Large countries such as the DRC, Ethiopia, and Mozambique are likely to experience pressures against centralized, authoritarian, or one-party governance (whether accompanied by real elections or not). African governance trends were transformed by the geopolitical changes that came with the end of the Cold War. The reasons why rural communities adhere to the traditional institutions are many (Logan, 2011; Mengisteab & Hagg, 2017). Learn more about joining the community of supporters and scholars working together to advance Hoovers mission and values. These features include nonprofits, non-profits and hybrid entities are now provide goods and services that were once delivered by the government. The book contains eight separate papers produced by scholars working in the field of anthropology, each of which focuses in on a different society in Sub-Saharan Africa. Subsequent to the colonial experience, traditional institutions may be considered to be informal institutions in the sense that they are often not sanctioned by the state. The movement towards a formal state system is characterized by its emphasis on retribution and punishment. The parallel institutional systems often complement each other in the continents contemporary governance. Printed from Oxford Research Encyclopedias, Politics. Ehret 2002 emphasizes the diversity and long history of precolonial social and political formations, whereas Curtin, et al. Issues of corruption and transparency are likely to become driving themes in African politics. This category of chiefs serves their communities in various and sometimes complex roles, which includes spiritual service. 79 (3), (1995) pp. The Constitution states that the institution, status and roles of traditional leadership, according to customary law, are recognised. Customary law also manages land tenure and land allocation patterns. Poor statesociety relations and weak state legitimacy: Another critical outcome of institutional fragmentation and institutional detachment of the state from the overwhelming majority of the population is weak legitimacy of the state (Englebert, 2000). Copy this link, or click below to email it to a friend. Prominent among these Sudanic states was the Soninke Kingdom of Ancient Ghana. Almost at a stroke, the relationships between African governments and the major powers and major sources of concessional finance were upended, while political liberalization in the former Soviet bloc helped to trigger global political shock waves. These circumstances can generate an authoritarian reflex and the temptation to circle the wagons against all sources of potential opposition. Government and Political Systems. Note that Maine and . This fragmentation is also unlikely to go away anytime soon on its own. Only four states in AfricaBotswana, Gambia, Mauritius, and Senegalretained multiparty systems. Decision making is generally participatory and often consensus-based. There were several reasons for such measures. The Dutch dispatched an embassy to the Asantehene's . But it also reflects the impact of Arab, Russian, Chinese, Indian, European and U.S. vectors of influence which project their differences into African societies. This we might call transformative resilience.21. African Governance: Challenges and Their Implications. Unfortunately, little attention by African governments has been given to this paradoxical aspect of traditional institutions. These migrations resulted in part from the formation and disintegration of a series of large states in the western Sudan (the region north of modern Ghana drained by the Niger River). Large segments of the rural populations, the overwhelming majority in most African countries, continue to adhere principally to traditional institutions. South Africas strategy revolves around recognition of customary law when it does not conflict with the constitution and involves traditional authorities in local governance. Certain offences were regarded as serious offences. Reconciling the parallel institutional systems is also unlikely to deliver the intended results in a short time; however, there may not be any better alternatives. Beyond the traditional sector, traditional institutions also have important attributes that can benefit formal institutions. Other governance systems in the post-independence era and their unique features, if any. Oftentimes, however, they contradict each other, creating problems associated with institutional incoherence. For example, the electoral college forces a republic type of voting system. According to this analysis, Africas traditional institutional systems are likely to endure as long as the traditional subsistent economic systems continue to exist. The political systems of most African nations are based on forms of government put in place by colonial authorities during the era of European rule. These consisted of monarchy, aristocracy and polity. There are several types of government that are traditionally instituted around the world. 