tag:theconversation.com,2011:/global/topics/clientelism-26387/articlesclientelism – The Conversation2023-12-13T13:35:56Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2179602023-12-13T13:35:56Z2023-12-13T13:35:56ZGrowth of autocracies will expand Chinese global influence via Belt and Road Initiative as it enters second decade<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564937/original/file-20231211-23-i4omvy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Xi Jinping shakes hands with Chinese construction workers at a Belt and Road Initiative site in Trinidad and Tobago in June 2023.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/chinas-president-xi-jinping-shake-hands-with-chinese-news-photo/169793922">Frederic Dubray/AFP via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>China currently faces <a href="https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2023/10/18/chinas-economy-may-be-growing-faster-but-big-problems-remain">daunting challenges</a> in its domestic economy. But weakness in the real estate market and consumer spending at home is unlikely to stem its rising influence abroad. </p>
<p>In mid-October 2023, China celebrated the 10-year anniversary of its <a href="https://theconversation.com/chinas-belt-and-road-initiative-turns-10-xi-announces-8-new-priorities-continues-push-for-global-influence-216014">Belt and Road Initiative</a>, or BRI. The BRI seeks to connect China with countries around the world via land and maritime networks, with the aim of improving regional integration, increasing trade and stimulating economic growth. Through the expansion of the BRI, China also sought to extend its global influence, especially in developing regions.</p>
<p>During its first decade, the initiative has faced a <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/wadeshepard/2020/01/29/how-chinas-belt-and-road-became-a-global-trail-of-trouble/?sh=124d92a5443d">barrage of criticism from the West</a>, mainly for saddling countries with debt, inattention to environmental impact, and corruption. </p>
<p>It has also encountered unexpected challenges – notably the COVID-19 pandemic, which led to massive supply chain issues and restrictions on the movement of Chinese workers overseas. Yet, as the BRI heads into its second decade, global economic trends suggest it will continue to play an important role in spreading Chinese influence.</p>
<p>I’m an associate professor of global studies at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen, where I teach about <a href="https://hss.cuhk.edu.cn/en/teacher/1126">business-government relations</a> in emerging economies. In my new book, “<a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/chinas-chance-to-lead/2C88E7D955049471664120981CDF2DFB">China’s Chance to Lead</a>,” I discuss which countries have already and are now most likely to seek out and benefit from Chinese spending. Understanding this helps explain why China and the Belt and Road Initiative are poised to benefit greatly from the global economy over the next several decades.</p>
<h2>Malaysia’s unlikely prominence</h2>
<p>In October 2013, China President Xi Jinping announced the launch of the maritime portion of the BRI during a <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-24361172">speech in Jakarta</a>. At the time, Indonesia appeared to be an ideal candidate for Chinese infrastructure spending, yet it was Malaysia – surprisingly – that emerged as a far more avid participant. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564350/original/file-20231207-15-siwmcd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Aerial view of massive housing development in Malaysia" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564350/original/file-20231207-15-siwmcd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564350/original/file-20231207-15-siwmcd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564350/original/file-20231207-15-siwmcd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564350/original/file-20231207-15-siwmcd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564350/original/file-20231207-15-siwmcd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564350/original/file-20231207-15-siwmcd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564350/original/file-20231207-15-siwmcd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A view of Forest City, a condominium project launched under China’s Belt and Road Initiative, in Malaysia’s Johor state.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/this-aerial-photo-taken-on-june-16-2022-shows-a-general-news-photo/1241336726">Mohd Rasfan/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In comparison to Malaysia, Indonesia’s economy was <a href="https://www.worlddata.info/country-comparison.php?country1=IDN&country2=MYS">three times larger</a> and its population <a href="https://www.worlddata.info/country-comparison.php?country1=IDN&country2=MYS">nearly nine times bigger</a>, yet its gross domestic product per capita only was <a href="https://www.worlddata.info/country-comparison.php?country1=IDN&country2=MYS">one-third as high</a>. Indonesia also had enormous potential to increase its already substantial <a href="https://oec.world/en/profile/bilateral-country/idn/partner/chn">natural resources exports to China</a>. Taken together, these factors point to Indonesia’s far greater demand for infrastructure that would aid its economic development. </p>
<p>Furthermore, Indonesia’s democratic institutions were more conducive to attracting foreign investment. Its checks and balances enhanced policy stability and reduced political risk. By contrast, Malaysia’s government, which was dominated by a single ruling party coalition, lacked comparable checks and balances.</p>
<p>Despite Indonesia’s numerous advantages, Malaysia attracted a far larger volume of BRI spending during its first several years. Data provided by the <a href="https://www.aei.org/china-global-investment-tracker/">China Global Investment Tracker</a> indicates the value of newly announced infrastructure projects in Malaysia surged from US$3.5 billion in 2012 to over $8.6 billion in 2016. Spending in Indonesia, meanwhile, rose modestly from $3.75 billion to $3.77 billion over the same period.</p>
<p>Malaysia also enthusiastically participated in the <a href="https://www.cfr.org/china-digital-silk-road/">Digital Silk Road</a>, or DSR, launched in 2015. The DSR is the technological dimension of the BRI that aims to improve digital connectivity in Belt and Road countries. Malaysia Prime Minister Najib Razak engaged Jack Ma, the co-founder of Chinese tech giant Alibaba, as an adviser to develop e-commerce in 2016. This led to the creation in 2017 of a <a href="https://www.nst.com.my/business/2017/11/298317/%C2%A0digital-free-trade-zone-goes-live-nov-3">Digital Free Trade Zone</a>, an international e-commerce logistics hub next to the Kuala Lumpur International Airport.</p>
<p>With this foundation in place, Malaysia’s capital went on to become the first city outside China to adopt Alibaba’s <a href="https://www.wired.co.uk/article/alibaba-city-brain-artificial-intelligence-china-kuala-lumpur">City Brain</a> smart city solution in January 2018. City Brain uses the wealth of urban data to effectively allocate public resources, improve social governance and promote sustainable urban development. <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/pivotal-year-city-brain-other-middle-east-ai-news-carrington-malin-/">Dubai and other cities in the Middle East</a> followed. </p>
<p>Digital Silk Road projects in Indonesia during that period were far fewer, slower and less ambitious. They primarily involved the expansion of <a href="https://www.lse.ac.uk/ideas/Assets/Documents/updates/2022-SU-IndoChina-Updated.pdf">Chinese smartphone and e-commerce firms</a> in Indonesia.</p>
<p>What accounts for these contrasting responses? The short answer: their political regimes. And understanding that could be key to the global spread of Chinese influence in the coming years.</p>
<h2>State-owned business and clientelism</h2>
<p>In the lead-up to the May 2018 election, Malaysia’s ruling party and its allies <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/186810341803700307">worried they could lose power</a> after six decades of rule. Desperate to bolster support, Najib quickly identified <a href="https://thediplomat.com/2021/10/what-happened-to-chinas-bri-projects-in-malaysia/">numerous infrastructure megaprojects</a> in which Chinese state-owned businesses could partner with Malaysian counterparts.</p>
<p>Indonesia, by contrast, placed far greater emphasis on projects led by private business. For example, the Indonesia Morowali Industrial Park, “<a href="https://www.wired.com/story/workers-are-dying-in-the-ev-industrys-tainted-city/">the world’s epicenter for nickel production</a>,” is one of the largest Chinese investments in Indonesia and a joint venture between private Chinese and Indonesian companies. </p>
<p>As I discuss in <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/chinas-chance-to-lead/2C88E7D955049471664120981CDF2DFB">my book</a>, when rulers in autocracies with semi-competitive elections, like Malaysia’s, have a weak hold on power, their desire for Chinese spending is amplified. This relates to <a href="https://www.oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803095617734">clientelism</a>, or the delivery of goods and services in exchange for political support.</p>
<p>A higher level of state control in autocracies grants political leaders greater influence over the allocation of clientelist benefits, which aids leaders’ reelection efforts. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564351/original/file-20231207-27-yxvnt3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Najib Razak, prime minister of Malaysia, and Jack Ma Yun, founder of Alibaba Group, stand and clap" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564351/original/file-20231207-27-yxvnt3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564351/original/file-20231207-27-yxvnt3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564351/original/file-20231207-27-yxvnt3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564351/original/file-20231207-27-yxvnt3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564351/original/file-20231207-27-yxvnt3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=527&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564351/original/file-20231207-27-yxvnt3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=527&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564351/original/file-20231207-27-yxvnt3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=527&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Najib Razak, left, then-prime minister of Malaysia, and Jack Ma, Alibaba Group founder and executive chairman, attend a launch ceremony of the Digital Free Trade Zone in Kuala Lumpur.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/najib-razak-prime-minister-of-malaysia-and-jack-ma-yun-news-photo/1092858894">Thomas Yau/South China Morning Post via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Economic trends that will benefit China</h2>
<p>Even if China’s future growth is lower than the pre-pandemic period, these four features of the global economy are poised to benefit China and the Belt and Road Initiative over the next several decades. </p>
<p><strong>1. Global rise of autocracies</strong> </p>
<p><a href="https://www.v-dem.net/documents/29/V-dem_democracyreport2023_lowres.pdf">Over 60% of developing countries</a> are autocratic, according to data provided by the <a href="https://www.v-dem.net/">Varieties of Democracy Project</a>. This represented 72% of the global population in 2022, up from 46% in 2012. </p>
<p>For decades, the World Bank and affiliated regional development banks were the only game in town for development financing to low- and middle-income countries. Consequently, these global lenders could demand liberalizing reforms that were sometimes contrary to the interests of incumbent rulers, especially autocrats. </p>
<p>China’s rise has created an attractive alternative for autocratic regimes, especially since it does not impose the same kinds of conditions that often require loosening state controls on the corporate sector and reducing clientelism. Between 2014 and 2019, I find that 77% of total BRI spending on construction projects went to autocracies, and primarily to those with semi-competitive elections.</p>
<p><strong>2. Demand for Chinese infrastructure spending</strong></p>
<p>The economies of developing countries have grown <a href="https://www.imf.org/external/datamapper/NGDP_RPCH@WEO/WEOWORLD/ADVEC/OEMDC">more than twice as quickly</a> as advanced economies since 2000 and are projected to <a href="https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/research-insights/economy/the-world-in-2050.html">outpace advanced economies</a> in the decades ahead. On the eve of the Soviet Union’s dissolution in 1991, developing economies accounted for 37% of global GDP; by 2030, the International Monetary Fund projects they will account for <a href="https://www.imf.org/external/datamapper/PPPSH@WEO/OEMDC/ADVEC/WEOWORLD">around 63%</a>. </p>
<p>At the same time, the global infrastructure financing gap – that is, the money needed to build and upgrade existing infrastructure – is estimated to be around <a href="https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/econographics/the-global-infrastructure-financing-gap-where-sovereign-wealth-funds-swfs-and-pension-funds-can-come-in/#:%7E:text=The%20global%20infrastructure%20financing%20gap%20is%20estimated%20to%20be%20around,year%20in%20the%20infrastructure%20sector.">$15 trillion</a> by 2040. To fill this gap, the world must spend just under $1 trillion more than the previous year up through 2040, with most of this spending directed toward low-income economies.</p>
<p>Because many of these fast-growing, low-income countries are predominantly semicompetitive autocracies, China is well-positioned to expand its global influence via the Belt and Road Initiative. </p>
<p><strong>3. Emerging tech</strong></p>
<p>The advent of what is known as <a href="https://www.mckinsey.com/featured-insights/mckinsey-explainers/what-are-industry-4-0-the-fourth-industrial-revolution-and-4ir">Industry 4.0 technologies</a>, such as artificial intelligence, big data analytics and blockchain, could enable developing countries to <a href="https://hub.unido.org/sites/default/files/publications/Unlocking%20the%20Potential%20of%20Industry%204.0%20for%20Developing%20Countries.pdf">leapfrog stages of development</a>. </p>
