State, constitutionalism, and the management of ethnicity in Africa

African and Asian Studies

Volumn 4, Issue 1-2, 2005, Pages 83-106

  Osaghae, Eghosa E ^a  

^a NONE

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

CONSTITUTIONAL REFORM; DEMOCRACY; ETHNIC CONFLICT; ETHNIC MINORITY; STATE;

AFRICA; EASTERN HEMISPHERE; WORLD;

EID: 25844440559     PISSN: 15692094     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1163/1569209054547292     Document Type: Article

References (70)

1. Donald Rothchild and Victor Olorunsola, eds., State Versus Ethnic Claims: African Policy Dilemmas (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1983), p. 10.
2. Henry Bienen, "The State and Ethnicity: Integrative Formulas in Africa," in State Versus Ethnic Claims: African Policy Dilemmas, ed. Donald Rothchild and Victor Olorunsola (Boulder: Westview, 1983), p. 100.
3. Eghosa E. Osaghae, "The Problems of Citizenship in Nigeria," Africa 45, no. 4 (1990);
4. Olasope O. Oyeleran and Michael O. Adediran, "Colonialism, Citizenship and Fractured National Identity: The African Case," in Citizenship and National Identity: From Colonialism to Globalism, ed. T.K. Oommen (New Delhi: Sage, 1997).
5. Anthony H.M. Kirk-Greene, "'Damnosa Hereditas': Ethnic Ranking and the Martial Races Imperative in Africa," Ethnic and Racial Studies 3, no. 4 (1980).
6. Patrick Chabal and Jean Daloz, Africa Works: Disorder as Political Instrument (London: Inernational African Institute and James Currey, 1999).
7. Rothchild et al., State Versus Ethnic Claims, p. 7.
8. H.W.O. Okoth-Ogendo, "Constitutions without Constitutionalism: Reflections on an African Political Paradox," in State and Constitutionalism: An African Debate on Democracy, ed. Issa G. Shivji (Harare, Zimbabwe: SAPES Books, 1991), p. 5.
9. See J. Litvack, J. Ahmad, and R. Bird, Rethinking Decentralization in Developing Countries (Washington, D.C.: The World Bank, 1998).
10. J. Elster and R. Slagstad, Constitutionalism and Democracy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988).
11. Karl R. Popper, The Poverty of Historicism (New York: Harper & Row, 1964).
12. See, for example, Chabal et al., Africa Works.
13. See K.G. Banting and R. Simeon, Redesigning the State: The Politics of Constitutional Change (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1985);
14. U.K. Preus, "Constitutional Power-Making for the New Polity," in Constitutionalism, Identity, Difference and Legitimacy: Theoretical Perspectives (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1994).
15. Okoth-Ogendo, "Constitutions without Constitutionalism," p. 8.
16. P. Hanafin and M.S. Williams, eds., Identity, Rights and Constitutional Transformation (Aldershot: Ashgate, 1999).
17. L. Henkin, "Elements of Constitutionalism," The Review 60 (1998), 12. Henkin has pointed out that constitutionalism also implies that "the constitution cannot be suspended, circumvented or disregarded by political organs of government, and that it can be amended only by procedures appropriate to change of constitutional character and that give effect to the will of the people acting in a constitutional mode."
18. Adebayo Olukoshi, "State, Conflict, and Democracy in Africa: The Complex Process of Renewal," in State, Conflict, and Democracy in Africa, ed. Richard Joseph (Boulder, Colo.: Lynne Rienner, 1999;
19. see also Julius O. Ihonvbere, "The 1999 Constitution of Nigeria: The Limitations of Undemocratic Constitution-Making" (paper presented at the conference on The 1999 Constitution and the Future of Democracy in Nigeria, Abuja, Nigeria, 1999);
20. Julious O. Ihonvbere, Towards a New Constitutionalism in Africa, CDD Occasional Paper Series, no. 4 (London: CDD).
21. Michael Bratton and Nicholas van de Walle, Democratic Experiments in Africa: Regime Transitions in Comparative Perspective (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997).
22. Bratton et al., Democratic Experiments in Africa, 162. The actions of leaders considered to be authoritarian - Arap Moi of Kenya, Omar Bongo of Gabon, Paul Biya of Cameroon, Andre Kolingba of Congo, Gnassingbe Eyadema of Togo - lend support to this claim.
23. Ihonvbere, "The 1999 Constitution," p. 3.
24. Bratton and van de walle, Democratic Experiments in Africa, p. 163.
25. By contrast, unregulated conflicts tend to get out of control (leading in some cases to secession and partition) and are usually met with arbitrariness on the part of the state, often leading to the deployment of repressive, violent, and terrorist strategies.
26. John McGarry and Brendan O'Leary, ed., The Politics of Ethnic Conflict Regulation (London: Routledge, 1993), p. 4 ff.
27. These may be constitutional or non-constitutional (policies fall into this category), democratic or non-democratic. Our concern is with democratic and constitutionalized models.
28. See Ivo D. Duchacek, "Antagonistic Cooperation: Territorial and Ethnic Communities, Publius, 71, no. 4 (1977);
29. Eric A. Nordlinger, Conflict Regulation in Divided Societies (Cambridge, Mass.: Center for International Affairs, Harvard University, 1972);
30. and Eghosa E. Osaghae, Ethnicity and its Management in Africa: The Democratisation Link (Lagos: Malthouse Press, 1994);
31. Also see Rothchild and Olorunsola, State Versus Ethnic Claims;
32. McGarry and O'Leary, Ethnic Conflict Regulation.
33. Donald L. Horowitz, "Democracy in Divided Societies," in Nationalism, Ethnic Conflict, and Democracy, ed. Larry Diamond and Marc F. Plattner (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994).
34. Pierre du Toit, State-Building and Democracy in Southern Africa: A Comparative Study of Botswana, South Africa and Zimbabwe (Pretoria: HSRC, 1995), 59.