1. The African state system has gradually developed a stronger indigenous quality only in the last twenty-five years or so. This proposal will be subject to a referendum on the constitutional changes required.16.2e 2.4 Traditional leadership Traditional leaders are accorded They must know the traditional songs and must also be able to improvise songs about current events and chance incidents. The political history of Africa begins with the emergence of hominids, archaic humans andat least 200,000 years agoanatomically modern humans (Homo sapiens), in East Africa, and continues unbroken into the present as a patchwork of diverse and politically developing nation states. One is the controversy over what constitutes traditional institutions and if the African institutions referred to as traditional in this inquiry are truly indigenous traditions, since colonialism as well as the postcolonial state have altered them notably, as Zack-Williams (2002) and Kilson (1966) observe. The Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (Alkire, Chatterjee, Conconi, Seth, & Vaz, 2014) estimates that the share of rural poverty to total poverty in sub-Saharan Africa is about 73.8%. Poor leadership can result in acts of commission or omission that alienate or disenfranchise geographically distinct communities. 134-141. Yet, the traditional judicial system in most cases operates outside of the states institutional framework. Judicial Administration. These different economic systems have corresponding institutional systems with divergent property rights laws and resource allocation mechanisms, disparate decision-making systems, and distinct judicial systems and conflict resolution mechanisms. Why can't democracy with African characteristics maintain the values, culture and traditional system of handling indiscipline, injustice and information management in society to take firm roots. Many African countries, Ghana and Uganda, for example, have, like all other states, formal institutions of the state and informal institutions (societal norms, customs, and practices). Before delving into the inquiry, clarification of some issues would be helpful in avoiding confusion. As noted, there are notable differences in the authority systems of African traditional institutions. An election bound to be held in the year 2019 will unveil the new . The key lies in identifying the variables that will shape its context. If more leaders practice inclusive politics or find themselves chastened by the power of civil society to do so, this could point the way to better political outcomes in the region. The origins of this institutional duality, the implications of which are discussed in Relevance and Paradox of Traditional Institutions, are largely traceable to the colonial state, as it introduced new economic and political systems and superimposed corresponding institutional systems upon the colonies without eradicating the existed traditional economic, political, and institutional systems. With respect to their relevance, traditional institutions remain indispensable for several reasons. Three layers of institutions characterize most African countries. Chief among them is that they remain key players in governing and providing various types of service in the traditional sector of the economy because of their compatibility with that economic system. African political elites are more determined than ever to shape their own destiny, and they are doing so. Such post-electoral pacts reflect the conclusion that stability is more important than democracy. Building an inclusive political system also raises the question of what levels of the society to include and how to assure that local communities as well as groups operating at the national level can get their voices heard. Although considerable differences exist among the various systems, opportunities for women to participate in decision making in most traditional systems are generally limited. Political leaders everywhere face competing demands in this regard. The chapter further examines the dabbling of traditional leaders in the political process in spite of the proscription of the institution from mainstream politics and, in this context, analyzes the policy rationale for attempting to detach chieftaincy from partisan politics. Even old-fashioned tyrants learn that inclusion or co-option are expensive. To complicate matters further, the role of traditional institutions is likely to be critical in addressing the problem of institutional fragmentation. Ndlela (2007: 34) confirms that traditional leaders continue to enjoy their role and recognition in the new dispensation, just like in other African states; and Good (2002: 3) argues that the system of traditional leadership in Botswana exists parallel to the democratic system of government and the challenge is of forging unity. This section grapples with the questions of whether traditional institutions are relevant in the governance of contemporary Africa and what implications their endurance has on Africas socioeconomic development. Contents 1. Among the key challenges associated with institutional fragmentation are the following: Policy incoherence: Fragmented economies and institutions represent dichotomous socioeconomic spaces, which makes it highly challenging for policy to address equitably the interests of the populations in these separate socioeconomic spaces. Given its institutional disconnect with the state, the traditional sector and the communities that operate under it invariably face marginalization in influencing policy as well as in access to economic resources throughout the continent. for a democratic system of government. These partners, for their part, sometimes disengaged from close political ties and often brought new governance conditions into their assistance programs. With the exceptions of a few works, such as Legesse (1973), the institutions of the decentralized political systems, which are often elder-based with group leadership, have received little attention, even though these systems are widespread and have the institutions of judicial systems and mechanisms of conflict resolution and allocation of resources, like the institutions of the centralized