<p>By creating <a href="https://www.nbr.org/publication/setting-the-standards-locking-in-chinas-technological-influence/">new technical standards</a> to be used in these emerging digital technologies, China aims to lock in Chinese digital products and services and lock out non-Chinese competitors wherever its standards are adopted. </p>
<p>In Tanzania, for example, the Chinese company contracted to deploy the national ICT broadband network constructed it to be <a href="https://www.cfr.org/sites/default/files/pdf/Chinas%20Digital%20Silk%20Road%20and%20Africas%20Technological%20Future_FINAL.pdf">compatible only with routers</a> made by Chinese firm Huawei. </p>
<p>Incorporating digital technologies into hard infrastructure projects – digital traffic sensors on roads, for example – presents more opportunities for China to use the Belt and Road Initiative to promote adoption of its technologies and standards globally.</p>
<p><strong>4. Urbanization</strong></p>
<p>Finally, the developing world’s <a href="https://ourworldindata.org/urbanization#:%7E:text=Across%20all%20countries%2C%20urban%20shares,from%2054%25%20in%202016">urban population</a> is expected to rise from 35% in 1990 to 65% by 2050. The biggest increases will likely occur in the semi-competitive autocracies of Africa. A desire for sustainable urbanization will increase the demand for infrastructure that incorporates digital technologies – once again amplifying the opportunity for China and the BRI. </p>
<p>Understanding what drives the demand for the Belt and Road Initiative, and the trends that will propel it into the future, is vital for the West to devise an effective strategy that counters China’s rising global influence.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/217960/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Richard Carney does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>More autocratic governments, growing urbanization and emerging technologies will bolster the spread of Chinese influence around the world, an expert on emerging economies explains.Richard Carney, Associate professor of global studies, Chinese University of Hong Kong, ShenzhenLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1679332021-09-17T12:42:57Z2021-09-17T12:42:57ZAngola’s president has little to show for his promise of a break with the authoritarian past<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/421542/original/file-20210916-15-lrg5m6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Joao Lourenco, the President of Angola. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EFE-EPA/Clemens Bilan</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>It’s <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/9/26/angola-swears-in-joao-lourenco-as-president">four years</a> since João Lourenço was sworn in as Angola’s third president. He succeeded former president José Eduardo dos Santos, who had governed the southern African nation <a href="http://www.thepresidency.gov.za/national-orders/recipient/president-jos%C3%A9-eduardo-dos-santos-1942">for 38 years</a>.</p>
<p>Lourenço promised to initiate a wide range of much-needed reforms. This included curbing corruption and diversifying Angola’s oil-dependent economy. Many Angolans saw his presidency as the beginning of a more open and accountable government.</p>
<p>He has taken <a href="https://freedomhouse.org/country/angola/freedom-world/2020">a number of steps in this direction</a>. He opened up the political space by meeting longtime critics of Dos Santos’ government, including the investigative journalist <a href="https://globalfreedomofexpression.columbia.edu/cases/case-of-rafael-marques-de-morais/">Rafael Marques de Morais</a>. Lourenço also criticised violent security responses to peaceful anti-government demonstrations and urged state owned media to report outside the ruling People’s Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) party line. Other steps he took included easing down on repression, and creating a freer environment for the press and civil society. </p>
<p>These gained him significant political support from opposition parties and society at large. </p>
<p>However, four years into his presidency and a year to the end of his first term, the optimism his election generated has dwindled as his electoral promises have not become reality. </p>
<p>His flagship policies, such as tackling corruption and diversify Angola’s economy away from oil dependence, have stalled. And some of his initial liberalising moves are being reversed. These include his openness to civil society, the call for an end to heavy-handed security responses against protesters and partisan reporting by public media outlets. This is leaving Angola’s authoritarian political system largely unchanged. </p>
<p>In addition, the economy has not grown under Lourenço and economic diversification is yet to happen. As <a href="https://novojornal.co.ao/economia/interior/se-o-sector-petrolifero-se-movimenta-contra-nos-toda-a-economia-entra-em-stress--vera-daves-de-sousa-104026.html">acknowledged</a> by Finance Minister Vera Daves de Sousa in late August:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>if the oil sector moves against us, the whole economy goes into stress.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This is important because, as was the <a href="https://theconversation.com/state-of-democracy-in-africa-changing-leaders-doesnt-change-politics-144292">case with Zimbabwe</a>, it shows that change in leadership does not necessarily engender political and economic change.</p>
<h2>What’s wrong in the state of Angola</h2>
<p>The power structure in Angola <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/angola-the-fall-of-the-dos-santos-clan/a-45646757">was shaped</a> during the course of Dos Santos’ nearly four-decade long presidency. It gives extensive powers to the president, who is also the leader of the ruling party, the MPLA. It also ensures the dominance of the party in government and state institutions.</p>
<p>Following his inauguration in 2017, Lourenço <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-angola-politics-idUSKBN1CW10S">replaced</a> most of Dos Santos’ loyalists in government and in the governing party with close associates. He appointed allies to key positions in the army, police, intelligence services, government, state-owned companies and the party.</p>
<p>Recently, he initiated and enacted a <a href="https://theconversation.com/angolas-constitution-is-under-review-but-a-great-deal-has-been-left-undone-165544">Constitutional Revision Law</a> that effectively keeps the Angolan judiciary hostage to political power. It also retains the president’s prerogative to appoint key judicial officers. These include the attorney general and his deputies as well as the presiding judges and deputy presiding judges of the highest courts.</p>
<p>In addition, oversight institutions remain toothless as the president and the ruling party have the prerogative to appoint candidates to serve on them. They often dominate these institutions and their processes by virtue of their combined numbers. These include the Constitutional Court, the National Electoral Commission and the entity responsible for media regulation. </p>
<p>On top of this, there has been a progressive closure of the political space over the past two years. The security services have become <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2021/02/04/angola-security-forces-kill-protesters-lunda-norte-province">more repressive</a>. This has been especially so against young activists who have been protesting against the high cost of living and high unemployment. </p>
<h2>Same old authoritarian practices</h2>
<p>State-owned media (television, radio and press) have reverted to their old ways of partisan reporting. For instance, Adalberto Costa Junior, <a href="https://news.yahoo.com/angolan-opposition-unita-elects-leader-191331499.html">the leader of Unita</a>, Angola’s main opposition party, has not been interviewed by public media outlets since his election two years ago. </p>
<p>The government has almost absolute control over television since it <a href="https://allafrica.com/stories/202107230385.html">suspended</a> some private television companies. Other TV channels were ordered <a href="https://cpj.org/2021/05/angola-suspends-3-tv-channels-for-alleged-improper-registration/">to close for allegedly operating illegally </a>.</p>
<p>There is a multiparty system in Angola. But opposition parties don’t have much say in parliament. The ruling party <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/25/world/africa/angola-election-dos-santos-president-lourenco.html">has the numbers</a> to approve or block any legislation or policy that does not advance its interests. </p>
<p>This has allowed the MPLA <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-covid-19-cant-be-blamed-for-angolas-failure-to-have-local-governance-144685">to consistently delay the implementation</a> of elected local government. Under the current system of centralised governance, the ruling party gets to appoint all state officials at subnational level (provincial governor, municipal and district administrators). </p>
<h2>Preparing for next year’s elections</h2>
<p>Lourenço’s popularity, and that of the ruling party, <a href="https://www.rfi.fr/pt/angola/20210220-sondagem-aponta-l%C3%ADder-da-unita-mais-popular-que-jo%C3%A3o-louren%C3%A7o">continues to decline</a>. This is due to the cumulative effects of a <a href="https://www.afdb.org/en/countries/southern-africa/angola/angola-economic-outlook">severe economic crisis</a> which started in 2014, the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change. </p>
<p>The President and the MPLA seem to be devising strategies to ensure their continued stay in power. These include: </p>
<ul>
<li><p>keeping a highly contested official at the helm of the National Electoral Commission, </p></li>
<li><p>the creation of new provinces, and</p></li>
<li><p>the approval of a controversial electoral law, which prevents votes from being counted at district, municipal and provincial levels. </p></li>
</ul>
<p>This raises serious concerns about the transparency of the general elections <a href="https://allafrica.com/stories/202108230386.html">due next year</a>. In the end, Lourenço sent the controversial electoral law back to parliament for further discussion following mounting criticism from opposition parties and civil society.</p>
<p>The main opposition forces have been capitalising on these and other failures to criticise Lourenço’s government while advancing strategies to challenge the hegemony of the ruling party. One such initiative is the political alliance being formed by Unita, the Democratic Bloc and PraJá Servir Angola to run in the upcoming elections as a United Patriotic Front. This should potentially make the general election <a href="https://allafrica.com/stories/202108230386.html">next year</a> more competitive.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/167933/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Albano Agostinho Troco does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The optimism Angolan president João Lourenço’s election generated four years ago has dwindled as electoral promise after another have failed to materialise.Albano Agostinho Troco, NRF/British Academy Postdoctoral Research Fellow under the SA-UK Bilateral Chair in Political Theory, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1675172021-09-14T16:10:37Z2021-09-14T16:10:37ZMarriages of inconvenience: the fraught politics of coalitions in South Africa<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/420279/original/file-20210909-21-zmb5t2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Former Nelson Mandela Bay Mayor Athol Trollip, from the DA, third from left, and his deputy Mongameli Bobani, from the UDM, extreme right, help clean up a street in 2017. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">by Werner Hills/Foto24/Gallo Images/Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The popularity of the African National Congress (ANC), which has governed South Africa since <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/south-african-general-elections-1994">the end of apartheid in 1994</a>, has slipped in successive elections from its high of over <a href="http://archive.ipu.org/parline-e/reports/arc/2291_94.htm">60%</a>. First it declined to under <a href="https://www.elections.org.za/NPEDashboard/app/dashboard.html">60% </a>, then to below <a href="https://www.eisa.org/eu/eu2016main.htm">50%</a> in the cities of Tshwane, Johannesburg, and Nelson Mandela Bay in 2016. </p>
<p>Nonetheless, the Democratic Alliance (DA), the official opposition, shows no sign of benefiting from the ANC’s slack – hardly reaching even 30% of the votes cast. Instead, the ANC’s numbers have been absorbed by small, mostly new parties.</p>
<p>Inevitably, South Africa is in for many decades of coalitions. This is the central theme of a new <a href="https://mistra.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/MISTRA-Marriages-of-Inconvenience-layout-FA-chap-10.pdf">book</a>, <em>Marriages of Inconvenience: The Politics of Coalitions in South Africa</em>, which takes a forward-looking view of the country politics but also a historical one.</p>
<p>Political scientist <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/susan-booysen-197872">Susan Booysen</a> and the <a href="https://mistra.org.za/">Mapungubwe Institute for Strategic Reflection</a>, the independent think tank, have done themselves proud by assembling a team of 15 scholars to publish this authoritative 528 page volume. It shows both the nation’s track record of previous municipal and provincial coalitions, and what factors will influence future successes and failures in the new round of coalitions that will come after the <a href="https://www.enca.com/news/local-government-elections-be-held-1-november">1 November 2021 local government elections </a>.</p>
<p>South Africans ought, at the least, to remember their former Government of National Unity <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/south-african-government-national-unity-gnu-1994-1999">between 1994-97</a>: this was a grand coalition of the then three largest parties in Parliament – the ANC, National Party, and the Inkatha Freedom Party – diverse in policies, but united in the intention to defuse the threat of continued civil war. </p>
