Civil Society and Democratisation in Francophone Africa
- 1 September 1995
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Cambridge University Press (CUP) in The Journal of Modern African Studies
- Vol. 33 (3) , 359-379
- https://doi.org/10.1017/s0022278x00021169
Abstract
When analysing the implosion of political space and the rupture of social stability which has characterised the course of African history in recent years, there has too often been a tendency to focus attention on institutions, structures, and politicans. Whilst these are obviously important, such an approach tends to obscure the groundswell of new and yet barely understood social changes. Yet given that the ‘politicians’ seem unable to advance the process in which so many people have invested so much, many observers feel the need to explore alternative sources of dynamism. This is largely the reason for the current interest in the notion of ‘civil society’ which has recently become fashionable in the often cloistered world of African studies.Keywords
This publication has 1 reference indexed in Scilit:
- West African States: Failure and PromisePublished by Cambridge University Press (CUP) ,1978