systems. In direct contrast is the second model: statist, performance-based legitimacy, measured typically in terms of economic growth and domestic stability as well as government-provided servicesthe legitimacy claimed by leaders in Uganda and Rwanda, among others. This page was processed by aws-apollo-l2 in. The first type is rights-based legitimacy deriving from rule of law, periodic elections, and alternation of political power, the kind generally supported by western and some African governments such as Ghana and Senegal. These include - murder, burglary, landcase, witchcraft, profaning the deities and homicide. Hoover scholars offer analysis of current policy challenges and provide solutions on how America can advance freedom, peace, and prosperity. Although much has been lost in the shadows and fogs of a time before people created written accounts, historians . South Africa has a mixed economy in which there is a variety of private freedom, combined with centralized economic . This brief essay began by identifying the state-society gap as the central challenge for African governance. In these relatively new nations, the critical task for leadership is to build a social contract that is sufficiently inclusive to permit the management of diversity. The geography of South Africa is vast scrubland in the interior, the Namib Desert in the northwest, and tropics in the southeast. A command economy, also known as a planned economy, is one in which the central government plans, organizes, and controls all economic activities to maximize social welfare. 1995 focuses on social, economic, and intellectual trends up to the end of the colonial era. Should inclusion be an ongoing process or a single event? Wise leadership respects ethnic diversity and works toward inclusive policies. Legitimacy based on successful predation and state capture was well known to the Plantagenets and Tudors as well as the Hapsburgs, Medicis, and Romanovs, to say nothing of the Mughal descendants of Genghis Khan.14 In this fifth model of imagined legitimacy, some African leaders operate essentially on patrimonial principles that Vladimir Putin can easily recognize (the Dos Santos era in Angola, the DRC under Mobutu and Kabila, the Eyadema, Bongo, Biya, and Obiang regimes in Togo, Gabon, Cameroon, and Equatorial Guinea, respectively).15 Such regimes may seek to perpetuate themselves by positioning wives or sons to inherit power. Throughout our over one-hundred-year history, our work has directly led to policies that have produced greater freedom, democracy, and opportunity in the United States and the world. They succeed when there are political conditions that permit a broad coalition to impose pluralist political institutions and limits and restraints on ruling elites.20 Thus, resilience of both state and society may hinge in the end on the rule of law replacing the rule of men. If African political elite opinion converges with that of major external voices in favoring stabilization over liberal peacebuilding agendas, the implications for governance are fairly clear.17. Safeguarding womens rights thus becomes hard without transforming the economic system under which they operate. On the other hand, their endurance creates institutional fragmentation that has adverse impacts on Africas governance and socioeconomic transformation. Traditional affairs. Our data indicate that traditional leaders, chiefs and elders clearly still play an important role in the lives Despite such changes, these institutions are referred to as traditional not because they continue to exist in an unadulterated form as they did in Africas precolonial past but because they are largely born of the precolonial political systems and are adhered to principally, although not exclusively, by the population in the traditional (subsistent) sectors of the economy. Governance also has an important regional dimension relating to the institutional structures and norms that guide a regions approach to challenges and that help shape its political culture.1 This is especially relevant in looking at Africas place in the emerging world since this large region consists of 54 statesclose to 25% of the U.N.s membershipand includes the largest number of landlocked states of any region, factors that dramatically affect the political environment in which leaders make choices. On the one hand, traditional institutions are highly relevant and indispensable, although there are arguments to the contrary (see Mengisteab & Hagg [2017] for a summary of such arguments). Indications are, however, that the more centralized the system is, the lower the accountability and popular participation in decision making. While this attribute of the traditional system may not be practical at the national level, it can be viable at local levels and help promote democratic values. Often women are excluded from participation in decision making, especially in patrilineal social systems. A second conflict pattern can develop along the lines of ethnic cleavages which can be readily politicized and then militarized into outright ethnic violence. Additionally, the transaction costs for services provided by the traditional institutions are much lower than the services provided by the state. In light of this discussion of types of inclusion, the implications for dealing with state fragility and building greater resilience can now be spelled out. If a critical mass of the leaderse.g., South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya, Ethiopia, Cote dIvoire, Algeria, Egyptare heading in a positive direction, they will pull some