Ethnic Politics and State Power in AfricaThe Logic of th.docx

Ethnic Politics and
State Power in Africa
The Logic of the
Coup-Civil War Trap
and…
Conundrum!!!!!
Ethnic Pol. & State Power in Africa: Logic of the Coup-Civil
War Trap
Philip Roessler asks fundamental questions:
• Why are some African countries trapped in vicious
cycles of ethnic violence and others not?
• What causes civil wars in some African countries?
(p. i)
In relation to the civil war issue, he argues that:
• Successful or unsuccessful bargaining over power is
at the center of the equation;
• Successful or unsuccessful bargaining over power is
much more important in these equations than
issues of poverty, inequality, land conflicts,
corruption, etc. (p. xv)
In other words, for Roessler,

• Traditionally, analysts have seen civil wars as a
consequence of the need to forge order and peace
out of anarchy;
• Yet, competition for the control of the central
government has been surprisingly marginal in the
analysis of the causes of civil wars in Africa, yet he
believes that this is where we must look a little
more carefully if we are to understand those causes.
(p. xvi).
War Trap
Roessler focuses on the anarchic
conditions that arose in Africa with the
end of colonialism. According to him,
the end of colonization triggered:
•Fierce competition for the control of
the extractive institutions left behind
by the Europeans;
•This competition often played itself
out along ethnic lines (p. xvi)
Hence the following question:
How could these ethnic groups, in the
absence of absolute authority and
strong cross-cutting institutions (and
even economic alliances), forge a
political covenant (agreement) that
would allow them to govern the new
countries that they inherited?

War Trap
On the issue of power-sharing and coup d’états,
Roessler suggests that:
• Most leaders of the new African countries did
understand that they could not avoid sharing
power with other ethnic groups. However, this
realization came with a conundrum:
• When they decided to share power, they were
inevitably but also paradoxically giving rival groups
the ability to seize power in a coup.
• And, this, in turn automatically created a coup-civil
war trap, which took effect immediately after the
withdrawal of colonial powers.
• The Cold War (1946-1991) that was triggered after
World War II then worsened this situation by
creating permanent conditions of political
instability through support to such or such other
group, either by the United States and its Western
European allies, or by the Soviet Union and its
Eastern European and Asian allies (p. xvi)
The civil war conundrum, thus, represents the direct
consequence of a strategic choice by rulers with an
ethnic base of supporters to use such an ethnic base
to coup-proof their regimes from ethnic rivals.

War Trap
The coup-civil war trap:
Most rulers ended up with only two merciless
choices, that always ended up in a conundrum:
• They could decide to share power: this opens the
door to coups by rival groups;
• They could decide not to share power and decide
to exclude other groups: this opens the door to civil
wars;
Rationale and calculation of many leaders: what is
less costly?
• A coup is more likely than civil war;
• Ethnic inclusion and power sharing give rival ethnic
groups the ability to conduct coups (They are closer
to the inner circles of power through members of
government and military leaders to whom some
power was given);
• Ethnic exclusion deprives rival ethnic groups of the
ability to conduct a coup;
• And since civil war is less likely than a coup, it
follows that in the longer run ethnic exclusion is a
better choice since it is more likely to ensure
preservation of power by only members of the
dominant group (either sociologically or militarily
when power is owned by a minority group) than
ethnic inclusion; (pp. xvi-xvii)

War Trap
Civil wars, in that case, are thus deemed the
least threatening option and, as a consequence,
their unlikelihood causes the ruling group to
prefer to risk civil war by excluding others in
order to avoid giving them the capability to
conduct a coup: The lack civil war potential is
thus an incentive for the ruling group: ethnic
exclusion is seen in such a context as more likely
to secure the political interests of the ruling
group. (p. xvii)
It follows therefore that,
• Where the strategic cost of civil war is high due
to rival groups having the capability to mobilize
an armed rebellion, this induces power sharing,
especially if the rival group can credibly threaten
the seat of power, which is the capital city.
• So, where the ruling group and the rival group
are both endowed with strong and credible
threat capability due to either their sociological
size (ethnic population) and proximity to the
capital city, power-sharing becomes almost
self-enforcing.
• In this case, each group will reluctantly trade
executive power and authority for peace and
accepts the risk of a coup as a better option
than a mutually destructive total war for the
control of the state. (p. xvii)

