Democracy and economy in Africa: The optimists and the pessimists

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Abstract
Democratization has come relatively late to Africa, but it has swept the continent which hitherto had mostly known only a brief period of liberal democracy immediately after independence. The pressure for democratization has come from the international community with the end of the cold war; and has been encouraged by aid conditionality; and from the peoples of Africa who have felt abused and repressed by other forms of rule in the intervening years. The survival of democracy is however far from assured: there are a number of arguments in its favour, but also a series of political problems. In addition democratization comes after a decade of economic hardship that has left Africa as the poorest continent in the world. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank have promoted Structural Adjustment Programmes, (SAPS) but the international economic environment is generally hostile for Africa's development and structural adjustment has had only limited success. Thus in addition to the political problems of democratization, it is taking place in a harsh economic environment which could contribute to the long term undermining of the enterprise.

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