Number of results to display per page
Search Results
212. A Double-Edged Sword: Examining the Role of the State in National Dialogues as Mechanisms of Nation-building in Uganda and Rwanda
- Author:
- Sylvie Namwase
- Publication Date:
- 11-2021
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Social Science Research Council
- Abstract:
- This working paper argues that, while the state is a key actor in facilitating national dialogues as mechanisms of nation-building in post-colonial contexts, it can also co-opt these processes to entrench the status quo and undermine genuine dialogue and nation-building objectives. As a process built on solidarity, relationship-building, and “open-endedness” with indeterminate and subjective results, nation-building can be used as a pretext to depoliticize and control national dialogues and offer the illusion of change while evading any real challenge to the status quo. This paper shows the ways in which this applies to Uganda and Rwanda, where state-controlled national dialogues have been open-ended, longterm processes that have played a double-edged role as facilitators and inhibitors of meaningful dialogue. In the absence of effectively organized, empowered, and credible non-state actors to counter its dominant discourse, the national dialogues in these contexts are likely to operate on the terms and interests of elites who wield state power. This is because they fall short on the requirements of “a credible convener” and “inclusive participation” necessary for genuine dialogue. Moreover, even where the dialogues are dubbed “citizen-led” as is the case in Uganda, they are still infused with dominant elite interests that seek to maintain the status quo.
- Topic:
- Post Colonialism, Governance, Nation-State, Identity, and Nation-building
- Political Geography:
- Uganda, Africa, and Rwanda
213. The Center Is Not Holding: Analyzing South Sudan’s Social Cohesion Architecture in the Evolving Context of the Revitalized Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in the Republic of South Sudan
- Author:
- Tunji Namaiko
- Publication Date:
- 11-2021
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Social Science Research Council
- Abstract:
- South Sudan is making major strides in peace consolidation and strengthening social cohesion since the signing of the Revitalized Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in the Republic of South Sudan (R-ARCSS) on 12 September 2018 in Addis Ababa. However, this paper argues that, despite these efforts, the center is not holding as inter-communal violence and a myriad of political and security dynamics are reversing many of these gains. As the conflict is protracted, peacebuilding remains a severe challenge while social cohesion remains weakened. The paper commences with a conceptual clarification of social cohesion before analyzing current evolving social cohesion dynamics and trends. This is followed by a discussion of the social cohesion programming challenges and consequently centers on Key Driving Factors (KDF) of conflict. Finally, the paper ends with an analysis of the drivers of conflict and peace and makes recommendations for strengthening social cohesion going forward.
- Topic:
- Security, Conflict, Violence, and Peace
- Political Geography:
- Africa and South Sudan
214. Transparency of Land-based Investments: Cameroon Country Snapshot
- Author:
- Sam Szoke-Burke, Samuel Nguiffo, and Stella Tchoukep
- Publication Date:
- 03-2021
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
- Abstract:
- Despite a recent transparency law and participation in transparency initiatives, Cameroon’s investment environment remains plagued by poor transparency.
- Topic:
- Agriculture, Environment, Law, Transparency, and Land Reform
- Political Geography:
- Africa and Cameroon
215. The Costs of United States’ Post-9/11 “Security Assistance”: How Counterterrorism Intensified Conflict in Burkina Faso and Around the World
- Author:
- Stephanie Savell
- Publication Date:
- 03-2021
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs at Brown University
- Abstract:
- United States “security assistance” exports a militarized counterterrorism model to dozens of countries through money, training, and weapons. This model comes with dangerous costs. The narrative, tactics, funding, and institutional supports of the U.S. post-9/11 wars fuel repression and corruption, and escalate cycles of violence. This paper delves into the current conflict in Burkina Faso as an illustrative case study of how the U.S. counterterrorism model has caused more, not less, instability and violence. Despite the relatively low levels of terrorism assessed in Burkina Faso at the time, the United States laid the groundwork for increased militarism in the region when it began providing security assistance to the country in 2009. Today, Burkina Faso is enveloped in a spiraling conflict involving government forces, state-sponsored militias, and militant groups, and civilians are paying the price. Militant groups have strengthened and seized territory, ethnic tensions have skyrocketed, thousands of Burkinabe have been killed and over one million displaced. A Burkina-based human rights group has warned that the government’s ethnic killings may lead to the “next Rwanda.”