<p>From 1983-89 South Africa was in a low-level civil war, including rioting, petrol-bombing, assassinations, wildcat general strikes, and <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/archive/covert-operations">massacres</a>.</p>
<p>The political future will be markedly different, the authors say. In short, voters face a mix of parties winning an outright majority in some towns, but increasingly requiring coalitions to hold power in other towns. For this reason, South Africa will increasingly, but variably and intermittently, enter into interparty coalition arrangements in the years to come. (p.6)</p>
<h2>Lessons from elsewhere</h2>
<p>Part of this book examines coalitions in other countries, whose lessons South Africa could heed. At one extreme, Mauritius had a coalition which lasted 15 years (p.453). At the other, Italy has suffered 30 prime ministers after World War II - of whom only four lasted five years or more. Belgium took 13 attempts over 493 days to negotiate a coalition in 2019; after their 2010 election, they took 541 days to succeed in forming a coalition. (p.462)</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/what-two-books-have-to-say-about-the-political-lifespan-of-south-africas-anc-103377">What two books have to say about the political lifespan of South Africa's ANC</a>
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<p>South Africa’s political parties would do well to learn from Ireland, where the three largest political parties negotiated a coalition treaty over one hundred pages long. This stipulated measures and mechanisms for conflict resolution, plus agreed compromise policies on health care, education, housing, and foreign policy.</p>
<h2>Sobering experiences</h2>
<p><a href="https://mistra.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/MISTRA-Marriages-of-Inconvenience-layout-FA-chap-10.pdf">Marriages of Inconvenience</a> examines South Africa’s sobering experiences with coalitions in the Western Cape and Kwazulu-Natal; and in Nelson Mandela Bay, Tshwane, Johannesburg, and Cape Town.</p>
<p>The rarest of all the country’s coalitions – so far – have been short ANC-DA coalitions in Beaufort West and Kannaland, (pp.52, 60) though these parties are adjacent on the country’s political spectrum. The most unlikely have been the Johannesburg, Tshwane, and Mandela Bay DA-Economic Freedom Front “confidence and supply agreements”. This is political science jargon for a minimalist agreement where one party agrees to vote with the other only on votes of no confidence, and on passing the annual budget.</p>
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<p>Nelson Mandela Bay, in the Eastern Cape, provides readers with a grim lesson of all the reasons to wish to minimise or best of all avoid coalitions. Two authors in this book have each previously written a book about this city’s governance. The DA, African Christian Democratic Party, Congress of the People, Freedom Front Plus, and the United Democratic Movement (UDM) did indeed have a “co-governance agreement” between them both on substantive issues, such as not allocating public works jobs on party lines, through to procedures for consultation. (p.269)</p>
<p>Eagerness for power left both the DA and ANC vulnerable to extortion from the smallest parties. The UDM (with only two councillors) and the Patriotic Alliance (with only one councillor) both in turn demanded - and got – the mayoralty.</p>
<p>The UDM’s <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/obituaries/obituary-mongameli-bobani-port-elizabeths-mayor-who-was-both-loved-and-loathed-20201112">Mongameli Bobani</a>’s first action on becoming mayor was to demand lists of all contracts up for tender, and all vacant managerial positions – flashing red lights. He fired the city manager, and appointed a further seven acting city managers, in his attempts to get his way. (pp. 383-4)</p>
<p>All DA appeals to UDM national leader <a href="https://www.pa.org.za/person/bantubonke-harrington-holomisa/">Bantu Holomisa</a> to replace Bobani fell on deaf ears. The inevitable result was the collapse of the DA-led coalition; a collapse of the following coalition; then a period with no mayor. This put many day-to-day operations into a tailspin.</p>
<h2>Dangers of political interference</h2>
<p>This is not the only instance where the vulnerability of municipal staff to political threats from their mayor hurt South Africa. Prior to 2000, the post of city manager - then called <a href="https://open.uct.ac.za/handle/11427/16765">town clerk</a> – was on permanent staff. This was then changed to a maximum contract of five years, to expire one year after municipal elections.</p>
<p>The city manager is the CEO of the entire administration of a metropolis, where the buck should stop when anything malfunctions or ceases to work.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/who-stands-to-win-or-lose-if-south-africa-were-to-hold-all-elections-on-the-same-day-145333">Who stands to win or lose if South Africa were to hold all elections on the same day</a>
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<p>Since 2000, the city manager has been appointed on a contract limited to a maximum of five years (p.297). This means that no city manager may dare refuse an illegal order from a mayor about appointments or tenders for fear of their contract not being renewed, or even being fired from their career job.</p>
<p>In practice, the situation is worse – municipal managers average only three and a half years before they are squeezed out by their political bosses; in the large <a href="https://www.gov.za/about-government/government-system/local-government">metropolitan councils</a> they average a mere 15 months before being purged. (p.277). The consequences are devastating – the bleeding away of competent leadership, and appointment of unqualified and sometimes unethical party hacks to, for example, run the sewage treatment plant.</p>
<p>Political interference in appointments and tenders are the prime drivers of corruption. South Africa urgently needs to return to city managers as permanent staff as speedily as possible. This will require a statutory revision.</p>
<p>Another lesson from the book is that all political parties in the country centralise power. No municipal nor provincial coalition will survive unless it is supported by the national leadership of all the political parties involved.</p>
<p>This book will be valuable on every bookcase. It could not be more timely – the country is now a mere two months away from the next local government election, in which there are certain to be far more coalitions than ever before.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/167517/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Keith Gottschalk is an ANC member, but writes this review in his professional capacity as a political scientist.</span></em></p>South Africa’s political parties would do well to learn from Ireland, where the three largest political parties negotiated a coalition treaty that stipulated mechanisms for conflict resolution.Keith Gottschalk, Political Scientist, University of the Western CapeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1629422021-06-22T16:08:34Z2021-06-22T16:08:34ZWe studied why South Africans vote the way they do. This is what we found<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/407006/original/file-20210617-27-x72wne.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Residents in a Cape Town suburb queue to vote during previous municipal elections in South Africa.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Foto24/Gallo Images/Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>South Africans are set to <a href="https://businesstech.co.za/news/trending/485123/ramaphosa-sets-the-date-for-the-2021-local-government-elections/">go to the polls</a> on 27 October 2021 for the country’s sixth municipal elections since the advent of democracy in 1994. The right of all adult South Africans to vote was <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/history-elections-south-africa">hard won</a> after a long struggle against colonialism and apartheid.</p>
<p>Voting is a cornerstone of democracy: a chance for people to elect their preferred representatives. But, what informs people’s voting decisions? Why do they choose to vote for one party and not another? In short, can we predict who they are likely to vote for in an upcoming national and a local election? </p>
<p>Over the past four years we tracked the factors that influence South African voters’ party choices and more importantly, why they made these choices. We interviewed a nationally representative sample of about 3 400 respondents from October to December, between 2017 and 2020. In total, four waves of data were collected in face-to-face interviews.</p>
<p>We are, therefore, able to compare the findings over the four waves to identify the factors that influenced their choices and also how these changed over this period. </p>
<p>Our <a href="https://www.uj.ac.za/faculties/humanities/sarchi-welsocdev/Documents/Factors%20Determining%20Voter%20Choice%20_%20Report%20_%20May%202021%20_%20Web_Final.pdf">latest report</a> contains the findings from the fourth wave of data collected on voter preferences - amid the pandemic and in the run-up to the 2021 municipal elections. </p>
<p>Four theories are tested statistically in our research. These are rational choice, clientelistic, sociological and party identification. All are widely used to understand voting behaviour across countries. The research questions and analysis model that we devised include all four theories. These provide the possible explanations for people’s voting choices. </p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africa-needs-new-thinking-for-its-democracy-to-work-for-all-162472">South Africa needs new thinking for its democracy to work for all</a>
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<p>In this article, we share findings from our longitudinal study to gain a better understanding of why people vote the way they do. The findings serve as a gauge of citizens’ approval or disapproval of policies and programmes, and can serve to hold elected officials accountable for their decisions and actions. </p>
<h2>What informs voter choices?</h2>
<p>We asked six questions about their party choice relating to governance and trust in political leadership, corruption, socio-economic well-being, democratic rights, social grants and socio-demographic factors such as age, gender, education and income and employment. </p>
<p>We used a logistic regression model to assess how the four factors influenced their choices. In December 2020, 52% of respondents selected the ANC, 10% selected the opposition Democratic Alliance and Economic Freedom Fighters, respectively. A quarter were either undecided, would not vote or refused to disclose their party choice. Only 6% said they would vote differently in a local government election compared to a national election. </p>
<p>We found the following: </p>
<p><strong>Rational choice model</strong>: This <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00869640">suggests</a> that voters make their choices based on rational considerations motivated by self-interest. Closely related factors that are pertinent that we assessed included perceptions of governance – such as trust in institutions, government performance and progress in addressing corruption.</p>
<p>We found that concern about socioeconomic well-being was the main reason respondents gave for their choice of a political party across all four waves. It was also a statistically significant predictor of voter choice in 2017.</p>
<p>But, this factor became less important after the leadership changes in the governing African National Congress (ANC), that saw Cyril Ramaphosa replace Jacob Zuma as ANC president <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-anc-has-a-new-leader-but-south-africa-remains-on-a-political-precipice-89248">in December 2017</a>.</p>
<p>It is likely that socio-economic well-being became less important and that trust in Ramaphosa’s presidency resulted in <a href="https://journals.co.za/doi/pdf/10.20940/JAE/2020/v19i1a1">increased support for the ANC</a>. </p>
<p><strong>Clientelism model:</strong> This <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/3876122?seq=1">contends</a> that politicians use their power to provide economic privileges or material support in exchange for political support. </p>
<p>Some opponents of South Africa’s <a href="https://www.gov.za/faq/services/how-do-i-apply-social-grant">extensive social grant system</a> have suggested that social grants guarantee support for the ANC.</p>
<p>Respondents expressed fear of losing a social grant if they supported an opposition party across all four waves. Although receiving a grant is not a predictor of party preference, fear of loss of a grant certainly is. This suggests that potential voters do make rational decisions and choices that affect their material well-being, and expressed approval of the grants system.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/242653736_Theoretical_models_of_voting_behaviour"><strong>The Sociological model</strong></a> also informed our analysis. This essentially argues that social determinants like “race”, class, gender and education are what drive voting decisions. </p>
<p>We found that <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-origin-of-the-khoisan-tells-us-that-race-has-no-place-in-human-ancestry-53594">“race”</a> continued to be consistently a predictor of voter preference over all the waves. Regarding gender, women shifted their support away from the ANC towards the opposition in 2017 during the Zuma presidency (<a href="http://www.thepresidency.gov.za/profiles/president-jacob-zuma-0">May 2009 - February 2018)</a>.</p>
