Supporters of Zambia’s president-elect Edgar Lungu in 2016. The country is known for peaceful polls, but this one was marked by clashes.
Dawood Salim/AFP via Getty Images
Political legacies generated during authoritarian rule have a tendency to transcend into the multiparty era.
Sudan’s ousted President Omar al-Bashir appears in court in Khartoum on December 14, 2019. He was later sentenced to two years in prison for corruption.
Photo by Mahmoud Hajaj/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
The ICC must not further destroy its credibility by cooperating with the sorts of bad actors who should be before a court themselves.
Malawi’s President elect Peter Mutharika waves to supporters during the swearing in ceremony in Blantyre in May last year after the contentious poll.
AMOS Gumulira/AFP via Getty Images
The unstable authoritarian pathway that many post-colonial African states followed was facilitated by the way in which European empires undermined democratic elements within African societies.
Many Zimbabweans have turned to hawking to keep the wolf from the door as the economic crisis in the country deepens.
EFE-EPA
The election’s result endorses other evidence that trust in South Africa’s constitutional settlement and its political institutions is steadily declining.
Newspapers in Swahili and in English in Dar es Salaam. The media is increasingly not trusted in Tanzania.
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The role of the military in toppling authoritarian rulers, after intensive popular protests, raises questions about how the AU’s policy against coups should be applied.
The Ugandan government is one of many on the continent that’s overseen the erosion of media freedom.
EPA/Dai Kurokawa
The argument isn’t whether African democracies are better than those in the West. It’s simply that the idea of “real” and “not yet real” democracies expresses a colonial mentality, not reality.
A coup attempt failed in Gabon, following President Ali Bongo’s extended illness and absence.
EPA/Stringer
Elections are supposed to hold politicians accountable: Officials who fear losing their seat will work harder for voters. But in some countries, political competition actually makes government worse.
Days before their Oct. 28 presidential election, Brazilians protested news that supporters of right-wing front-runner Jair Bolsonaro had used WhatsApp to spread false information about his opponents.
Reuters/Nacho Doce
Facebook retired its ‘Move fast and break things’ slogan – perhaps because, as new research from Brazil confirms, democracy is among the things left broken by online misinformation and fake news.
Professor of Francophone Studies (Africa, Caribbean), Faculty Affiliate with Africana Studies, World Literature Program and Human Rights Pracice, University of Arizona