35. In saying this, I am fully aware of the increased importance and involvement of local and foreign NGOs and other civil society constituents in the management of ethnic and other conflicts in Africa. While the benefits of this cannot be discounted - it has at least expanded the space for complementary non-state intervention - NGOs and civil society at large cannot take the place of the state.
36. See Donald Rothchild, ed. Managing Ethnic Conflict in Africa: Pressures and Incentives for Cooperation (New York: Brookings Institution, 1997).
37. Also see Eghosa E. Osaghae, Ethnicity and its Management in Africa: The Democratization Link (Lagos and Oxford: Malthouse, for Centre for Advanced Social Science, 1994).
38. Eghosa E. Osaghae, "Democracy and National Cohesion in Multi-ethnic African States: South Africa and Nigeria Compared," Nations and Nationalism 5, part 2 (1999).
39. Peter P. Ekeh and Eghosa E. Osaghae, eds., Federalism and Federal Character in Nigeria (Ibadan: Heinemann, 1989).
40. South Africa interim const (1994), §8(3).
41. Cynthia Enloe, "Internal Colonialism, Federalism and Alternative State Development Strategies," Publius 7, no. 4 (1977).
42. Nelson Kasfir, The Shrinking Political Arena: Participation and Ethnicity in African Politics, with a Case Study of Uganda (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1976).
43. Zimbabwe const (1980), Art 98(3).
44. See du Toit, State-Building and Democracy. The author points out that as an instrument of affirmative action, the presidential directive has been used to redress the imbalances in the formerly white-controlled public service. By 1983, the number of whites in the senior cadres, the established officers, dropped from 7,202 to 4,495, while the number of blacks rose to 17,693. The overall size of the public service also expanded rapidly, from 40,000 officers at independence to 95,000 in 1984, to enlist more blacks.
45. See Eghosa E. Osaghae, "The Purpose and Functioning of the Senate," in Institutional Development in Divided Societies, ed. B. de Villiers et al. (Pretoria: HSRC, 1998).
46. Eghosa E. Osaghae, "Conflict Research in Africa," International Journal on World Peace 16, no. 4 (1999).
47. J. Bayo Adekanye, "Structural Adjustment, Democratization, and Rising Ethnic Tensions in Africa," Development and Change 26, no. 2 (1995).
48. Also see Eghosa E. Osaghae, Structural Adjustment and Ethnicity in Nigeria (Uppsala: Nordiska Afrikainstitutet, 1995). F
49. Julius O. Ihonvbere, Africa and the New World Order (New York: Peter Lang, 2000).
50. Eghosa E. Osaghae, "Managing Ethnic Conflicts under Democratic Transition in Africa: The Promise, the Failure and the Future," in Democratic Transition in Africa, ed. B. Caron, A. Gboyega, and E. Osaghae (Ibadan: CREDU, 1992).
51. Ihonvbere, Towards A New Constitutionalism, 30.
52. For the constructivist perspective, see Peter Yeros, ed., Ethnicity and Nationalism in Africa: Constructivist Reflections and Contemporary Politics (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1999).
53. Cf. J.D. Eller and R.M. Coughlan, "The Poverty of Primordialism: The Demystification of Ethnic Attachments," Ethnic and Racial Studies 16, no. 2 (1993);
54. David Brown, "Are There Good and Bad Nationalisms?," Nations and Nationalism 5, part 2 (1999).
55. Narendra Subramanian, Ethnicity and Populist Mobilization: Political Parties, Citizens and Democracy in South India (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1999), p. 1.
56. Eghosa E. Osaghae, "The Federal Solution in Comparative Perspective," Politeia 16, no. 1 (1997).
57. Naomi Chazan et al., Politics and Society in Contemporary Africa (Boulder, Colo.: Lynne Rienner, 1988), p. 120.
58. du Toit, State-Building and Democracy;
59. also see, for conceptual analyses of state autonomy along these lines, M. Mann, "The Autonomous Power of the State: Its Origins, Mechanisms and Results," European Journal of Sociology 25, no. 2 (1984);
60. L.W. Snider, "Identifying the Elements of State Power: Where Do We Begin?," Comparative Political Studies 20, no. 3 (1987);
61. Joel S. Migdal, Strong Societies and Weak States: State-Society Relations and State Capabilities in the Third World (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1988).
62. Migdal, Strong Societies.
63. du Toit, State-Building and Democracy, p. 27.
64. William D. Graf, The Nigerian State: Political Economy, State Class and Political System in the Post-Colonial Era (London: James Currey, 1988), p. 25.
65. Okoth-Ogendo, "Constitutions without Constitutionalism."
66. Bernard O. Nwabueze, Nigeria '93: The Political Crisis and Solutions (Ibadan: Spectrum Books, 1994).
67. Cf. Okoth-Ogendo, "Constitutions without Constitutionalism"; I.G. Shivji, ed., State and Constitutionalism: An African Debate on Democracy (Harare: SAPES Books, 1991).
68. Even when attempts were made to make the process of constitution-making more participatory - as in the multi-level (village, district, provincial, and regional) consultations that preceded the introduction of the Macpherson Constitution in Nigeria in 1951 - the stage still clearly belonged to the regional political elites, who simply organized to mobilize support for party positions along ethno-regional lines.
69. Olukoshi, "State, Conflict, and Democracy," 456.
70. See Lidija R. Basta and Jibrin Ibrahim, Federalism and Decentralization in Africa: The Multicultural Challenge (Fribourg, Switzerland: Institute of Federalism, 1999), for a comparative analysis of how federalism and decentralization have served as models of multicultural accommodation in Africa in the era of reforms.