- Topic:
- Security, Ethnic Conflict, Counter-terrorism, and Conflict
- Political Geography:
- Africa, United States of America, and Burkina Faso
216. West African Elites’ Spending on UK Schools and Universities: A Closer Look
- Author:
- Matthew Page
- Publication Date:
- 01-2021
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Abstract:
- Political, business, and cultural elites from around the world have a strong affinity for the United Kingdom (UK) education system. Nowhere is this truer than in West Africa, where some families in Nigeria and Ghana have a long tradition of sending their children to private boarding schools and universities in the UK. These institutions are especially popular destinations for the offspring of prominent politically exposed persons (PEPs) from the region. Immigration officials, admissions staff, and UK law enforcement are not likely to scrutinize the conditions under which the children of PEPs enroll in British schools, even though the PEPs themselves may have modest legitimate earnings and opaque asset profiles that in other circumstances would raise serious financial concerns. This relative lack of review has allowed some West African PEPs to channel unexplained wealth into the UK education sector. It is not easy to estimate the overall value of this flow, yet it likely exceeds £30 million annually.1 Most of these funds emanate from Nigeria and, to a lesser extent, Ghana; compared with these two countries, only a handful of students from elsewhere in West Africa seek an education in British schools. Tackling this small but significant illicit financial flow should be a priority for UK policymakers. In doing so, they would be helping to realize the UK’s global anticorruption objectives, advance its International Education Strategy, and close a troublesome anti–money laundering (AML) loophole. Failing to do so would exacerbate existing corruption challenges both at home and abroad and increase the UK education sector’s reputational liabilities.
- Topic:
- Corruption, Education, Law Enforcement, Higher Education, and Elites
- Political Geography:
- Africa, United Kingdom, Europe, and West Africa
217. South Africa: When Strong Institutions and Massive Inequalities Collide
- Author:
- Brian Levy, Alan Hirsch, Vinothan Naidoo, and Musa Nxele
- Publication Date:
- 03-2021
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Abstract:
- South Africa's economic and social imbalances can no longer be swept under the rug. The country has three choices: muddle through, endure another surge of ethnopopulism, or pursue inclusive development. South Africa was one of the 1990s iconic cases of democratization. Yet starting in the mid-2000s, the country began to experience a disruptive collision between its strong political institutions and massive economic inequality. The collision intensified across the 2010s, resulting in economic stagnation and increasing threats to institutional integrity. Understanding why this collision occurred and worsened over time is relevant not just for other middle-income countries but also many higher-income democracies wrestling with similar tensions between a declining tolerance for high or rising inequality and institutions that seemed strong in the past but find their legitimacy increasingly being questioned. Ideally, ideas, institutions, and growth all reinforce one another in a virtuous developmental spiral. Ideas offer hope by encouraging cooperation and the pursuit of opportunities for win-win gains. Institutions assure that the bargains underpinning cooperation will be monitored and enforced. Together, ideas and institutions provide credible commitment, which fuels economic growth. However, such a benign scenario does not reckon with the ways in which persistent high inequality, accompanied by unresolved tensions between the distribution of economic and political power, can both put pressure on institutions and quickly change hope into anger. The result can be a cascading set of pressures and an accelerating downward spiral. For the first fifteen years of democracy, South Africa enjoyed the advantages of both effective institutions and a shared willingness of stakeholders believed in the power of cooperation. This enabled the country to move beyond counterproductive conflict and pursue win-win outcomes. Growth began to accelerate, which created new opportunities for expanding the middle class. Increased fiscal space made it possible to broaden access to public services and to social grants, which reduced absolute poverty. There were, however, some stark limitations in what was achieved. Gains for the poorest did little to alter their difficult economic and social realities. Less than a quarter of the total population, including essentially all white South Africans, enjoyed a standard of living that was middle class or better. There was ample reason for the majority of South Africans to feel that, notwithstanding the promises of mutual benefit, the deck remained stacked against them. This increased the vulnerability of South Africa’s political settlement.
