AbaThembu King Buyelekhaya Dalindyebo is fighting a 12-year jail sentence for arson and other crimes.
Reuters/Sumaya Hisham
By challenging the courts, King Dalindyebo is testing the degree of impunity with which traditional leaders can get away.
Whatever the terms agreed by the 12 trade ministers who signed the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the text is unlikely to include the word ‘democracy’.
Reuters/USTR Office
Why has the United States, the great engine of democratisation, advanced a pact that is silent on a defining theme of its foreign policy?
Reuters/Zoubeir Souissi
Arguably the Arab spring’s one true success story, Tunisia is getting the recognition it deserves.
Wided Bouchamaoui, president of Tunisia’s Employers’ Organisation and a member of Tunisia’s National Dialogue Quartet.
Zoubeir Souissi/Reuters
By forging to dialogue to achieve consensus, Tunisia’s Quartet are worthy winners.
So strong is public opposition to his miltarist policies that Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, having ignored the popular will, faces questions about democratic representation.
AAP Image/Newzulu/Munesuke Yamamoto
Shinzo Abe’s government (now in its second term) has consistently been vocal about Japan’s national defence.
Supporters of the Congress of South African Trade Unions march in the streets of Johannesburg. Economic freedom has eluded the majority of South Africans.
Siphiwe Sibeko/Reuters
Economic transformation of unequal societies in a democratising context is difficult. This requires a creative mix of policy options underpinned by a commitment to social justice.
The wisdom of crowds? An anti-corruption rally in India.
Ishan Khosla
Could the key to countering a culture of bribery and greed be in the hands of the people?
Post-election violence in Kenya in January 2008. The country was forewarned in its peer review report that trouble was brewing, but took no action.
EPA
The African Peer Review Mechanism has made a difference since it was started in 2003. There are multiple examples of reforms that have been introduced as a result. All have gone unnoticed.
Vendors sell bananas in an open market in a village near Bujumbura. Burundians are being driven deeper into poverty.
Reuters/Goran Tomasevic
Whenever the crisis in Burundi is discussed, the economy is often overlooked, even though it is central to understanding the backdrop to the most severe crisis since the end of the civil war.
King Mswati III, centre, with his regiments at Ludzidzini royal palace during the annual Reed Dance in August. Swaziland ranks among the worst in Africa for its level of democracy.
Reuters/Siphiwe Sibeko
Satisfaction with democracy varies widely in Africa. Across 28 countries, only 46% of citizens say they are “very satisfied” or “fairly satisfied” with the way democracy works in their countries.
Reuters/Edgar Su
By leveraging a wave of national celebration and a friendly state-funded media, Singapore’s authoritarian elite has as firm a grip as ever.
Raise your glasses.
Reuters/Russell Cheyne
If Labour can turn its fiasco of a leadership election into a voter registration drive, it can push back against a rigged system.
The message from Germany.
justflix
What happens to energy policy when democracy takes a back seat – and no one mentions the war.
Enough is enough: Guatemalans protesting outside congress.
Reuters/Jorge Lopez
Two Central American democracies are in turmoil – but don’t call it a revolution.
The funeral of General Adolphe Nshimirimana, assassinated in August 2015.
Reuters
Some of Burundi’s highest-ranking officials have been assassinated – but ordinary Burundians are still being terrorised too.
Online petitions almost certainly do not hold the same weight with their targets as offline petitions do.
shutterstock
Online petitions send a certain signal to politicians and other leaders: we care, but maybe not enough to get off our seats.
We all like free, but who really pays?
Image sourced from Shutterstock.com
While some are being given new platforms to express their views, the decline of paid journalism is shutting others out.
I could’ve sworn there were more of you yesterday…
EPA/Facundo Arrizabalaga
If Labour really is turfing “infiltrators” out of its purportedly open leadership election, it’s only proving that moderate centrism is often no such thing.
What do we want? Not quite sure. When do we want it? Now!
Reuters/Paulo Whitaker
Opposition to president Dilma Rousseff is growing, but there is division over what her fate should be.
Cairo’s Rabaa al-Adaweya Square before and after the August 14 massacre of more than 800 peaceful protesters in 2013.
Wikimedia Commons/Mazidan
Two years ago, on August 14, more than 800 protesters against a coup were massacred in Cairo. A court recently upheld the death sentence for Egypt’s ousted elected leader.