<p>In wave 4, a greater proportion of women grant beneficiaries and non-beneficiaries supported the ANC compared to male grant beneficiaries and non-beneficiaries. Age also remained a consistent predictor of voter choice: younger people were less likely than older people to support the ANC than opposition parties. But, support for the ANC was spread across all age groups.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.ajol.info/index.php/ad/article/view/135773"><strong>Party identification model:</strong></a> This has been used to explain voting preferences in South Africa. It examines the extent to which party choice is guided by support for the party that led the struggle for freedom and democracy – that is, the ANC and, specifically, its leadership. We did not find evidence for this in <a href="https://www.uj.ac.za/newandevents/Documents/Voter%20Preference%20Report%20A4%2002.10.%202018%20PDF.PDF">wave 1</a> during Zuma’s presidency. But, trust in the presidency of Ramaphosa and party loyalty <a href="https://theconversation.com/ramaphosas-presidency-is-drawing-voters-back-to-the-anc-new-study-115261">emerged as significant predictors</a> across the subsequent three waves.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/study-shows-young-south-africans-have-no-faith-in-democracy-and-politicians-118404">Study shows young South Africans have no faith in democracy and politicians</a>
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<p>While trust in institutions declined over this same period, trust in the president did not. In fact, it increased from 54% in wave 3 to 60% in Wave 4. This may be attributed to the view that President Ramaphosa and the government did a good job in managing the coronavirus pandemic. </p>
<p>This does confirm the importance of political leadership as a predictor of voting behaviour in the current South African scenario. Contextual factors such as leadership changes in the governing party and the management of the pandemic also appear to hold sway.</p>
<h2>Intersecting factors</h2>
<p>We found that a range of intersecting factors explain voting preferences over the past four years. While existing theories of voting behaviour are helpful in understanding voter choices, specific factors that influence party choice emerged from our study.</p>
<p>These include the importance of democratic rights and perceptions of good governance - in particular the prevalence of corruption and the performance of the president on Covid-19 - and the fear of loss of social grants if the party in power changes.</p>
<p>Furthermore, it is evident that party loyalty is not fixed. It can rise and wane as voters have become disillusioned with the governing party. Although there is a slight shift in voters agreeing (41%) that corruption is being dealt with decisively in wave 4, the majority thought that <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/SouthAfrica/News/siu-investigating-ppe-corruption-worth-r142bn-20210511">corruption during the pandemic</a> made them more negative towards the ANC. We conclude that voter preferences are driven by rational considerations in their choice of a party in elections.</p>
<p><em>Megan Bryer and Jaclyn de Klerk co-authored the research on which this article is based.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/162942/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Leila Patel receives funding from the DST/NRF for her Chair in Welfare and Social Development and from the University of Johannesburg </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Yolanda Sadie does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Concerns about socioeconomic well-being were the main reason why people voted for a certain political party.Leila Patel, Professor of Social Development Studies, University of JohannesburgYolanda Sadie, Emeritus professor in Politics, University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1467812020-10-05T15:07:32Z2020-10-05T15:07:32ZWhy members of parliament in Ghana can get away with ignoring voters<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/359975/original/file-20200925-14-sr0q2c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Ghana has invested heavily in its parliamentary democracy</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Delali-Adogla Bessa/Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>When Ghana turned to democracy in 1992 after many years of military rule, there were expectations that the people would choose their leaders. Ghanaians also expected to see a closer relationship between citizens and the state, making members of the legislature more sensitive to their needs. </p>
<p>Democracy has generally <a href="https://css.ethz.ch/en/services/digital-library/publications/publication.html/154807">flourished</a> in Ghana. Freedom House’s <a href="https://freedomhouse.org/sites/default/files/Feb2019_FH_FITW_2019_Report_ForWeb-compressed.pdf">rankings</a> have consistently marked Ghana as “free” since 2000.</p>
<p>But the country has yet to entrench some key aspects of democratic governance. One example is the disconnect between the people and their representatives in parliament. Public <a href="https://www.afrobarometer.org/">opinion surveys</a> conducted by Afrobarometer show a wide gap between the two. For instance, between 2002 and 2013, an average of 85.8% of Ghanaians had no contact with their representatives in parliament.</p>
<p>Ghanaian voters indicate that their legislators spend little time in the constituency. Even when they do, they tend not to listen to the concerns of voters. This gap is a problem because modern democracy relies on representative institutions. The very foundations of democracy could be shaken if citizens do not feel adequately represented.</p>
<p>I set out to <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13572334.2020.1814514">investigate</a> this disconnect. Other <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/322245711_ASSESSING_THE_QUALITY_OF_PARLIAMENTARY_REPRESENTATION_IN_GHANA">studies</a> exist, but none has examined the role of patronage networks mediating legislators’ pathway to power in Ghana.</p>
<p>I found that a major contributing factor to the gap between legislators and their constituents in Ghana is the strong presence of patronage networks in primaries within the parties. The way the two main political parties, the New Patriotic Party and the National Democratic Congress, select parliamentary candidates for general elections makes it possible for patronage networks to hijack electoral processes.</p>
<h2>Internal party competition</h2>
<p>Parliamentarians in Ghana, as everywhere else, do not emerge out of the blue. Political parties have established procedures for selecting candidates. Internal party primaries have been the main avenue for selecting parliamentary aspirants since the early 2000s. </p>
<p>But the very nature of these internal competitions creates a cohort of legislators who can easily circumvent voters’ “punishment” if they don’t perform. </p>
<p>To become an MP in Ghana on the main parties’ tickets, aspirants must apply to designated constituency committees and be vetted by the regional and national party. Where more than one aspirant passes this stage, they are presented to the party’s delegates at a conference for a deciding vote. The small number of delegates who vote in these internal contests is a recipe for patronage. It’s easy for aspiring candidates to buy the support and loyalty of these delegates.</p>
<p>In <a href="https://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/politics/NPP-polls-Aspirant-shares-cars-on-election-day-at-Ajumako-Enyan-Essiam-784431">recent cases</a>, some aspirants have gone as far as buying cars to woo the delegates. Internal party primaries in Ghana are usually <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/authoritarian-origins-of-democratic-party-systems-in-africa/73C14DB2977550A337A424E8F7EEA67A">devoid of programmatic appeals</a>. A candidate who campaigns solely on programmes and doesn’t issue any material benefits will most likely lose. A candidate whose campaign relies solely on handing out material goods is likely to win even if his or her campaign contains zero programmes. </p>
<p>Therefore, the ability to award personal favours like pocket money, school fees, funeral donations, television sets and so on to party delegates becomes the exclusive focus of these party competitions. The road to parliament in Ghana gets smoother for the highest bidder than for the candidate with the most elaborate policies.</p>
<p>This places the power to determine the future of an MP in the hands of party delegates, not the electorate. After all, winning the primaries means a free ticket to parliament in many constituencies.</p>
<p>This is more so because more than <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S0007123412000014">60% of the 275 seats</a> in parliament are safe for either the New Patriotic Party or the National Democratic Congress. The huge number of constituencies that are dominated by either of these two parties give MPs the incentive to concentrate more on local party delegates than the entire constituency voters. The voice of constituency voters, therefore, gets trumped by that of the party delegates.</p>
<h2>What is the way forward?</h2>
<p>To make constituency votes matter, the focus should be on reviewing internal party contests which determine who stands as an MP.</p>
<p>In emerging democracies, there are hardly any national laws regulating how parties select their candidates. In Ghana, the constitution says political parties must ensure that their internal processes conform to democratic standards. But there’s no legislation spelling out how they should choose their candidates.</p>
<p>Ghana could follow the examples of Germany, the United States, New Zealand and Finland in regulating internal party competitions. The focus should be on the inclusivity of mechanisms to select candidates within parties. For example, all party members or even the entire constituency of voters can participate in the selection of candidate MPs.</p>
<p>An open candidate selection process would provide less incentive to reward a few party delegates and neglect the constituency. With more participants, candidate MPs wouldn’t have enough money to buy everybody. This would force candidate MPs to campaign on the basis of policies that benefit the entire constituency. Also, to be reelected, MPs would have to build a good relationship with their constituencies, not with internal party oligarchies.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/146781/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Martin Acheampong does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>An open candidate selection process would provide less incentive for the issuance of material benefits to only a few delegates while the constituency is neglected.Martin Acheampong, Doctoral Fellow, Bamberg Graduate School of Social Sciences, University of BambergLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1433612020-07-24T12:44:17Z2020-07-24T12:44:17ZWhat drove Asia’s economic success stories, and what should Africa emulate?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/349320/original/file-20200724-21-1s8my8w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">East Asian countries have looked up to Japan as a model of success. </span> </figcaption></figure><p>The remarkable economic transformation of Asia in recent decades has attracted global attention. It has ignited scholarly and policy debates about the region’s development models and strategies. </p>
<p>African policymakers have not been immune to the worldwide fascination with the “Asian miracle”. African leaders and officials have these past few years undertaken a constant stream of study visits to countries such as China, Singapore, South Korea and Vietnam.</p>
<p>What lessons can African countries glean from Asia’s successes and failures? And how can they emulate those successes and avoid the mistakes made by their Asian peers? These are the two key questions the book <em><a href="https://www.thebrenthurstfoundation.org/books-publications/the-asian-aspiration/">The Asian Aspiration – Why and How Africa Should Emulate Asia</a></em> seeks to answer. Co-authored by <a href="https://www.thebrenthurstfoundation.org/people/greg-mills">Greg Mills</a>, <a href="https://www.thebrenthurstfoundation.org/people/olusegun-obasanjo">Olusegun Obasanjo</a>, <a href="https://agra.org/zt_team/h-e-hailemariam-desalegn/">Hailemariam Desalegn</a> and <a href="https://www.thebrenthurstfoundation.org/people/emily-van-der-merwe/">Emily van der Merwe</a>, the book is divided into two parts.</p>
<p>The first part showcases the “growth stories” of 10 East Asian and South-East Asian countries. They are Japan, Taiwan, Singapore, South Korea, the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, China and Vietnam. It analyses the developmental paths of these countries, pointing out what they did well to power their rise as well as their policy missteps. The second section discusses five lessons for success from Asia and illuminates these with comparative examples from both Asia and Africa. </p>
<p>The book notes the differences between Asia and Africa, and the importance of differentiation. But it concludes by asking what <a href="https://www.pmo.gov.sg/Past-Prime-Ministers/Mr-LEE-Kuan-Yew">Lee Kuan Yew</a> might have done had he found himself at the helm of Africa. Lee was the formidable statesman who presided over the change in Singapore’s fortunes from 1959 to 1990.</p>
<h2>Not a miracle, but deliberate steps</h2>
<p>The book identifies some parallels between Africa and East Asia. These include a colonial heritage, a complex make-up of ethnic groups as well as human and institutional under-development. </p>
<p>The book also draws attention to differences between the two. These are rooted in how the political economy of Africa evolved after independence. This was typified by clientelism, </p>
<blockquote>
