995 and 2000 amidst heightened controversy and subsequent violence. With a tenuous political détente holding in Zanzibar, and unsuccessful attempts by opposition parties to form a coalition to contest against the CCM presidential nominee in 2005, it remains to be seen if the country can continue the gradual process of political liberalization.

The Case of Uganda

In January 1986, Yoweri Museveni and his National Resistance Army assumed control of Uganda's capital of Kampala after years of violent civil war. Shortly thereafter, Museveni declared himself president and then proceeded to develop a functioning political system from the carnage left behind by the corrupt and violent leaders Idi Amin, Milton Obote, and Tito Okello. In lieu of advocating multi-partyism, the National Resistance Movement (NRM) was created to carefully enfranchise urban and rural dwellers without fomenting ethnic divisions that were the hallmark of past administrations. The 1994 Constituent Assembly elections demonstrated local support for Museveni's plan, with NRM supporters capturing approximately two thirds of the seats. A new constitution was established shortly thereafter, with Museveni subsequently winning two consecutive "no-party" presidential elections and a referendum that controversially legitimized the "movement" system of government in the land-locked country. With the political landscape quickly changing in the country, the future of the movement experiment is in doubt, along with the relative political calm that the NRM has provided.

Definitions, Transitions and Endpoints

We live in a democratic age. Through much of human history the danger to an individual's life, liberty and happiness came from the absolutism of monarchies, the dogma of churches, the terror of dictatorships, and the iron grip of totalitarianism. Dictators and a few straggling totalitarian regimes still persist, but increasingly they are anachronisms in a world of global markets, information, and media. There are no longer respectable alternatives to democracy, it is part of the fashionable attire of modernity. Thus the problem is within democracy [italics in original]. This makes them more difficult to handle, wrapped as they are in the mantle of legitimacy.¹

The increasingly global demand that authoritarian governments initiate sustained transitions to multi-party democracy has tested the will and creativity of many incumbent African leaders wishing to remain in power. Across the continent, variations on the democratic ideal have proliferated. Democratic experiments have been labeled "pseudo,"² "virtual,"³ "illiberal,"⁴ "semi,"⁵ and "embryonic,"⁶ to name just a few. Regardless of the label created or normative assumptions employed, a transition is underway that is fundamentally altering the authoritarian structures developed by the first generation(s) of African leadership. After a brief discussion of the characteristics of this democratic transition process, we will provide an overview of the structure and content of this edited volume.

A political transition requires an "interval between one political regime and another ... delimited, on one side, by the launching of the process of dissolution of an authoritarian regime and, on the other, by the installation of some form of democracy (or) the return to some form of authoritarian rule."⁷ This transition takes place when there is a genuine change in a political system and "not just in the individuals holding positions of political power." Change has to occur also "in the assumptions and methods of the political system, in how the system legislates, formulates, and implements policies, and in the ways in which individuals gain access to power."⁸ Such a transition can be influenced by a number of factors. Among these are the duration and the methods of the incumbent authoritarian regime.⁹

A transition process "begins with an opening whereby the authoritarian regime is weakened and the possibility emerges for political change." An opening can be created by factors such as "protests, strikes, the death of the leader, conflict in the ruling bloc, economic crises, and international events." However, the progress of transition, once it is launched, is determined by "the strength and preferences of both the authoritarian incumbents and the opposition." The authoritarian regime can either support the transition process after getting "guarantees of protection or influence under the new government" or it "may refuse to exit." In the later scenario, the transition can only "succeed if the opposition is able to gain enough support" to obtain power through an electoral defeat or mass action.¹⁰

Since authoritarian incumbents have little interest in introducing political changes that undermine their dominance in the political system, they often initiate reform only "when they perceive that they have little choice but to attempt to channel social movement opposition into political parties ... [or they] try to use the electoral arena as a means to manipulate the opposition." Authoritarian incumbents often prefer graduated reforms to single iterations; the aim is to "make only the minimum number of concessions necessary to ensure the opposition's continued participation without conceding anything more." Incumbent rulers also "divide and conquer the opposition" by "supporting artificial 'window dressing' opposition parties." Finally, they attempt to get "strikers, students, and other potentially disruptive trouble makers 'off the regime's back,' and out of the unpredictable realm of street demonstrations and picket lines and into the highly regulated realm of campaigns and elections."¹¹

The initial stages of a democratic transition are deemed successful when a government "meets the minimal definition of democracy,"¹² in which the political system "supplies regular constitutional opportunities for changing the governing officials, and a social mechanism which permits the largest possible part of the population to influence major decisions by choosing among contenders for political office."¹³ The democratic transition process is subsequently consolidated when democratic norms and institutions are strengthened and the new regime "does not have the perverse elements undermining (democracy's) basic characteristics."¹⁴ This process should also provide "all the relevant political forces a chance to win from time to time," and make "even losing under democracy more attractive than losing under non-democratic alternatives."¹⁵ Consolidation is further enhanced after a period "leading to a truly competitive and 'free and fair' election in which there is a genuine possibility of an alternation of government from an authoritarian incumbent regime, or remnants of such, to the opposition."¹⁶ There needs to be a broad consensus representing a cross-section of society that democratic practice is the only acceptable type of rule, or "the only game in town."¹⁷

But how long does it take to complete a transition? Some have argued that the transition "from legalization of opposition parties to the holding of free and fair, direct elections for president or the national congress could last over 30 years,"¹⁸ while others caution that transitions will fail if an incumbent authoritarian regime controls the liberalization process or strengthens its support coalition.¹⁹

The contributors to this volume have carefully charted this transition in East Africa by comparatively addressing key themes that have emerged in contemporary research on democracy on the continent.

Key Themes Under Investigation

Historical Context

There are a number of studies that have highlighted the democratic values and practices that characterized the pre-colonial period. Studies have been conducted on the mechanisms of traditional debate and consultation, systems of checks and balances, accountability, and popular inclusion in political decision-making.²⁰ In Thomas Burgess' chapter on the historical context of current democratic transitions underway in East Africa, he points out that ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of Charts and Tables
• List of Contributors
• Acknowledgements
• List of Abbreviations
• 1 The Challenges of Democratic Transition in East Africa
• 2 The History of an Ideal
• 3 Political Parties and Party Systems
• 4 Political Leadership
• 5 Constitutional Reform
• 6 Civil Society
• 7 Structural Adjustment and Economic Reform
• 8 International Context
• 9 The Crisis of Legitimacy, Representation, and State Hegemony
• Timeline of Key Historical Events
• Select Journals and Periodicals
• Select East African Newspapers
• Major Works Cited
• Index