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Is the dominance of one political party a problem in an emerging democracy, or simply an expression of the will of the people? Why has one-party dominance endured in some African democracies and not in others? What are the mechanisms behind the varying party-system trajectories? Considering these questions, the authors of this collaborative work use a rigorous comparative research design and rich case material to greatly enhance our understanding of one of the key issues confronting emerging democracies in sub-Saharan Africa

"Do party systems help or hinder democracy in Africa? This collection offers important new insights into the relation between party systems and democracy on the African continent. It presents a comparative analysis of how African party systems influence procedural aspects of democracy such as accountability and government responsiveness and also shows how party systems affect citizens' satisfaction. It paints a vivid picture of the one-party dominant systems in Botswana, Namibia and South Africa and how these impede the deepening of democracy. Drawing lessons from Benin, Ghana and Zambia, it also portrays the fluidity of African party systems and draw attention to the importance of party system change. The insightful contributions show that African party systems affect democracy in ways that are different from the relation between party systems and democracy observed elsewhere"--

In the early 1990s, a wave of democratisation swept the African continents, resulting in a flurry of constitution-making and constitutional revision. Two decades later, leading experts in the fields of public law, political sciemnce and democratisation studies assess to what extent accountable governance has takenroot in Africa. this book represesents new knowldge about legal and political developments in a number of African countries - Ghana, Malawi, Mali, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia, with further references to Mozambique, Kenya and Swaziland - bringing the policy goal of developing and deepening democratic governance and accountable government on the continent up to date.

This comprehensive volume brings together contributions and diverse opinions from leading and emerging South African and international scholars to assess the quality of democracy and the electoral process in South Africa over the past ten years, with particular emphasis on the 2004 elections. The book speaks to a broad range of topics, all linked through the electoral theme, which get to the heart of many issues in contemporary South African politics. It offers an absorbing analysis of the evolution of the party system and party campaigns; tracks changes in public opinion and voter motivations; assesses the political implications of socio-economic change; depicts the evolution of parliament and the electoral system; probes the often tense relationship between media and government; and analyses the institutionalisation of the Independent Electoral Commission. Electoral Politics in South Africa serves as an essential sourcebook for information on the elections, the parties and their campaigns and as an authoritative contribution to careful electoral process analysis.

This paper charts the development of the two institutions most central to the nature of representative democracy in South Africa: the electoral system and the National Assembly.2 It reviews how developments since 1994 have shaped the institutional context in which political parties operate and compete for power. The paper first considers how the National Assembly has developed over the past ten years, reviewing the performance of parliament and its role in the consolidation of democracy. The second part of the paper focuses on the electoral system, reviewing the debate around electoral reform and discussing changes that have been introduced since 1999. In the conclusion, we suggest what the implications of these institutional developments are for the future of representative democracy in South Africa.

Intro -- Contents -- List of Tables and Figures -- Acknowledgements -- About the Editors -- About the Authors -- Accountable government in Africa: Introduction -- Overview -- Scope and significance -- Defining 'accountable government' -- The chapters in this book -- Post-apartheid accountability: The transformation of a political idea -- Introduction -- Accountability in the independent labour movement after 1973 -- The emergence of the post-apartheid model of accountability -- Two models of accountability compared -- The limits of accountability in capitalist society -- Conclusion -- The politics of constitutional reform in Zambia: From executive dominance to public participation? -- Introduction -- The history of constitution-making in Zambia -- From executive dominance to public participation? -- Conclusion -- Judicial independence and the judicialisation of electoral politics in Malawi and Uganda1 -- Introduction -- Courts and elections in Malawi -- Courts and elections in Uganda -- Do strategic models explain these patterns? -- Multifaceted explanations needed -- Conclusion -- From parliamentary supremacy to judicial review: Relations between Parliament and the judiciary in Tanzania -- Introduction -- Parliamentary supremacy in Tanzania -- From parliamentary supremacy to judicial review -- An uneasy relationship -- The Mtikila case: The judiciary and Parliament collide -- Further clashes between Parliament and the judiciary -- The excercise of judical powers by Parliament -- Conclusion -- Judicial review of parliamentary actions in South Africa: A nuanced interpretation of the separation of powers -- Introduction -- The judicial approach to reviewing parliamentary actions -- The limits of judicial intervention -- Conclusion -- Prosecutions, politics and the law: The way things are -- Introduction.

While modern parliaments in Africa receive little attention in the scholarly literature, they are receiving considerable attention from the international donor community. Since the early 1990s, when many African countries resumed multi-party elections and democratic practices, legislative strengthening programmes have become an important part of international democracy assistance. Despite these programmes, our knowledge about Africa's current parliaments remains limited. They seem to be widely regarded as potential agents for democratic change but whether national legislatures are in fact enhancing the quality of democracy on the African continent is far from clear. This paper discusses two important issues that lie at the heart of the democracy enhancing potential of Africa's current parliaments: their institutional capacity and the way they are perceived by the citizens they represent. After a brief review of the existing literature on legislatures in Africa, the paper first considers whether parliaments have the institutional capacity to fulfill a meaningful role and then provides a detailed description of the autonomy of parliaments in 16 selected countries. The paper subsequently turns to the way Africans perceive and evaluate their parliaments. Do citizens see their legislatures as valuable institutions? Finally, we discuss the implications of our findings for the prospects of African parliaments becoming agents of democratic change.

Is the dominance of one political party a problem in an emerging democracy, or simply an expression of the will of the people? Why has one-party dominance endured in some African democracies and not in others? What are the mechanisms behind the varying party-system trajectories? Considering these questions, the authors of this collaborative work use a rigorous comparative research design and rich case material to greatly enhance our understanding of one of the key issues confronting emerging democracies in sub-Saharan Africa