<p>the management of elite access and preferences in exchange for support, leading to ‘rent-seeking’ – the creation of wealth not by investment but by the connections of organised groups.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In contrast, the East Asian development tale has been defined by the unity of purpose among leaders in several countries. It has also been characterised by the deliberate use of institutional and constitutional means to broaden opportunities beyond a tiny elite. This does not suggest that these countries were insulated from or spared the ills of poor governance. The experiences of Indonesia and the Philippines, for example, demonstrate the baleful influence of corruption, cronyism, fragile institutions and populism on governance.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/349322/original/file-20200724-31-z98yw5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/349322/original/file-20200724-31-z98yw5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/349322/original/file-20200724-31-z98yw5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/349322/original/file-20200724-31-z98yw5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/349322/original/file-20200724-31-z98yw5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1134&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/349322/original/file-20200724-31-z98yw5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1134&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/349322/original/file-20200724-31-z98yw5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1134&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p>The authors emphasise the importance of differentiating between – and within – the East Asian countries, based on factors such as language, religion, economic wealth, governance systems and urban-rural divides. They argue, using 10 case studies, that the phenomenal changes that have taken place in East Asia are not the product of a “miracle”. They are the result of calculated policy actions. </p>
<p>They identify the vital principles of leadership, the policy choices and trade-offs that need to be made, and the policy execution that is required.</p>
<h2>The case of Japan</h2>
<p>East Asian countries have looked up to Japan as a model of success. Japan represents the power of example and innovation. The country’s industrialisation process borrowed from a mixture of American, British and German industrialisation models. </p>
<p>Japan’s technocracy, led by the <a href="https://www.japanpitt.pitt.edu/glossary/ministry-international-trade-and-industry">Ministry of International Trade and Industry</a> (MITI), played a key part in the country’s extraordinary rise in the post-war period. At the heart of the country’s development was strong collaboration between government and business, facilitated and guided by MITI.</p>
<p>This government-business prototype was later copied by Taiwan and South Korea. </p>
<p>Taiwan’s success can be attributed to its ability to modernise its economy through macro-economic stability, careful planning and institutionalisation. For its part, South Korea managed to accomplish a transition from an agrarian to high-tech society. In both countries, the business sector was central to industrialisation efforts.</p>
<p>In the case of China, the authors acknowledge the impressive strides the country has made. But they argue that its development experience does not offer a flawless model for African governance. This might disappoint several African policymakers who are enamoured with China’s development model.</p>
<h2>Singapore’s meritocracy</h2>
<p>Singapore’s success is venerated across Africa. The city-state used the crisis arising from its <a href="https://eresources.nlb.gov.sg/history/events/dc1efe7a-8159-40b2-9244-cdb078755013">separation</a> from the Malaysian Federation in 1965 to focus relentlessly on national growth and development. </p>
<p>Singapore epitomises the pinnacle of technocratic rule. Its success rests on expert rule, focus on meritocratic talent and long-range thinking. Leadership performance is non-negotiable. As a Singaporean scholar interviewed for the book stated:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The reality is that East Asian leaders need to perform, even in an authoritarian setting, as their legitimacy and tenure is due to their successful growth performance, even in the absence of free and fair elections.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Like Singapore, South Korea had an authoritarian leader in <a href="https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/resource/modern-korean-history-portal/park-chung-hee">Park Chung-hee</a>. </p>
<p>But the authors caution against the focus on authoritarianism as the reason for these countries’ rapid growth and transformation. They cite other key success factors, including a meritocratic civil service, an adroitness at fusing the political and expert components of the governing system, and policy pragmatism. </p>
<p>These countries also place a great deal of store on hard work, discipline, education, innovation, incentivisation and growth. These experiences have been absorbed and replicated by other countries across the region, Vietnam being an example.</p>
<p>The book outlines five lessons for Africa from Asia’s success. These are encapsulated under the headings:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>The premium of leadership and institutions; </p></li>
<li><p>Don’t be a prisoner of the past; </p></li>
<li><p>Get the basics right for growth; </p></li>
<li><p>Build and integrate; </p></li>
<li><p>Open up to keep control.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2>Call to action</h2>
<p>This meticulously researched, well-written and solution-oriented book is a call for action. It exhorts African leaders and other actors to shun parochial mindsets and ideological dogma, and to enact policies that prioritise the collective interests of their nations. It does not confine itself to providing a diagnosis of the problems afflicting Africa. It also offers well-considered and tested ideas on how the continent can overcome them.</p>
<p>The book was published before the outbreak of the coronavirus global pandemic, which has wrought significant social and economic damage across the world, including Africa. This makes its message even more relevant and urgent, given the pressing need for African countries to implement institutional and policy reforms to counter the effects of the pandemic.</p>
<p>Asia has extricated a billion people out of poverty in a single generation through inclusive and sustainable growth policies. As the authors note, Africa is neither a continent of chronic hopelessness nor one of unbridled optimism. With the right leadership, mindset and policies African countries can achieve, even exceed, the astonishing successes recorded by their Asian counterparts. </p>
<p>They cannot duplicate the Asian development path, but they can learn from their peers’ experiences, avoid their mistakes and replicate their successes.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/143361/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mills Soko does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>With the right leadership, mindset and policies African countries can achieve, even exceed, the growth and development successes of Asian counterparts.Mills Soko, Professor: International Business & Strategy, Wits Business School, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1393202020-05-26T14:18:26Z2020-05-26T14:18:26ZLesotho’s new leader faces enormous hurdles ensuring peace and political stability<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/337376/original/file-20200525-106823-ny354.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Lesotho's former Prime Minister Tom Thabane, left, and his successor Moeketsi Majoro, at the latter's swearing in ceremony at the Royal Palace in Maseru.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Molise Molise/AFP-GettyImages</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Tom Thabane (81), the embattled veteran Lesotho politician, has finally bowed to pressure to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/18/world/africa/lesotho-thomas-thabane-resigns.html">resign</a> as the Prime Minister of the politically volatile southern African nation of 2.2 million. This comes at least two years before the end of his term. </p>
<p>But, will his replacement by <a href="https://www.gov.ls/people/honourable-dr-moeketsi-majoro/">Moeketsi Majoro</a> (58) enable Lesotho to move in a more progressive direction? Majoro is an economist, former executive at the International Monetary Fund as well as the country’s former finance minister. He was recently <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-52707752">appointed to lead</a> the governing coalition of the majority <a href="https://www.facebook.com/All-Basotho-Convention-Page-713458675486895/">All Basotho Convention</a>, and the <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/258295724248074/">Democratic Congress of Lesotho</a>, ahead of Thabane’s resignation.</p>
<p>The Thabane <a href="https://issafrica.org/iss-today/will-ramaphosas-new-reform-timetable-save-thabanes-skin">saga</a>, revolving around allegations that he was party to a conspiracy to murder his then estranged wife, and that his new wife interferes in state matters, has been dragging on for more than a year. </p>
<p>These events have fed into a the raging political conflict within his ruling party, All Basotho Convention, and its governing coalition with the Democratic Congress of Lesotho. This has provided a major distraction to any attempt to address the country’s <a href="https://theodora.com/wfbcurrent/lesotho/lesotho_economy.html">massive developmental problems</a>. </p>
<p>But, setting Lesotho on a significantly different political trajectory will not be easy.</p>
<p>Majoro’s installation as Prime Minister is welcome. But it does not guarantee much needed political stability in an era of complex coalition politics in which none of Lesotho’s parties has a clear majority. Nor does it guarantee internal peace when the military and police both remain significant political players, with linkages to different political parties and actors.</p>
<p>Questions have correctly been posed whether Majoro, a technocrat with a great deal of international experience, has the political skills to hold his governing coalition together. For the moment, Thabane remains leader of the All Basotho Congress, and cannot be guaranteed to lend his support to the new government.</p>
<h2>Balancing act</h2>
<p>Thabane can be expected to use his position to try to secure <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-lesothos-constitution-says-about-immunity-for-a-sitting-prime-minister-133089">immunity for himself from prosecution</a> for his alleged role in the murder of his estranged wife, Lipopelo Thabane (58). She was shot dead in <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/africa/2017-06-15-estranged-wife-of-lesothos-incoming-pm-shot-dead/">June 2017</a> - two days before he was sworn in as the Prime Minister. Maesaiah Liabiloe Ramoholi (42), the woman he was living with at the time, and eventually married, is <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-lesothos-constitution-says-about-immunity-for-a-sitting-prime-minister-133089">on trial for the murder</a>. Thabane was also later charged with the murder.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-efforts-to-stabilise-lesotho-have-failed-less-intervention-may-be-more-effective-137499">South Africa's efforts to stabilise Lesotho have failed. Less intervention may be more effective</a>
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<p>Majoro must know that if he concedes this immunity, he will lose a great deal of domestic and global credibility. But if doesn’t show some leniency he may lose the support of a disgruntled element of his party which continues to back Thabane.</p>
<p>How this plays out may influence whether Majoro can secure the leadership of the party at its next congress, expected in February 2021. </p>
<p>This may not be plain sailing. One of the big factors will be the willingness of the deputy leader of the party, Nqosa Mahao, to support him. </p>
<p>Mahao defeated Majoro for leadership position in the party in February 2020. Though both will now want Thabane out of the way (a conviction in court would be convenient), it’s not clear whether they will work cooperatively together.</p>
<h2>Key challenges</h2>
<p>Beyond the immediate political problems, there are three major issues which need to be confronted. One is whether the country’s electoral system can be restructured to render the political landscape more predictable. Another is whether a recent tendency for the judiciary to be politicised can be reversed. A third is whether the political entanglements of the police and military can be neutralised. </p>
<p>To appreciate how difficult this may be, it is necessary to
recall that Lesotho is governed by a small elite (military and judicial as well as political), whose members’ knowledge of each other and their families often goes back decades. </p>
<p>In a country where <a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/press-release/2019/12/18/lesotho-reduces-poverty-but-nearly-half-of-the-population-remains-poor">poverty is intense</a> and resources are so few, personal feuds can easily translate into political issues.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://issafrica.org/iss-today/will-ramaphosas-new-reform-timetable-save-thabanes-skin">National Dialogue process</a>, launched in 2015 under the auspices of the Southern African Development Community, has led to proposals for electoral reform. Introduced in 2002, Lesotho’s <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/272466990_The_Case_of_Lesotho's_Mixed_Member_Proportional_System">Mixed Member Proportional electoral system</a> combines <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/0/first-past-the-post-voting-explained/">first-past-the-post</a> constituency elections with a national list <a href="http://www.elections.org.za/content/Elections/Election-types/">proportional representation system </a> to ensure proportionality of party representation.</p>
<p>But, its outcomes have been undermined by politicians crossing the floor for personal advantage, upsetting the intended proportionality and encouraging fragmentation of political parties. The Southern African Development Community has now proposed that such floor crossing should be banned, and parties should obtain a minimum proportion of the vote before they secure representation in parliament.</p>
<p>The real issue still to be resolved is how to form political parties which are genuinely constructed around political programmes rather than personal ambitions.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/events-in-lesotho-point-to-poor-prospects-for-political-stability-130498">Events in Lesotho point to poor prospects for political stability</a>
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<p>Lesotho’s political parties have often sought to resolve their problems by directing them to the courts. Most recently, the battle for control of the All Basotho Convention led to Thabane throwing his weight behind Acting Chief Justice ‘Maseforo Mahase, whose curious rulings in Thabane’s favour were to be <a href="http://lestimes.com/court-of-appeal-slams-shocking-justice-mahase-conduct/">thrown out by the Court of Appeal</a>, amid popular accusations of her political bias.</p>
