Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Decentralization and political opposition in contemporary Africa: evidence from Sudan and Ethiopia

2011; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 18; Issue: 5 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/13510347.2011.603476

1743-890X

Elliott Green,

Corruption and Economic Development

Abstract A growing literature in political science has examined the impact of democratization on decentralization without much attention, however, to how decentralization influences political opposition movements. In order to help fill this gap, in this contribution I examine two case studies of decentralization in Africa, namely Sudan's experiment with decentralization in the 1970s and Ethiopia's more recent experience with decentralization since the 1990s. In the former case political opposition pressured the government to abandon decentralization in the South, leading to a renewed civil war and a successful coup d'état, while in the latter case the political opposition has both remained fragmented and failed to gain a foothold in a series of national elections. I argue that the key reason for these divergent outcomes was the differing equality of decentralization. More specifically, inasmuch as Sudanese decentralization initially only applied to the South, political opposition in the North remained united and instead focused its attentions on Khartoum. In Ethiopia, however, President Zenawi's regime introduced an equitable form of ethnic federalism across 11 regions, which quickly became a site for political party competition and fragmentation. This contribution thus suggests that equitable decentralization can promote opposition political party fragmentation. Keywords: decentralizationdemocratizationfederalismEthiopiaSudan Acknowledgment I would like to thank conference participants in Växjö and Nairobi and comments on an earlier draft from Lahra Smith. All errors, however, remain my own. Notes Crook, ‘Decentralization and Poverty Reduction’; Enikolpov and Zhuravskaya, ‘Decentralization and Political Institutions’. Przeworski, ‘Self-Enforcing Democracy’. Treisman, The Architecture of Government, 264–7. Gerring, Case Study Research. Schneider, ‘Decentralization’. Heller, ‘Moving the State’, 144. Crook, ‘Decentralization and Poverty Reduction’, 85. Kulipossa, ‘Decentralization and Democracy’; Treisman, The Architecture of Government. Brancati, ‘The Origins and Strengths of Regional Parties’; Chhibber and Kollman, The Formation of National Party Systems; Harbers, ‘Decentralization and the Development of Nationalized Party Systems’; Van Cott, ‘Institutional Change and Ethnic Parties’. Sabatini, ‘Decentralization and Political Parties’, 144. Ryan, ‘Decentralization and Democratic Instability’, 85. Green, ‘Decentralization and Conflict in Uganda’, 434. Boone, ‘Decentralization as Political Strategy’. Bigombe, Collier, and Sambanis, ‘Policies for Building Post-Conflict Peace’. Hale, ‘Divided We Stand’. More specifically, anocracies are those countries which have a Polity IV score between -5 and 5, with -10 a full dictatorship and 10 a full democracy. CIA World Factbook, Sudan, 2010, http://www.google.co.uk/search?client=opera&rls=en&q=cia+world+factbook&sourceid=opera&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&channel=suggest. Woodward, US Foreign Policy and the Horn of Africa. Kasfir, ‘Southern Sudanese Politics’; Keller and Smith, ‘Obstacles to Implementing Territorial Decentralization’; Rondinelli, ‘Administrative Decentralization’. Rondinelli, ‘Administrative Decentralization’, 596. Kasfir, ‘Southern Sudanese Politics’, 144; Rondinelli, ‘Administrative Decentralization’. Kasfir, ‘Southern Sudanese Politics’, 165. Collins, A History of Modern Sudan, 133–5; Johnson, The Root Causes of Sudan's Civil Wars, 52–4. Hamid, ‘Confrontation and Reconciliation’, 327. The South was and is also split in four ways religiously between animists, Catholics, Protestants and Muslims. Kasfir, ‘Southern Sudanese Politics’, 162–4. Atlas and Licklider, ‘Conflict Among Former Allies’, 40. Collins, A History of Modern Sudan, 127, 130. The next-highest level of government was thus the area or district. Alassam, ‘Regional Government’, 116. Gallab, The First Islamic Republic, 91–2. De Waal, ‘Who are the Darfurians?’; Morton, ‘Ethnicity and Politics’. Samatar, ‘Ethiopian Federalism’, 1142. Abbay, ‘Diversity and Democracy’; Tronvoll, ‘Ambiguous Elections’, 456. The Correlates of War dataset on intra-state (i.e. civil) war does not list any wars in Ethiopia since 1991. While some 200 people died in Ethiopian election violence in 2005, roughly 1100 people died in the 2007 election in neighbouring Kenya, which has half of Ethiopia's population and a much longer history of democratic elections. (See Smith, ‘Explaining Violence’.) Most of Somalia has remained in a state of civil war and anarchy since 1991. Eritrea is a one-party state and is currently the only country in Africa without regularly scheduled national elections. Alesina et al., ‘Fractionalization’. Fisseha-Tsion, ‘Highlights of the Constitution’, 170. Each state is guaranteed a minimum of one representative in the upper House, increasing by one with each million of its population. See Part 2, Article 61, clause 2 of the 1994 Ethiopian Constitution; Government of Ethiopia, Constitution of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia. Hale, ‘Divided We Stand’. Abbink, ‘The Ethiopian Second Republic’, 15. Green, ‘Patronage, District Creation and Reform in Uganda’. Government of Ethiopia, Population and Housing Census of Ethiopia. Vaughan, ‘Response to Ethnic Federalism’. Chanie, ‘Clientelism and Ethiopia's Post-1991 Decentralization’; Feyissa, ‘The Experience of Gambella State’. Africa Research Bulletin, ‘Ethiopia’. Samatar, ‘Ethiopian Federalism’, 1146–8. See the African Elections Database, http://africanelections.tripod.com/et_2005state.html. Arriola, ‘Ethnicity, Economic Conditions and Opposition Support’, 119. A third party member of the CUD was led by the Gurage native Berhanu Nega, thus explaining why the party picked up support in the Gurage part of SNNPR. Abbay, ‘Diversity and Democracy’. Lyons, ‘Conflict-Generated Diasporas’. Sansculotte-Greenidge, ‘A Contest of Visions’, 225. Arriola, ‘Ethnicity, Economic Conditions and Opposition Support’, 123. Tronvoll, ‘Ambiguous Elections’. See the African Elections Database, http://africanelections.tripod.com/et_2010state.html. Lindberg, Democracy and Elections in Africa. Ishiyama, ‘The Politics of Appeasement’. Storholt, ‘Lessons Learned’. Humphreys and Ag Mohamed, ‘Senegal and Mali’, 257. Seely, ‘A Political Analysis of Decentralization’, 516. Ibid. Hale, ‘Divided We Stand’, 183, 188–9. Suberu, ‘Federalism and the Management of Ethnic Conflict’. Green, ‘Ethnicity and the Politics of Land Tenure Reform’. Presidential Commission on Single-Party or Multi-Party System in Tanzania, Report and Recommendations. Horowitz, ‘The Many Uses of Federalism’. Branch and Mampilly, ‘Winning the War’. Mamdani, Saviors and Survivors, 188. Tache and Oba, ‘Policy-Driven Inter-Ethnic Conflicts’.