Journal Article
Opposition Parties and the Urban Poor in African Democracies
Africa’s urban poor increasingly represent a key constituency for electoral mobilization. Opposition parties, which are pivotal for democratic consolidation, have nevertheless exhibited disparate success at obtaining votes from this constituency. To...
Working Paper
The Economics of Happiness and Anger in North Africa
Economics has rediscovered happiness even though the discipline has always been about human wellbeing. A growing evidence suggests that happier people can be more productive and innovative, which leads to profitability and economic growth. Thus...
Working Paper
The Impact of Democracy on Economic Growth in Sub-Saharan Africa, 1982-2012
Does democracy promote economic growth? There is still an ongoing debate over the economic implications of democracy, and this question has gained critical importance particularly in the African context, where a wave of democratization in the early...
Book Chapter
Benin - a pulverized party system in transition
Benin has seen a rapid proliferation of political parties since the country’s democratic transition in 1990. Recent counts suggest that over a hundred political parties are registered in this nation of just over 9 million people. No single party...
Working Paper
Why Humanitarian Emergencies Occur
This paper provides a beginning toward explaining why humanitarian emergencies have been so substantial in the post-cold war era, a period expected to be less violent. The humanitarian emergencies of the contemporary period tend to be state-centred...
Journal Article
In the shadow of the city
Sub-Saharan Africa is the fastest urbanising region of the world. This demographic transformation has occurred in concert with two other trends in the region, nascent democratisation and stalled decentralisation. Using the case of Lusaka, Zambia...
Book Chapter
The Economics of Happiness and Anger in North Africa
From the book: Oxford Handbook of Africa and Economics, Vol. 1.
Book Chapter
The Impact of Democracy on Economic Growth in Sub-Saharan Africa, 1982-2012
From the book: Oxford Handbook of Africa and Economics, Vol. 1.
Working Paper
Intervention, Aid, and Institution-Building in Iraq and Afghanistan
Since 2001 international attention has focused on the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, and specifically on the question of whether external intervention can assist weak or fragile states in successfully making the transition to stable democracies...
Working Paper
Aid, Accountability, and Institution-Building in Ethiopia
Forty billion dollars of official development assistance during 1991-2012 reduced Ethiopian absolute poverty while underwriting more efficient but exclusionary public institutions. This aid-institutions paradox reflects a strong interest-alignment...
Working Paper
Consociational Settlements and Reconstruction
This paper examines Bosnia with some comparative insights from Northern Ireland. Both places were extremely fragile in the immediate aftermath of their brokered peace negotiations and consociational institutions, in Bosnia in 1995 and Northern...
Working Paper
The Impact of Adult Civic Education Programmes in Developing Democracies
Can democracy be taught? Are individuals more likely to embrace democratic values, to learn basic knowledge about political processes, and to engage the political process more effectively as a result of their exposure to donor-sponsored civic...
Working Paper
A Capable State in Afghanistan
This paper argues that attempts at state-building in Afghanistan have led to institutions that are not robust. The state institutions and organizations continue to be highly dependent on external resources and technical expertise, and lack of...
Report
Comoros: desk study on aid and democracy
This study is part of a series of ten country-focused desk studies on aid and democracy prepared under the project The state and statebuilding in the Global South. They are prepared under the guidance of Rachel M. Gisselquist as background to a...
Report
Central African Republic: desk study on aid and democracy
This study is part of a series of ten country-focused desk studies on aid and democracy prepared under the project The state and statebuilding in the Global South. They are prepared under the guidance of Rachel M. Gisselquist as background to a...
Report
Benin: desk study on aid and democracy
This study is part of a series of ten country-focused desk studies on aid and democracy prepared under the project The state and statebuilding in the Global South. They are prepared under the guidance of Rachel M. Gisselquist as background to a...
Report
Bolivia: desk study on aid and democracy
This study is part of a series of ten country-focused desk studies on aid and democracy prepared under the project The state and statebuilding in the Global South. They are prepared under the guidance of Rachel M. Gisselquist as background to a...
Report
Tunisia: desk study on aid and democracy
This study is part of a series of ten country-focused desk studies on aid and democracy prepared under the project The state and statebuilding in the Global South. They are prepared under the guidance of Rachel M. Gisselquist as background to a...