<p>It seems unlikely, with Thabane out of the way, that Mahase will now be
confirmed in her position. But, Majoro will need to avoid the temptation of securing the appointment of a crony as the Chief Justice. Prior to Thabane’s politicking, the judiciary had more or less been kept above the political fray. This neutrality now needs to be restored.</p>
<p>Yet the major problem confronting stability in Lesotho is presented by the military and police. They have been a <a href="https://media.africaportal.org/documents/The_Lesotho_Election.pdf">major factor</a> in the country’s politics, stretching back to 1970, when the then Police Mobile Unit backed Prime Minister Leabua Jonathan to <a href="https://uca.edu/politicalscience/dadm-project/sub-saharan-africa-region/lesotho-1966-present/">overthrow the adverse results</a> of the first post-independence election. </p>
<h2>Headache for new PM</h2>
<p>The military’s penchant for <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-lesotho-could-abandon-its-army-and-put-the-money-to-better-use-106179">direct intervention in the political</a> arena has been curtailed by the insistence of South Africa, Southern African the Development Community, and the African Union that <a href="https://theconversation.com/sudan-a-chance-for-the-au-to-refine-support-for-countries-in-crisis-118463">the legitimacy of coups will not be accepted</a>. But this has not stopped governments seeking protection from political opponents by forging strong links with the senior military. </p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-lesotho-could-abandon-its-army-and-put-the-money-to-better-use-106179">How Lesotho could abandon its army and put the money to better use</a>
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<p>In an era of unstable government coalitions, this has itself become a source of major tension, with incoming governments seeking to counter-balance military leaderships left over by the previous government by cosying up to the police. Determined efforts to neutralise the military have been made via training programmes carried out by, among others, South Africa, the Southern African the Development Community, India, Britain and Zimbabwe. None have yet succeeded.</p>
<p>For all that Majoro may want attend to tackling Covid-19 and the economy, his
biggest headache may yet turn out to be the army.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/139320/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Roger Southall has previously received research funding from the National Research Foundation</span></em></p>Moeketsi Majoro’s installation as Prime Minister is welcome. But it does not guarantee much needed political stability in an era of complex coalition politics.Roger Southall, Professor of Sociology, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1391262020-05-24T07:50:11Z2020-05-24T07:50:11ZUrbanites across Africa are more likely to be unhappy with their government. Here’s why<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/336984/original/file-20200522-124826-kfygxr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Ugandan protesters call for an end to President Yoweri Museveni's despotic rule.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Peter Busomoke/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>For decades urban residents in many Africa countries have shown their dissatisfaction with their governments. Food price riots that rocked Guinea, Mauritania, and Senegal <a href="https://www.un.org/africarenewal/magazine/july-2008/price-protests-expose-state-faults">in 2007-8</a>, and Uganda’s “Walk to Work” protests <a href="https://www.peaceinsight.org/blog/2011/05/walk-to-work/">in 2011</a> were testament to this. As were the protests that rippled through Sudanese cities <a href="https://theconversation.com/sudan-the-symbolic-significance-of-the-space-protesters-made-their-own-115864">in 2018</a>. </p>
<p>But, hostility towards incumbent governments is usually subtler. Riots and protests are the tip of the iceberg. New evidence from public opinion data clarifies the extent of this urban dissatisfaction.</p>
<p>In my new book <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/rural-democracy-9780198851073?lang=en&cc=gb">Rural Democracy: Elections and Development in Africa</a>, I use survey data from <a href="http://afrobarometer.org/">Afrobarometer</a>, the independent African research network, from 28 countries over ten years (2005-2015) to document the extent of urban hostility towards incumbent governments across Africa. The picture is not rosy. </p>
<p>Throughout the continent, urban residents are significantly less supportive of incumbent governments than rural residents. This varies quite dramatically with considerable variation between countries. But, on average, urbanites are between 5 and 7 percentage points less likely to say that they would vote for the incumbent.</p>
<p>Differences in satisfaction with democracy are similar. Urbanites are at least 5 percentage points less likely to report being satisfied with democracy in their country, on average. </p>
<p>These findings give a strong sense of the average level of urban hostility towards incumbent governments. While the negative sentiment is widespread, there are sizeable differences in its extent. For example, urbanites in Burundi are 18 percentage points less likely to support incumbents. And they are 22 percentage points less likely to be satisfied with democracy. In Malawi and Tanzania, urbanites are around 10 percentage points less likely to support incumbents, and 5 percentage points less likely to report satisfaction with democracy.</p>
<p>At the other end of the spectrum lie Botswana and Zambia. These cases see no significant differences in support for incumbent leaders or satisfaction with democracy across urban and rural areas.</p>
<p>A major benefit of comparative, cross-national research is the ability to look across cases for systematic patterns, as I have done in the <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/rural-democracy-9780198851073?lang=en&cc=gb">book</a>. This enables the development of generalised explanations, to make sense of the observed variation.</p>
<p>Why is there trouble in the cities?</p>
<h2>Trouble in the cities</h2>
<p>Part of the greater rural support for incumbents is explained by structural differences across urban and rural contexts. For example, lower political opposition in the countryside means incumbents face less competition. </p>
<p>In rural areas there is also more clientelism - the exchange of private goods and services for political support. This matters because access to state resources gives incumbents an advantage in dispensing patronage. And traditional authority often remains stronger in the countryside. This means incumbents can also engage local authority figures to deliver votes.</p>
<p>These factors help make some sense of the difference between urban and rural areas. But they leave much unaccounted for. They cannot explain, for example, why incumbents risk hostility in urban areas. Nor do they account for the wide variation in urban dissatisfaction across countries.</p>
<p>One <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/rural-democracy-9780198851073?lang=en&cc=gb">reason</a>, is that most African countries still have majority rural populations. Urban discontent stems from incumbents implementing policies that favour rural areas to win elections.</p>
<p>Looking after rural interests and paying less attention to the demands of urban voters is, therefore, a feature of democracy in predominantly rural countries. </p>
<p>It wasn’t always like this. Under authoritarian rule and in the absence of meaningful electoral competition, the main threat to rulers came from coups. These were easier to coordinate in urban areas. So, to prevent urban unrest, authoritarian leaders tended to be biased towards urban areas. </p>
<p>But, with the reintroduction of multiparty elections the discrepancies in political power between urban and rural areas have been largely equalised by the ballot box, leading to rural bias in policy-making. </p>
<h2>A change in weighting</h2>
<p>There are signs that this is beginning to change as countries urbanise. This decreases the incentive to prioritise rural voters. That means incumbents are likely to balance pro-rural and pro-urban policies more evenly. </p>
<p>This reduction in rural bias in line with urbanisation should diminish urban dissatisfaction, which is exactly what I find.</p>
<p>Notwithstanding some outliers, differences in support for incumbents and satisfaction with democracy across urban and rural areas is greatest in the least urbanised countries. The size of country-specific coefficients estimating the impact of urban residence on incumbent support and democratic satisfaction are negatively and significantly related to urbanisation. </p>
<p>The relationship becomes clearer still when urbanisation is interacted with the urban/rural indicator in estimates pooling data across all countries. These estimates provide robust and compelling evidence that urban dissatisfaction across Africa is mitigated by urbanisation. The more urban a society, the less unhappy urban citizens are. The more rural it is, the higher the levels of urban dissatisfaction.</p>
<h2>Implications</h2>
<p>These findings offer strong reasons to believe that trouble in Africa’s cities stems from the fact that electoral competition drives leaders to be biased towards rural areas.</p>
<p>This provides important new insights into the dynamics of electoral competition in Africa. Not only does it explain widespread urban dissatisfaction, but it also offers an alternative to the received wisdom that elections are predominantly contests in corruption, clientelism and ethnic mobilisation. </p>
<p>While these are prevalent, elections across Africa are also being fought over policies and which types of voters they favour. To the extent that democratic accountability structures operate this way, democracy in Africa works.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/139126/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Robin Harding has received funding from the National Science Foundation. </span></em></p>Trouble in Africa’s cities is due to the fact that electoral competition drives leaders to be biased towards rural areas.Robin Harding, Associate Professor of Government, University of OxfordLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/917092018-03-06T11:40:16Z2018-03-06T11:40:16ZWhile Mexico plays politics with its water, some cities flood and others go dry<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/208978/original/file-20180305-146675-ywnca2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Flooding is a common hazard in Nezahualcoyotl, a Mexican city just outside the nation's capital.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photos/Eduardo Verdugo</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://theconversation.com/los-juegos-politicos-con-el-agua-del-que-son-victimas-los-mexicanos-93914"><em>Leer en español</em></a>.</p>
<p>When Cape Town acknowledged in February that it would <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-safrica-drought/drought-hit-cape-town-dreads-day-zero-when-taps-will-run-dry-idUSKCN1G51DL">run out of water within months</a>, South Africa suddenly became the global poster child for bad water management. Newspapers revealed that the <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-saundersonmeyer-drought-commentary/commentary-in-drought-hit-south-africa-the-politics-of-water-idUSKBN1FP226">federal government had been slow</a> to respond to the city’s three-year drought because the mayor belongs to an opposition party. </p>
<p>Cape Town is not alone. While both <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/mar/05/britain-braces-for-floods-and-water-shortages-as-temperatures-rise">rich</a> and poor countries are drying out, the <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-42982959">fast-growing cities of the developing world</a> are projected to suffer the <a href="http://www.wri.org/blog/2013/12/world%E2%80%99s-36-most-water-stressed-countries">most acute shortages in coming years</a>. </p>
<p>Scarcity turns water into a powerful political bargaining chip. From <a href="http://foreignpolicy.com/2015/07/17/at-the-mercy-of-the-water-mafia-india-delhi-tanker-gang-scarcity/">Delhi</a> to <a href="https://in.reuters.com/article/women-cities-kenya-water/feature-kenyan-women-pay-the-price-for-slum-water-mafias-idINKCN0JA0P620141126">Nairobi</a>, its oversight is fraught with inequality, corruption and conflict. </p>
<p>Mexico, too, has seen its water fall prey to cronyism in too many cities. I interviewed 180 engineers, politicians, business leaders and residents in eight Mexican cities for <a href="https://www.press.umich.edu/9210462/water_and_politics">my book on politics and water</a>. I was startled to discover that Mexican officials frequently treat water distribution and treatment not as public services but as political favors. </p>
<h2>When thunderstorms are cause for panic</h2>
<p>Nezahualcoyotl is a city in Mexico State near the nation’s sprawling capital. Just after lunch one Friday afternoon in 2008, Pablo, an engineer, was showing me around town when news of an unexpected thunderstorm began lighting up his team’s cell phones and pagers. </p>
<p>The engineers shouted back and forth, looking increasingly frantic. Having just begun my book research, I did not yet understand why an everyday event like a thunderstorm would elicit such panic. </p>
<p>Pablo explained that Nezahualcoyotl’s aged electric grid often failed during big storms and that the city lacked backup generators. If a power outage shut down the local sanitation treatment plant, raw sewage would flood the streets. </p>
<p>These “aguas negras” <a href="https://www3.epa.gov/npdes/pubs/sso_casestudy_control.pdf">carry nasty bacteria, viruses and parasitic organisms</a> and can cause cholera, dysentery, hepatitis and severe gastroenteritis. If raw sewage also contains industrial wastewater – which is common in rapidly industrializing countries like Mexico – it may also <a href="http://www.dailypioneer.com/columnists/oped/heavy-metal-toxicity-and-water-contamination.html">expose residents to chemicals and heavy metals</a> that can lead to everything from lead poisoning to cancer. </p>
