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- Convenors:
-
Isabella Soi
(Università degli Studi di Cagliari)
Paul Nugent (University of Edinburgh)
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- Location:
- C6.02
- Start time:
- 27 June, 2013 at
Time zone: Europe/Lisbon
- Session slots:
- 1
Short Abstract:
This panel aims to investigate reciprocal comparisons between African countries, that have a shared legacy of British colonialism, in which there are two central objectives: to shed new light on each of the cases, but also to generate comparative insights that have a wider application.
Long Abstract:
How do we generate meaningful general statements about the pursuit of power and the practice of politics in contemporary Africa? One approach is to take concepts such as 'neo-patrimonialism' or 'ethnicity' and to make comparative statements at the continental level, invoking specific examples. A second approach is to dissect a particular country with a view to exposing its internal dynamics, and then scaling up to make more general statements. This panel seeks to explore a third approach which builds on genuinely reciprocal comparisons between African countries, in which there are two central objectives: to shed new light on each of the cases, but also to generate comparative insights that have a wider application. This panel sets out to map and to contrast the trajectories of African states that have a shared legacy of British colonialism. It is interested in questions of (i) how power is configured spatially (from the centre to the margins, and from the national to the local) (ii) the language with which leaders relate to their followers (including specific appeals and symbols) (iii) how institutions function on a daily basis (iv) and how a sense of national difference is articulated. The panel welcomes papers, especially joint contributions, which address such comparisons between two or more cases in an explicit fashion. Each of the contributions should also address the methodological issues involved in engaging in reciprocal comparison.
Accepted papers:
Session 1Morten Jerven (Norwegian University of Life Sciences)
Paper short abstract:
Do African states have capacity for development? African states are described either as incapable or uninterested in development, but these notions have not been historicized. This paper evaluates the conditions under which capacities for development were strengthened and weakened.
Paper long abstract:
Do African States have the capacity for 'Development'? In the contemporary literature African states are described either as incapable or uninterested in development, but these notions have not been fully historicized. Meanwhile, it is widely acknowledged in the history, economics and politics of development literature that it is history and institutions that matter most for development outcomes. This paper examines when, where and under what conditions states in sub-Saharan Africa were capable of nurturing development and when, where and under what conditions they were not. At present, we have no clear empirical metric to gauge whether African states are more capable, stronger or more legitimate today than they were 20, 50 or 100 years ago.
Judging African states to be incapable or uninterested in development calls for a complete reorientation of most internationally sponsored development policy initiatives. This paper aims to provide a new comparative basis by changing the objective from explaining the relative dysfunction of states in Africa, towards explaining determinants of how those states function, thus keeping with the principle of reciprocal comparison. Research has so far tended towards normative statements about how African states ought to be, rather than concrete analysis of how states function. This paper shed light on comparative state development capacity in Sub-Saharan Africa by evaluating the conditions under which capacities for development were strengthened and under which such conditions were weakened.
Isabella Soi (Università degli Studi di Cagliari) Paul Nugent (University of Edinburgh)
Paper short abstract:
This paper compares the state trajectories of Ghana and Uganda over the last 30 years. Against the backdrop of their distinct ‘poliscapes’, the emergence of Rawlings and Museveni marked a rupture in which an alternative set of imaginaries took centre-stage
Paper long abstract:
This paper compares the state trajectories of Ghana and Uganda over the last 30 years. The two countries share elements of a colonial legacy, in the shape of former kingdoms whose prominence in the architecture of the post-colonial state has been a recurrent political issue, and a pronounced pattern of uneven development. They both experienced periods of military rule in the 1970s that destabilized state institutions in fundamental ways. Against the backdrop of their distinct 'poliscapes', the emergence of Rawlings and Museveni marked a rupture in which an alternative set of imaginaries - in which mass participation and national unity would replace the divisiveness and corruption associated with multipartyism - took centre-stage. The paper seeks to compare these populist projects and to explain why their trajectories began to diverge again in the late 1980s. In each case, there were external and internal pressures that forced the regimes to accept the principle of multipartyism. But whereas the NDC in Ghana reconciled itself to competing on a level playing field, the Museveni regime was able to frustrate the demands for a complete democratic opening. The reasons lie partly in the greater coherence of entrenched political traditions in Ghana; in the differential levels of autonomy accorded to key state institutions; and the ability of the Museveni regime to instrumentalize the Kony insurgency for political ends.
Ivan Cuesta-Fernandez
Paper short abstract:
This paper explores the discursive attempts of African political elites to countervail the erosion of state legitimacy due to a desolating electricity supply. It compares Ghana and Tanzania in order to show how divergent spatial patterns of supply are also shaping the narratives of state elites
Paper long abstract:
Electricity has figured prominently in the discourses of state legitimation broadcasted by political elites all over the world. Hence, for a number of sub-Saharan rulers, past and present (Nkrumah, Rawlings, Atta Mills, Nyerere and Zenawi amongst them), electricity supply is part and parcel of narratives of national modernisation. These attempts to underpin state legitimacy work in two directions: 1) they show that the state is delivering, and 2) instil among the public the idea that political authority embodies modernity.
However, real access to electricity has been limited to urban areas, almost without exception, in sub-Saharan countries. Therefore, narratives of state legitimacy around electricity are certainly conveying limited appeal to rural populations and, in general, to unserved African citizens.
This paper explores the ways in which African political elites are addressing this challenge, by suggesting that contemporary discourses of state legitimation could be conditioned by spatial patterns in the supply of electricity.
In order to test this hypothesis, I compare Ghana and Tanzania, two countries in which electrification ranks high in the political debate (a legacy of the times of Nkrumah, Rawlings and Nyerere). By contrast, in the last decade at least, the Ghanaian public utility has been supplying electricity following a pattern which is at the same time more extensive and geographically balanced. The comparison between Ghana and Tanzania provides a good illustration of how the existence of spatial patterns of electricity supply also leads to the spatialisation of discourses of legitimation by state rulers