others along in their wake; of course, the reverse is also true. Strictly speaking, Ghana was the title of the King, but the Arabs, who left records . One-sided violence against unarmed civilians has also spiked up since 2011.4, These numbers require three major points of clarification. The system of government in the traditional Yoruba society was partially centralised and highly democratic. Consequently, national and regional governance factors interact continuously. Some regimes seem resilient because of their apparent staying power but actually have a narrow base of (typically ethnic or regional) support. First, many of the conflicts enumerated take place within a limited number of conflict-affected countries and in clearly-defined geographic zones (the Sahel and Nigeria; Central Africa; and the Horn.) The term covers the expressed commands of This page was processed by aws-apollo-l2 in 0.093 seconds, Using these links will ensure access to this page indefinitely. Careful analysis suggests that African traditional institutions lie in a continuum between the highly decentralized to the centralized systems and they all have resource allocation practices, conflict resolution, judicial systems, and decision-making practices, which are distinct from those of the state. The essay concludes with a sobering reflection on the challenge of achieving resilient governance. This discussion leads to an analysis of African conflict trends to help identify the most conflict-burdened sub-regions and to highlight the intimate link between governance and conflict patterns. However, the system of traditional government varied from place to place. This brief overview of conflict in Africa signals the severity of the security challenges to African governance, especially in those sub-regions that feature persistent and recurrent outbreaks of violence. 14 L.A. Ayinla 'African Philosophy of Law: A Critique' 151, available at Council of elders: These systems essentially operate on consensual decision-making arrangements that vary from one place to another. In this regard, the president is both the head of state and government, and there are three arms and tiers of rules by which the country is ruled. Executive, legislative, and judicial functions are generally attributed by most modern African constitutions to presidents and prime ministers, parliaments, and modern judiciaries. The question then becomes, how to be inclusive?19 A number of African states have decentralized their political decision-making systems and moved to share or delegate authority from the center to provincial or local levels. It is unlikely, however, that such harmony can be brought about by measures that aim to abolish the traditional system, as was attempted by some countries in the aftermath of decolonization.
Evidence from case studies, however, suggests that the size of adherents varies from country to country. 2. Chester A. Crocker is the James R. Schlesinger Professor of Strategic Studies at Georgetown University. Africas rural communities, which largely operate under subsistent economic systems, overwhelmingly adhere to the traditional institutional systems while urban communities essentially follow the formal institutional systems, although there are people who negotiate the two institutional systems in their daily lives. A more recent example of adaptive resilience is being demonstrated by Ethiopias Abiy Ahmed. A second attribute is the participatory decision-making system. Africa contains more sovereign nations than any other continent, with 54 countries compared to Asia's 47. Less than 20% of Africas states achieved statehood following rebellion or armed insurgency; in the others, independence flowed from peaceful transfers of authority from colonial officials to African political elites. An alternative strategy of bringing about institutional harmony would be to transform the traditional economic systems into an exchange-based economy that would be compatible with the formal institutions of the state. We know a good deal about what Africans want and demand from their governments from public opinion surveys by Afrobarometer. This chapter examines traditional leadership within the context of the emerging constitutional democracy in Ghana. In addition, resolution needs to be acceptable to all parties. This study points to a marked increase in state-based conflicts, owing in significant part to the inter-mixture of Islamic State factions into pre-existing conflicts. The features associated with this new form of governmental administration deal with smaller government responsibility for providing goods and services. However, there are customs and various arrangements that restrain their power. However, the traditional judicial system has some weaknesses, especially with respect to gender equality. The same technology vectors can also empower criminal, trafficking, and terrorist networks, all of which pose threats to state sovereignty. Africa's tumultuous political history has resulted in extreme disparities between the wealth and stability of its countries. Government: A Multifarious Concept 1.2. The first objective of the article is to shed light on the socioeconomic foundations for the resilience of Africas traditional institutions. Democratic and dictatorial regimes both vest their authority in one person or a few individuals. The US system has survived four years of a norm-busting president by the skin of its teeth - which areas need most urgent attention? 1. The challenge facing Africas leadersperhaps above all othersis how to govern under conditions of ethnic diversity.