<p>Pablo and his colleagues avoided a flood that day. But I later read news articles confirming how <a href="http://archivo.eluniversal.com.mx/ciudad/51610.html">relatively common sewage overflows are there</a>. Nezahualcoyotl residents have been dealing with this multisystem failure for 30 years, complaining of gastrointestinal illness and skin lesions all the while. </p>
<p>So why hasn’t this public health emergency been fixed? The answer is a primer on the <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=pkWm4ZAAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=sra">tricky politics of urban water delivery in Mexico</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/208944/original/file-20180305-146655-qgb11v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/208944/original/file-20180305-146655-qgb11v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208944/original/file-20180305-146655-qgb11v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208944/original/file-20180305-146655-qgb11v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208944/original/file-20180305-146655-qgb11v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208944/original/file-20180305-146655-qgb11v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208944/original/file-20180305-146655-qgb11v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In some Mexican cities, heavy rains routinely cause raw sewage carrying a host of dangerous parasites and bacteria to overflow into the streets.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Prometeo Lucero</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Profit from dysfunction</h2>
<p>Public malfeasance <a href="https://theconversation.com/governors-gone-wild-mexico-faces-a-lost-generation-of-corrupt-leaders-76858">in Mexico is widespread</a>. Nearly 90 percent of citizens see the state and federal government as corrupt, according to the <a href="http://www.beta.inegi.org.mx/proyectos/enchogares/regulares/encig/2015/">Mexican National Institute of Statistics and Geography</a>.</p>
<p>The country’s water situation, too, is pretty dire. The capital, Mexico City, is “parched and sinking,” <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/02/17/world/americas/mexico-city-sinking.html">according to a powerful 2017 New York Times report</a>, and 81 percent of residents say they <a href="http://foreignpolicy.com/2015/07/31/the-war-for-privatization-mexicos-water/">don’t drink from the tap</a>, either because they lack running water or they don’t trust its quality. </p>
<p>Officially, <a href="http://www.conagua.gob.mx/CONAGUA07/Publicaciones/Publicaciones/EAM2015_ing.pdf">nearly all Mexicans have access to running water</a>. But in practice, many – particularly poorer people – have <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/315976">intermittent service and very low pressure</a>. </p>
<p>Workers in one city asked me to keep their identity anonymous before explaining why the water infrastructure there was so decrepit. It wasn’t a lack of technology, they said. The mayor’s team actually profits from refusing to upgrade the city’s perpetually defunct hardware. That’s because whenever a generator or valve breaks, they send it to their buddies’ refurbishing shops. </p>
<p>Numerous engineers across Mexico similarly expressed frustration that they were sometimes forbidden from making technical fixes to improve local water service because of a mayor’s “political commitments.” </p>
<p>In Nezahualcoyotl, I met a water director who openly boasted of using public water service for his political and personal gain. In the same breath, he told me that he fought to keep water bills low in this mostly poor city because water was a “human right” but also that he had once turned off supplies to an entire neighborhood for weeks because of a feud with another city employee. </p>
<h2>No voter ID, no water</h2>
<p>Public officials also use water to influence politics.</p>
<p>My sources also alleged that the powerful <a href="http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.843.5120&rep=rep1&type=pdf">Revolutionary Institutional Party</a>, or PRI – which has long run Mexico State, and thus controlled its water supply – has turned off the water in towns whose mayors belonged to opposition parties. These tactics are not reported in the Mexican press, but according to my research the cuts tend to occur just before municipal elections – a bid to make the PRI’s political competition look bad.</p>
<p>Water corruption isn’t limited to Mexico State, or to the center-right PRI party. </p>
<p>The millions of Mexicans who lack reliable access to piped water are served by <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/02/17/world/americas/mexico-city-sinking.html">municipal water trucks</a>, called “pipas,” which drive around filling buildings’ cisterns. This system seems prone to political exploitation. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/208982/original/file-20180305-146645-el6xi4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/208982/original/file-20180305-146645-el6xi4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208982/original/file-20180305-146645-el6xi4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208982/original/file-20180305-146645-el6xi4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208982/original/file-20180305-146645-el6xi4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208982/original/file-20180305-146645-el6xi4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208982/original/file-20180305-146645-el6xi4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Mexican households without steady running water have cisterns filled by ‘pipas,’ or municipal water trucks.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Dario Lopez-Mills</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Interviewees told me that city workers sometimes make people show their voter ID cards, demonstrating their affiliation to the governing party, before receiving their water. Across the country, mayoral candidates chase votes by promising to give residents <a href="http://notipascua.com/agua-gratis-sector-arevalo-cedeno-gracias-pablo-alvarado/">free or subsidized water service</a>, rather than to charge based on consumption. </p>
<p>The phenomenon of trading water as a political favor is probably more common in lower income communities, which <a href="http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/nacion/sociedad/acusan-politizacion-de-agua-despues-del-sismo">rely almost exclusively on the pipas</a>.</p>
<h2>Water is a state secret</h2>
<p>In Xalapa, the capital of Veracruz state, I saw how water can hold a different kind of political power. </p>
<p>There, I found, the location of underground pipes and other critical water infrastructure was guarded like a state secret, known by just a handful of public workers. It made them irreplaceable. </p>
<p>So when customers complained that some municipal employees were asking for bribes to provide water, management hesitated to fire them. The workers controlled valuable information about the city’s water system.</p>
<p>Water may be a <a href="http://www.unesco.org/new/en/media-services/single-view/news/the_right_to_water/">human right</a>. But when politicians manipulate it for their personal or political benefit, some cities flood while others go dry.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/91709/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Veronica Herrera does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>In many Mexican cities, water is treated as a political bargaining chip – a favor that public officials can trade for votes, bribes or power.Veronica Herrera, Assistant Professor of Political Science, University of ConnecticutLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/896992018-01-08T09:18:17Z2018-01-08T09:18:17ZWhy Rwanda’s development model wouldn’t work elsewhere in Africa<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/200946/original/file-20180105-26142-cm4fig.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Paul Kagame has exercised firm personal control over Rwanda's politics since becoming president in 2000.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Phillip Guelland</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Rwanda is often touted as an example of what African states could achieve if only they were better governed. Out of the ashes of a horrific genocide, <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/rwandas-paul-kagame-saviour-or-dictator-bjdhp22nv">President Paul Kagame</a> has resuscitated the economy, curtailed corruption and maintained political stability.</p>
<p>This is a record that many other leaders can only dream of, and has led to Rwanda being cited as an economic success story that the rest of the continent would <a href="https://www.fastcompany.com/1208900/rwanda-rising-new-model-economic-development">do well to follow</a>.</p>
<p>In countries like <a href="https://www.tuko.co.ke/253319-kenya-a-dictator-paul-kagame-uhuru-leader-jubilee-vice-chair.html#253319">Kenya</a> and <a href="https://www.thestandard.co.zw/2017/12/04/mnangagwa-zimbabwes-kagame/">Zimbabwe</a> some have argued that their leaders should operate more like Kagame. In other words, that job creation and poverty alleviation are more important than free and fair elections.</p>
<p>In response, critics have sought to puncture Kagame’s image by pointing to <a href="https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/02/rwanda-paul-kagame-americas-darling-tyrant-103963">human rights violations</a> committed under his leadership. This is an important concern. But the notion that the Rwandan model should be exported also suffers from a more fundamental flaw: it would not work almost anywhere else because the necessary conditions – political dominance and tight centralised control of patronage networks – do not apply.</p>
<h2>The Rwandan model</h2>
<p>Many of the achievements of Kagame and his governing <a href="https://www.hrw.org/reports/1999/rwanda/Geno15-8-03.htm">Rwandan Patriotic Front</a> party are impressive. He took over a deeply divided nation in desperate need of economic and political reconstruction in 1994. Since then, Kagame has established firm personal control over Rwandan politics, generating the political stability needed for economic renewal.</p>
<p>Instead of sitting back and waiting for foreign investors and the “market” to inspire growth, the new administration intervened directly in a process of state directed development. Most notably, his government kick started economic activity in areas that had previously been stagnating by investing heavily in key sectors. It has done so through party-owned holding companies such as <a href="https://www.economist.com/news/business/21718000-crystal-ventures-has-investments-everything-furniture-finance-rwandan-patriotic">Tri-Star Investments</a>.</p>
<p>Combined with the careful management of agriculture, these policies generated <a href="http://www.worldbank.org/en/country/rwanda/overview">economic growth of around 8%</a> between 2001 and 2013. Partly as a result, the percentage of people living below the poverty line fell from 57% in 2005 to <a href="https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/04/5-things-to-know-about-rwanda-s-economy/">45% in 2010</a>. Other indicators of human development, such as <a href="http://hdr.undp.org/sites/all/themes/hdr_theme/country-notes/RWA.pdf">life expectancy</a> and <a href="https://en.unesco.org/countries/rwanda">literacy</a>, have also improved.</p>
<h2>An example for Africa?</h2>
<p>Despite the impressive headline figures, a number of criticisms have been levelled at the Rwandan model.</p>
<p>Most obviously, it sacrifices basic human rights – such as <a href="http://www.nybooks.com/daily/2017/08/04/rwanda-kagame-efficient-repression/">freedom of expression and freedom of association</a> – to sustain the ruling party’s political hegemony. The Rwandan system therefore involves compromising democracy for the sake of development. That decision may be an easy one to make for those who enjoy political power, but is often rejected by the opposition.</p>
<p>Less obviously, the use of party-owned enterprises to kick start business activity places the ruling party at the heart of the economy. It also means that when the economy does well, the already dominant Rwandan Patriotic Front is strengthened. This empowers Kagame to determine who is allowed to <a href="https://www.news24.com/Africa/News/ruling-partys-business-arm-dominates-rwandan-economy-20170730">accumulate economic power</a>, which in turn undermines the ability of opposition leaders and critics to raise funds.</p>
<p>These arguments have been around for some time. But they have done little to dampen the allure of the Rwandan model for some <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2017-07-07-00-like-it-or-not-rwanda-is-africas-future">commentators</a> and <a href="http://en.igihe.com/news/kenya-s-kenyatta-congratulates-kagame.html">leaders</a>. </p>
<p>Given this, the strongest argument against exporting the Rwandan model is not that it is undemocratic and gives the ruling party tremendous economic power. It’s that it won’t actually work.</p>
<h2>Can’t work everywhere</h2>
<p>One of the most rigorous efforts to understand the political conditions that made the Rwandan model possible has emerged from the <a href="http://www.institutions-africa.org/">African Power and Politics</a> research project led by David Booth, Tim Kelsall and others. They argue that Kagame’s government is an example of <a href="http://www.institutions-africa.org/page/developmental-patrimonialism.html">“developmental patrimonialism”</a>. In this system, the potentially damaging aspects of patrimonial politics are held in check by a leader who enjoys tight control over patronage networks. These include jobs for the boys, waste and inefficiency.</p>
<p>This authority needs to be established both internally and externally. External political control is required because the threat of electoral defeat by a strong opposition party may force the government to prioritise short-term survival over long-term investments. Internal control is required because the absence of checks and balances on the ruling party is likely to exacerbate corruption.</p>
