DEMOCRACY AND CHALLENGE OF GOOD GOVERNANCE IN AFRICA

Résumé

The paper discusses the challenges of democratization in Africa. It considers the idea of democracy as a universal one, rather than an exclusive preserve of the West. However, it regards the attempt to foist the western liberal type of democracy on Africa as an ideological factor in contemporary African cultural dislocation by the West. It attributes the failure of this democracy in Africa, as manifested in the rampant political instability and bad governance, to the system’s neglect of the cultural roots of the African people. It calls for the revival and creative exploitation of valuable assets from the indigenous African democratic culture for the construction of authentic paradigm of democracy relevant to the conditions of Africa in the contemporary world. The paper concludes with the caveat that democracy in Africa may not succeed until such cultural adaptation is done.