Adjustment, Political Conditionality and Democratisation in Africa

Abstract

African states are, in an unprecedented manner, buffeted by a wave of pressures from both domestic and external forces calling for wide-ranging and profound economic and political reforms. The economic reforms envisaged are usually in the form of structural adjustment programmes almost invariably drawn up by international financial institutions, while the political reforms proposed usually take the form of multiparty democracy. The economic reforms have been taking place for close to a decade now, while the movement for political reform is of quite recent origin. However, whatever their sequence and differences in start-up time, the two types of reforms are now linked in the minds of both the general public and specialists. Or, at least, each now serves as the backdrop to the other, so that no coherent discussion of the prospects of one is possible without consideration of the other.