Introduction
p. 1-3
Remerciements
The authors are grateful to Dr Jinmi Adisa and Pius Adesanmi for their useful comments and suggestions.
Texte intégral
1The end of the Cold War was marked by an upsurge in demands for liberalization and democratization in various parts of the world. Most of the communist states collapsed while one-party states succumbed to the plea for multi-party structures and elections. As the demand for human rights and elections became widespread, autocratic military governments began to succumb to pressures from within and without. The leading countries of the West, which had won the Cold War, began to insist on the introduction of free market economies and liberal democratic principles as conditions for economic assistance. As a result, Third World countries, particularly in Africa, whose economies are very dependent on external aid, became enveloped in the bid for democratic transition. This led to problems.
2The difficulty was that most African states lacked the necessary structures for democratic transition, as political changes had occurred mainly through military coup d’états. The only alternative was for the incumbents to die in office. The continent has suffered from a sit-tight leadership syndrome which has been at the root of its crises of political succession. Against this background the decision to democratize was invariably a painful one, since the family of African dictators, many of whom had been in power since independence in the early 1960s, were forced to come to terms with the requirements of the new international landscape. The interaction of domestic discontent and international pressure made democratization compelling.
3The innate aspirations of these leaders were to contain these pressures and establish the trappings of democracy without the substance, that is, to legitimize their administrations as democratic with as little change as possible. This bid to manage the process of change created complications. As the scale of public disenchantment grew, various rulers were changed in Zambia, Congo, Niger, Mali and the Republic of Benin. Others continued to ride the tiger, contriving a democratic appearance without democratic ingredients. The upshot was the emergence of different models1 of political engineering on the continent, among them, the national conference, which became popular among; the Francophone states, but was not restricted to them.2
4The aim of this study is to examine critically the possibility of institutionalizing the national conference as a model for transition to democracy in Africa. There are basically two types of national conference: one with limited autonomy and the other with sovereign powers. The Benin Republic instituted a national conference with sovereign powers which culminated in political democracy for the country; Nigeria opted for a national conference with limited autonomy. This analysis focuses primarily on the experiences of these two countries. Reference is, however, made to other countries where these models have been tried, to enrich our understanding of this method of democratization.
Notes de bas de page
1 Guy Martin and Richard Joseph identified five and seven models of transition respectively. For details, see Guy Martin, Preface to democratic transition in Africa, Issue 21 (1-2) 1993: 6-7. Richard Joseph, Africa: The rebirth of political freedom. Journal of Democracy 2 (4) Fall, 1991.
2 Pearl T. Robinson argues that the national conference is common among Francophone states because of the continuing political and cultural influence of France on her former African colonies. The conference is seen as being in the mould of the estates-general of 1789 during the French Revolution, where the Third Estate (assembly) declared itself sovereign thus shifting sovereignty from the ruler to the assembly. For details see: The national conference phenomenon in Francophone Africa. Society for Comparative Study of Societies and History 36 (3) 1994: 575-610.
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