- Topic:
- Development, Inequality, and Institutions
- Political Geography:
- South Africa and Africa
218. Economic Diversification in Africa: How and Why It Matters
- Author:
- Zainab Usman and David Landry
- Publication Date:
- 04-2021
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Abstract:
- Many African countries have placed economic diversification high on the policy agenda, yet they first need to define what it means in their specific structural and socioeconomic contexts. For decades, economic diversification has been a policy priority for low- and middle-income economies. In the words of former managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Christine Lagarde, “We know that economic diversification is good for growth. Diversification is also tremendously important for resilience.” Unfortunately, this goal continues to elude many African countries. In fact, the continent is home to eight of the world’s fifteen least economically diversified countries. This reality weakens the foundation of their economic transfomation and slows their pace of progress. It also makes these countries particularly vulnerable to sudden external shocks, as the pandemic-induced disruption of tourism and oil-dependent economies has illustrated. Given the importance of diversifying African economies, it is critical to recognize how various dimensions of diversification can have different implications for the menu of policy options. Closely associated with the process of structural transformation from lower to higher productivity sectors, economic diversification has three evident dimensions. The first relates to the expansion of economic sectors that contribute to employment and production or gross domestic product (GDP) diversification, and the second is associated with international trade or exports diversification. This paper, however, focuses on a third dimension that the economics literature pays scant attention to: fiscal diversification. This fiscal element involves expanding government revenue sources and public expenditure targets and can therefore play a central role in helping to catalyze broader economic transformation through the expansion of activity in specific industries and sectors. It is also critical that policymakers effectively measure the extent to which this objective is being achieved. Both the expansion of existing economic sectors and the creation of new ones may diversify an economy. But these processes are vastly different in practice and will garner distinct outcomes. Of the main tools used by economists to measure diversification, the Theil Index differentiates between the respective contributions of new economic sectors and existing ones to overall diversification. Another tool widely used by development practitioners—the Public Expenditure and Financial Accountability (PEFA) framework—has significant potential for evaluating fiscal diversification but would need to capture more information on government revenue collection and spending and link them to policy objectives.
- Topic:
- Economics, Governance, Diversification, and Trade
- Political Geography:
- Africa
219. Illicit Financial Flows Risk Factors in Uganda's Oil and Gas Sector
- Author:
- D. Ngabirano, Onesmus Mugyenyi, J. Muhindo, and P. Lamunu
- Publication Date:
- 02-2021
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Advocates Coalition for Development and Environment (ACODE)
- Abstract:
- Illicit Financial Flows (IFFs) are becoming a real challenge to resource mobilisation for financing development in Uganda and Africa at large. This fact sheet highlights the challenge of illicit financial flows, proposes mechanisms that can minimise the vice and makes a call for action to address the challenge.
- Topic:
- Energy Policy, Oil, Gas, Risk, and Illegal Trade
- Political Geography:
- Uganda and Africa
220. Mainstreaming Climate Change in the National Budget: Memorandum of Issues from the Review of the Budget Framework Paper FY2021/2022
- Author:
- Advocates Coalition for Development and Environment
- Publication Date:
- 03-2021
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Advocates Coalition for Development and Environment (ACODE)
- Abstract:
- This policy memorandum analyses the extent to which climate change is integrated in the Uganda National Budget Framework Paper for Financial Year 2021/2022. This will inform policy and the final budgetary appropriations for climate change interventions in key National Development Plan III Programmes.
- Topic:
- Climate Change, Development, Environment, and Budget
- Political Geography:
- Uganda and Africa