| dc.description.abstract | Why has the electoral process in the newly democratised
African states had such limited impacts? How can the
continued one-party dominance on the continent be
explained despite the reintroduction of political freedoms,
substantial external financial support to these processes, and
a variety of institutional reforms to back the democratic
processes?
The report confronts these questions by conducting a
review of the literature that has focused on a) the main
characteristics of the electoral arrangements of sub-Saharan
African states, b) the characteristics of parties in the region,
and c) the behaviour and attitudes of the electorate. In the
second part, we illustrate the general findings and conclusions
of part one with an analysis of electoral policies in Zambia
since the reintroduction of multiparty politics in 1991. In the
final part, we assess the role of the international donor
community in terms of electoral assistance to sub-Saharan
Africa in the 1990s and ask what the international
community can do to improve the quality and content of
electoral processes.
This report was originally commissioned by the
Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (NORAD)
and submitted December 2001. | |
