The Military in African Politics

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maggie Dwyer
Keyword(s):  
Domestic Politics ◽  
Armed Forces ◽  
Humanitarian Assistance ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
External Threats ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Military Control ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Civilian Leadership ◽  
The Military

Interstate conflict has been rare in sub-Saharan Africa and militaries often do not fit the image of a force focused on external threats. Instead, they have often been heavily engaged in domestic politics, regularly serving as regime protection. For many militaries on the continent, the continued internal focus of the armed forces has been shaped by practices under colonialism. One defining feature of African militaries’ involvement in politics is the coup d’état. From the 1960s to the 1980s coups were the primary method of regime change, making the military central to the political landscape of the continent. By the start of the 21st century there were far fewer direct attempts at military control of African states, yet militaries continue to influence politics even under civilian leadership. While there are differences in the role of militaries based on the unique circumstances of each state, there are also general patterns regarding new missions undertaken by armed forces following the end of the Cold War. These include peacekeeping, counterterrorism, and humanitarian assistance, all of which generally involve international partnerships and cooperation. Yet these missions have also had domestic political motivations and effects.

Tanzania: Civil–Military Relations and Nationalism

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel G. Zirker
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Military Training ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
East African ◽  
African Countries ◽  
Civil Military Relations ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Military Relations ◽  
The Military

Why have there been no successful military interventions or civil wars in Tanzania’s nearly 60 years of independence? This one historical accomplishment, by itself striking in an African context, distinguishes Tanzania from most of the other post-1960 independent African countries and focuses attention on the possibilities and nature of successful civil–military relations in sub-Saharan Africa. Contrary to most civil–military relations theory, rather than isolating the military in order to achieve civilian oversight, Tanzania integrated the military, the dominant political party, and civil society in what one observer called a combination of “political militancy” and “antimilitarism,” somewhat akin, perhaps, to the Chinese model. China did provide intensive military training for the Tanzanians beginning in the 1960s, although this could in no way have been expected to ensure successful integration of the military with civil society, nor could it ensure peaceful civil–military relations. Eight potentially causal and overlapping conditions have been outlined to explain this unique absence of civil–military strife in an African country. Relevant but admittedly partial explanations are: the largely salutary and national developmental role of the founding president, Julius Nyerere; the caution and long-term fear of military intervention engendered by the 1964 East African mutinies; Tanzania’s radical foreign policy as a Frontline State; its ongoing territorial disputes with Uganda and Malawi; concerted efforts at coup-proofing through the co-opting of senior military commanders; and the country’s striking ethnic heterogeneity, in which none of the 125 plus ethnolinguistic tribes had the capacity to assume a hegemonic dominance. Each factor has a role in explaining Tanzania’s unique civil–military history, and together they may comprise a plausible explanation of the over 50 years of peaceful civil–military relations. They do not, however, provide a hopeful prognosis for future civil–military relations in a system that is increasingly challenging the dominant-party state, nor do they account for Tanzania’s subsequent democratic deficit.

Rebellion, Revolution, and Tradition: Reinterpreting Coups in Ghana

1989 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 372-397 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maxwell Owusu
Keyword(s):  
West Africa ◽  
Armed Forces ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Military Coup ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
The Government ◽  
The Military

Since the military coup that toppled the government of Sylvanus Olympio in Togo, West Africa, no less than seventy African leaders throughout sub-Saharan Africa have been overthrown by the armed forces. In the first two decades of independence alone, there were forty successful coups, not to mention the countless coup attempts (Meredith, 1984; Kitchen, 1985)

scholarly journals Rethinking the Emergence and the Practice of Three Praetorian States in Southeast Asia: A Comparative Study between Indonesia, Myanmar and Thailand

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 7
Author(s):  
Muhammad Indrawan Jatmika
Keyword(s):  
Southeast Asia ◽  
Political Institutions ◽  
Domestic Politics ◽  
Armed Forces ◽  
Political Life ◽  
New Order ◽  
External Threats ◽  
Full Power ◽  
The Military ◽  
Political Realm

Military forces have had many important roles in political life in Southeast Asia where the military has a full power or major role and influence in the domestic politics. These forms of military intervention in domestic politics are called praetorianism, which is characterized by the military being more inclined to take care of domestic political affairs rather than carrying out its professional duties as guardians of sovereignty from external threats. We can find this practice from seeing the New Order regime in Indonesia to the Military Junta of Myanmar and Thailand. This paper aims to analyze what factors are the background of the widespread practice of praetorianism and how the practice can last for a certain period of time, even still to this day in Southeast Asia. The main argument is the weak political institutions and the low political culture of developing country are the main causes of various intervention efforts made by the armed forces in the domestic political realm of a country.