Report
Liberia: desk study on aid and democracy
This study is part of a series of ten country-focused desk studies on aid and democracy prepared under the project The state and statebuilding in the Global South. They are prepared under the guidance of Rachel M. Gisselquist as background to a...
Report
Burundi: desk study on aid and democracy
This study is part of a series of ten country-focused desk studies on aid and democracy prepared under the project The state and statebuilding in the Global South. They are prepared under the guidance of Rachel M. Gisselquist as background to a...
Report
Mali: desk study on aid and democracy
This study is part of a series of ten country-focused desk studies on aid and democracy prepared under the project The state and statebuilding in the Global South. They are prepared under the guidance of Rachel M. Gisselquist as background to a...
Report
Malawi: desk study on aid and democracy
This study is part of a series of ten country-focused desk studies on aid and democracy prepared under the project The state and statebuilding in the Global South. They are prepared under the guidance of Rachel M. Gisselquist as background to a...
Report
Nicaragua: desk study on aid and democracy
This study is part of a series of ten country-focused desk studies on aid and democracy prepared under the project The state and statebuilding in the Global South. They are prepared under the guidance of Rachel M. Gisselquist as background to a...
Book
From Shock to Therapy
The great transformation undertaken by the countries of the former communist bloc exhibits immense diversity in terms of initial conditions, shifting target models, consistency, paths, speed, progress to date, and economic performance. This is the...
Working Paper
Is the International Community Helping to Recreate the Pre-Conditions for War in Sierra Leone?
‘In a very real sense, the conditions that spawned the war and inflicted gruesome casualties on Sierra Leone’s citizens have not disappeared’, warned the International Crisis Group. In this paper we argue that many of those conditions are being...
Working Paper
Separate but Equal Democratization?
Many commentators have noted the existence of a historical correlation between cities and democratization. This image of the city as an inherently civic space is linked to the notion that the spatial concentration intrinsic to urban contexts promotes...
Working Paper
Rethinking China’s Path of Industrialization
This study shows that China’s post-1949 state-led industrialization has closely followed an underlying path that began in the late nineteenth century. It was initiated by pressing national defence needs and has since been motivated by the same and...
Journal Article
Continuity and Change in Senegalese Party Politics
Senegal's 2012 presidential and legislative elections reaffirmed the country's longstanding reputation as one of Africa's most stable democracies. The elections also represented a critical juncture for the country's party system, demonstrated by the...
Journal Article
Do Electoral Coalitions Facilitate Democratic Consolidation in Africa?
In a region where democratization has led to a proliferation of opposition parties, pre-electoral coalitions represent an obvious means by which to reduce excessive party fragmentation in Africa. However, this article examines whether such coalitions...
Working Paper
Building New States
With the Derg's overthrow in 1991, Eritrea embarked on the construction of a new state. New economic institutions were created, and considerable reform undertaken. Problems in co-ordinating reform and reconstruction were largely avoided, mainly...
Working Paper
Reconstruction from War in Africa
Africa has become synonymous with conflict. There were armed conflicts in 16 of Africa's 54 countries in 1999. For Africa to recover, communities must reconstruct, private sectors must revitalize, and states must transform themselves. Aid donors...
Working Paper
Governance and Policy in Africa
The recent emphasis on governance in Africa is unique in that it was initiated by donors and not by domestic leaders under pressure from their own constituencies. Thus while many countries have embraced the market economy and liberalized their...
Working Paper
Resources and the Political Economy of State Fragility in Conflict States
This paper studies state failure and governance in two conflict-states in the Middle East: Iraq and Somalia. Iraq is currently undergoing a social experiment under which a new form of government is being constructed after the passage of autocratic...
Working Paper
Decentralization, Local Bureaucracies and Service Delivery in Uganda
Following close to two decades of political distress and economic decline, Uganda embarked, in the mid 1980s, on far-reaching reforms under Yoweri Museveni’s National Resistance Movement. Decentralization was emphasized, with the new leaders...
Working Paper
Overcoming the Fiscal Crisis of the African State
A critical task is to construct a development state-a set of democratically-accountable institutions capable of effective policy design and implementation. The new state agenda is ambitious and resource intensive. It cannot therefore be achieved...