<p>When these conditions hold, elements of patrimonialism may be economically productive by generating resources that are channelled back into the system. In the Rwandan case, the Rwandan Patriotic Front’s economic and political dominance has not undermined development because the funds generated through party-owned enterprises have often been <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/270777957_Developmental_Patrimonialism_The_Case_of_Rwanda">reinvested in the economy</a>.</p>
<h2>Unintended consequences</h2>
<p>The problem is that these conditions don’t hold in most African states. With a few exceptions such as Chad and Angola, the ruling party cannot aspire to the level of dominance witnessed in Rwanda because the opposition is too strong for this degree of political control to be sustained. In <a href="http://africanarguments.org/2017/06/13/why-do-opposition-coalitions-succeed-or-fail/">Kenya and Zimbabwe</a>, for example, the opposition has consistently won a large share of the legislative and presidential vote. </p>
<p>In addition, even some states that feature more dominant ruling parties have consistently failed to impose economic discipline on their governments. Instead, entrenched clientelism and internal factionalism have typically undermined anti-corruption efforts. This is true for both <a href="http://africanarguments.org/2017/08/14/angola-elections-ruling-family-dos-santos-worth-billions-what-happens-when-dad-steps-down/">Angola</a> and <a href="https://www.transparency.org/whatwedo/answer/overview_of_corruption_and_anti_corruption_in_chad">Chad</a>, hurting efforts to reduce poverty and boost economic growth.</p>
<p>Shorn of the internal and external political control required to make it work, the application of the Rwandan model elsewhere would generate very different results.</p>
<p>Extending the control of the ruling party over the economy is more likely to increase graft and waste than to spur economic activity. And efforts to neutralise opposition parties are likely to be strongly resisted, leading to political instability and economic uncertainty.</p>
<p>What this means is that if other countries on the continent try to implement the Rwandan model, the chances are that they will experience all of its costs while realising few of its benefits.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/89699/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nic Cheeseman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Rwandan model can’t be replicated easily given that it depends heavily on political dominance and tight, centralised control of patronage networks.Nic Cheeseman, Professor of Democracy, University of BirminghamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/572562016-04-07T04:33:48Z2016-04-07T04:33:48ZCan the ANC survive the end of South Africa’s heroic epoch?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/117728/original/image-20160406-28970-1ahuksm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Posters depicting the ANC in happier times.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters/Siphiwe Sibeko </span></span></figcaption></figure><p>South Africa’s governing African National Congress <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/index.php">(ANC)</a> has gone through episodic crises in its century of existence. Right now, the media and commentariat are seized with debate about whether or not it is <a href="http://www.heraldlive.co.za/anc-crisis-talks-zuma/">in a crisis</a> and whether it is as serious as any other.</p>
<p>The party has survived tumultuous times, including a major split that resulted in the <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/topic/pan-africanist-congress-pac">Pan Africanist Congress</a> (PAC) in 1959 as well as friction in the post-democratic era. The <a href="http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/carolus-kasrils-and-others-join-call-for-zuma-to-step-down-20160406">present crisis</a> differs because the party has governed the country for more than 20 years and faces different threats such as clientelism and patronage.</p>
<p>History should serve as a sombre warning to the ANC of what might happen if it does not manage leadership rivalries within its ranks. Though the party has won between <a href="http://mg.co.za/article/2014-05-11-the-partys-over-anc-sees-decline-in-support">62% and 68% of votes</a> cast in every election since 1994, history does not guarantee any party predestination to govern for ever.</p>
<h2>The tumultuous 1920s, 30s, 40s and 50s</h2>
<p>During the 1920s, ANC members were demoralised and dropped out when <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/topic/african-national-congress-timeline-1910-1919">their delegations</a> to the British government and <a href="https://history.state.gov/milestones/1914-1920/paris-peace">Conference of Versailles</a> elicited no support for their opposition to the <a href="https://www.nelsonmandela.org/omalley/index.php/site/q/03lv01538/04lv01646/05lv01745.htm">Natives Land Act</a> and other racist laws. So big was the loss in numbers that the <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/organisations/industrial-and-commercial-workers-union-icu">Industrial and Commercial Workers Union</a> overtook it as the largest black organisation in the country.</p>
<p>But by the end of the 1920s the ANC had again became the largest as administrative incompetence and corruption, as much as repression, saw the union collapse.</p>
<p>The publication of the draft <a href="https://www.nelsonmandela.org/omalley/index.php/site/q/03lv01538/04lv01646/05lv01784.htm">Native Trust and Land bill</a> in the mid-1930s saw the ANC’s fortunes again take a turn for the worse. The <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/world-and-african-history/all-africa-convention">All-African Convention (AAC)</a> swiftly grew in size to outnumber the ANC. The rump of the AAC constituted itself in the 1940s as the <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/organisations/non-european-unity-movement-neum">Non-European Unity Movement</a>. But it alienated and expelled many in repeated dogmatic schisms.</p>
<p>During the 1940s the ANC rejuvenated itself organisationally when it founded its <a href="http://www.ancyl.org.za/">Youth League</a>. It also got a new lease on life ideologically with its <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/show.php?id=4474">African Claims</a> manifesto. It peaked with 100,000 members during the <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/topic/defiance-campaign-1952">Defiance Campaign of 1952</a>. After that, state repression started to gradually grind it down, though it remained the largest black political party.</p>
<p>A split over ideology and tactics saw the formation of the PAC in 1959. This split was perhaps the most serious in ANC history; the PAC attracted crowds perhaps one-third the size of those attending ANC meetings, until both parties suffered banning and repression in the <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/dated-event/state-emergency-declared-after-sharpeville-massacre">1960 State of Emergency</a>. </p>
<p>During the harrowing decades of underground and exile only a few small cells of ANC and PAC veterans managed to evade and survive within South Africa. <a href="http://www.jacana.co.za/book-categories/current-affairs-a-history/the-anc-underground-in-south-africa-detail">In exile</a>, the ANC maintained pre-eminence, with solidarity support from communist parties, western socialists, trade unions and liberals, plus the <a href="http://www.politicsweb.co.za/news-and-analysis/the-anc-and-the-soviets">Soviet-led</a> bloc of communist governments, and many African governments.</p>
<p>By contrast, the banned PAC enjoyed US support for only four years, then <a href="https://www.nelsonmandela.org/omalley/index.php/site/q/03lv02424/04lv02730/05lv03188/06lv03214.htm">Chinese support</a> on a small scale. It also won some support from a minority of black power activists abroad, some tiny western Trotskyist circles, and only Libya and Iran.</p>
<p>Exile is usually a harsh environment for political parties, few of whom can remain viable longer than a decade or two. The ANC however remained organisationally intact.</p>
<p>By contrast the PAC was torn asunder in exile by perpetual <a href="http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:hf-4CN94vmsJ:www.disa.ukzn.ac.za/webpages/DC/slapr93.4/slapr93.4.pdf+&cd=2&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=za">splits and schisms</a> until it lost any organisational coherence. The <a href="http://azapo.org.za/azapohistory/azapo-and-bcma-historical-background/">Black Consciousness Movement of Azania</a> in exile remained marginal in number.</p>
<h2>Democracy heralds a sea change</h2>
<p>Democracy resulted in a sea change in the ANC. Before its <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/dated-event/fw-de-klerk-announces-release-nelson-mandela-and-unbans-political-organisations">unbanning in 1990</a> no-one could expect any personal gain from joining the ANC. To the contrary, members could only expect victimisation at work, harassment from the municipal authorities, and banning orders, house arrest, detention without trial, torture or assassination. As a result only highly committed idealists joined the ANC.</p>
<p>Today the heroic epoch is over. Many idealists remain, but they sit alongside careerists, floor crossers and <a href="http://www.gov.za/tenderpreneurship-stuff-crooked-cadres-fighters">tenderpreneurs</a> – businesspeople who enrich themselves through government tenders, often dubiously. In short, the ANC has become a normal political party. One consequence is that splits and factions are today less connected with policy ideals than with the system of <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africa-why-economic-freedom-is-proving-to-be-the-ancs-undoing-48339">patronage</a> and clientelism.</p>
<p>Mobilisation is usually aimed not at any policy, but at getting a patron elected who will try to divert tenders to political donors. This is at its bloodiest in municipal politics, where <a href="http://www.rdm.co.za/politics/2016/02/29/political-assassinations-are-on-the-rise">assassinations number in the dozens</a>, especially in the KwaZulu-Natal province. The stakes are indeed high. A ward councillor is paid ten times the average wage in a township.</p>
<p>For example, policy divergence was an escalating symptom, rather than the cause, of the expulsion of <a href="http://mg.co.za/article/2012-02-29-julius-malema-expelled">Julius Malema</a> from the ANC Youth League and his subsequent launch of the <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/article/founding-economic-freedom-fighters-eff">Economic Freedom Fighters</a>. The mutual accusations of corruption between Zuma and the pre-expulsion Malema underscore the stark facts of their political patronage networks.</p>
<p>The current media debate on the probability of Zuma not lasting out his term of office as ANC leader until 2017 and as South African president until 2019 is flawed by one methodological failing. South Africans and their media are prone to either canonise a politician as a saint, such as Nelson Mandela, or demonise him as a monster, as Zuma. Leadership counts big-time, but such over-personalisation of politics fails to spot the system of patronage and clientelism.</p>
<p>Removing Zuma and replacing him with another is unlikely to replace the spoils system of inappropriate cadre deployment, nor tenderpreneurship. Replacing Thabo Mbeki with Zuma did not end these problems. Zuma’s successor as president will be hard pressed to face down those demanding payback. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/117735/original/image-20160406-28950-v1wntj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/117735/original/image-20160406-28950-v1wntj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=447&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/117735/original/image-20160406-28950-v1wntj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=447&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/117735/original/image-20160406-28950-v1wntj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=447&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/117735/original/image-20160406-28950-v1wntj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=562&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/117735/original/image-20160406-28950-v1wntj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=562&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/117735/original/image-20160406-28950-v1wntj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=562&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Patronage and corruption have become rampant under President Jacob Zuma.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters/Mike Hutchings</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>What now?</h2>
<p>So far Zuma’s supporters have outvoted his rivals in the ANC, and often purged them from executive structures. One consequence could be larger numbers of abstentions from former ANC voters in the coming <a href="http://www.thepresidency.gov.za/pebble.asp?relid=21869">municipal elections</a>.</p>
<p>ANC membership numbers tend to peak during election campaigns (up to one million) and slump between elections. Whether this pattern will hold remains to be seen. The ANC nevertheless remains by far the largest political party in the country. There is not yet any sign of a seismic shift in this balance of power.</p>
<p>On the other hand, there are flashing red lights that the ANC party bureaucracy has deteriorated to the level where it battles to perform even the simplest of everyday tasks, such as issuing membership cards. And there is growing anger at appointments driven by <a href="http://mg.co.za/article/2012-07-12-anc-cadre-deployment">cronyism</a> that lead to dysfunctional schools and sewage treatment plants.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/57256/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Keith Gottschalk is an ANC member. He writes this in his professional capacity as a political scientist. </span></em></p>Democracy resulted in a sea change in the governing ANC. In the past, only highly committed idealists joined the party. Today’s splits and factions are about patronage and clientelism.Keith Gottschalk, Political Scientist, University of the Western CapeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.