Explaining the Long-Term Maintenance of a Military Regime: Panama before the U.S. Invasion

1992 ◽  
Vol 44 (2) ◽  
pp. 210-234 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steve C. Ropp
Keyword(s):  
Domestic Politics ◽  
Authoritarian Regime ◽  
Military Force ◽  
International Banking ◽  
Military Regimes ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The Military ◽  
Term Maintenance ◽  
The U.S

Before the U.S. invasion of December 1989, Panama experienced one of the longest periods of military rule in the modern-day history of Latin America. While numerous authoritarian military regimes emerged in the region during the 1960s and established for themselves a relatively high degree of autonomy from both domestic and international actors, only those in Panama, Paraguay, and Chile survived until the late 1980s. And of these three surviving military regimes, only Panama's was ended through the application of external military force. For the past several years, there has been considerable discussion of the factors that seem best to account for General Manuel Antonio Noriega's personal ability to resist U.S. pressure from 1987 until 1989 and to largely insulate himself from the political and economic constraints of Panamanian domestic politics. However, much less attention has been devoted to discussion of the factors that explain the long-term maintenance of the military authoritarian regime in existence for fifteen years prior to his assumption of power. This analysis suggests that the long-term maintenance of Panama's military authoritarian regime was due in large part to its ability to acquire substantial amounts of foreign capital. During the 1970s, such capital was preferentially obtained from the international banking community. During the 1980s, it was obtained through illicit activities of various kinds, including participation in the growing international drug trade.

scholarly journals Glimmering Utopias: 50 Years of African Film

2010 ◽  
Vol 45 (3) ◽  
pp. 147-159 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cassis Kilian
Keyword(s):  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
African Film ◽  
Feature Films ◽  
History Of ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
The 1960S

The history of African film began in the 1960s with the independence of the colonies. Despite all kinds of political and economic difficulties, numerous films have been made since then, featuring wide-ranging processes of consolidation, differentiation and transformation which were characteristic of post-colonial sub-Saharan Africa. However, these feature films should not merely be viewed as back references to specifically African problems. The glimmering fictions are imagination spaces. They preserve ideas about how the post-colonial circumstances should be approached. Seen from this perspective, the history of African film may be studied as a history of African utopias.

Economics of Farm Input Subsidies in Africa

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 501-522 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stein T. Holden
Keyword(s):  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Agricultural Policies ◽  
Exit Strategy ◽  
African Countries ◽  
Design And Implementation ◽  
Subsidy Program ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Negative Impacts ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Subsidy Programs

Fertilizer and other input subsidies have been prominent components of agricultural policies in many Asian and African countries since the 1960s. Their economic and political rationale is scrutinized with emphasis on the second generation of targeted input subsidy programs that were scaled up in Sub-Saharan Africa after 2005. The extent to which they fulfill the goal of being market smart is assessed after inspecting the potential for such subsidies in Sub-Saharan Africa. The new fertilizer subsidy programs do not live up to the market-smart principles and suffer from severe design and implementation failures. While a clear exit strategy was one of the key principles, this has been neglected, with the result that most current programs are more sticky than smart. They have only partially achieved the intended impacts and have resulted in a number of unintended negative impacts. Subsidy program redesign should start from a pilot stage testing basic mechanisms.

The Sahel: Regional Politics and Dynamics

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sebastian Elischer
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Civil Liberties ◽  
Armed Forces ◽  
West African ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Regional Politics ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
Islamic Terrorism ◽  
Security Challenge ◽  
Sub Saharan

Niger, Mali, Mauritania, and Chad are some of least researched countries in sub-Saharan Africa. Since independence from France in 1960 these four countries have experienced two distinct yet interrelated struggles: the struggle for statehood and the struggle for democracy. Each country has experienced violent conflict between the central authorities in the capitals and security challengers on the peripheries. Prominent examples are the Tuareg uprisings in Niger and Mali, the various rebel insurgencies in Chad, and the conflict between black Africans and Arabs in Mauritania. The emergence of jihadi-Salafi groups in the West African sub-region affects all four countries and poses a particularly strong security challenge to Mali. All these conflicts are unresolved. The liberalization of the political sphere in the late 1980s and early 1990s has led to considerable political diversity across the Sahel. In Niger and Mali meaningful multiparty competition and basic civil liberties have taken root despite many setbacks. Civil society is strong and in the past has successfully mobilized against autocratic tendencies. In Mauritania and Chad, democratic institutions exist on paper as autocratic rulers have managed to stay in office. The national armed forces remain the preeminent political actors. Civil society is not strong enough to achieve political change for the better. Stagnant living conditions, social immobility, the ongoing war against Islamic terrorism, and weak accountability mechanisms remain the most important political challenges for the Sahel.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document