War Trap
Ethnic geography
The problem with colonialism and its legacy
is that it unduly created:
•Unusually large states;
•That were also unusually divided.
So, in those large states (such as Sudan, Chad,
the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC),
which are also three of the most failed African
states that are also very large:
•Ethnic geography reduced incentives for
power sharing, especially when rival groups
that could pose a threat are too remote and
far from the capital city to pose a serious
and credible threat;
•This remoteness had the consequence of
rendering these remotely located rival
groups impotent as they had very little
leverage to effectively and durably hold the
group in power accountable. (xvii)
War Trap
Preliminary solutions or considerations
There are therefore essentially three dimensions of
the coup-civil war trap that are worth exploring when

thinking about solutions:
The rules of the game must change: (pp. xvii-xviii)
• For instance:
• Role of the African Union in Changing the rules
of the game: The African Union has begun a
policy of not recognizing rulers who came to
power via a coup; this, according to them, would
reduce the incentives for coming to power via a
coup (My Take: But this is debatable since most
of them are dictators who also came to power via
a military coup or the overthrow of a regime after
a successful civil war; and most of them rule over
countries that are not democracies);
• Such a decision, when well followed, promotes
change via elections (My Take: BUT here too,
dictators and regimes have found a way to have
multiparty-system with no democracy and,
therefore, no possibility of alternation of power
via free and fair elections)
• My Take: unless admission to the African Union is
made solely on the basis of being a democratic
country, and the Union has an army that can go in
a settle disputes, the incentive will not work;
current policy is not likely to work since most of
the member countries are ruled by dictators who
fraudulently manipulate elections;
War Trap
2. The structure of the post-colonial African

state will have to change:
For instance:
The government must find a way to project state
power and authority into the remote areas of
the country that are not usually reached or
where the presence of the state is not felt in a
coherent way. And this means:
• Move beyond the usual practice of projecting
(uneven) military or police power alone;
• Investment in infrastructure will help to
project such state power, authority and
presence (roads, hospitals, schools, etc.)
3. Finding ways to strengthen Social
Mobilization:
For instance:
Find ways to strengthen interethnic social ties
and bases for interethnic trust; this, in turn, will
help to reduce political appeals based on ethnic
mobilization and ethnic lines, and increase
society’s capacity to hold rulers accountable:
Sample tools:
• Urbanization; (My Take: REALLY????????)
• Technology diffusion;
• Generational changes;
• My Take: Easier said than done????
War Trap
Limitations: (p. xviii)

• The rules of the African Union are debatable: the regimes
who shun coups often rig elections and are dictatorships
themselves. They are not likely to vote to encourage
coups.
• Political mobilization along ethnic lines remains,
unfortunately, the dominant form of social, political and
cultural mobilization in Africa;
• Corruption and other malfeasance continue to limit
diffusion of infrastructure;
• And all the above issues tend to feed each other as, for
instance, political corruption (patronage) helps power
sharing while depriving states of the resources needed to
deploy infrastructure throughout the country.
War Trap
Case Study: South Sudan
• 2011: Independence
• Broke away from the Sudan and became
independent after a bloody civil war. Sudan itself
became independent in 1956
• Latest country in the world to acquire sovereignty.
• Became the 54th country of Africa.
• Capital City is Juba
• Population 12 million
Oil:

• 75% of all oil reserves that belonged to the whole of
Sudan before the break-up resides in South Sudan.
War Trap
Tribal Warfare and Political instability:
• 9 of the 10 states that form South Sudan have been
marred by political instability: The central
government has been at war with various rebel
groups (7 at least) operating from those 9 provinces.
• South Sudan has 64 tribes, of which the Dinkas are
the largest (35%); the second largest are the Nuers
(3.5 million people, with 3 million in South Sudan).
• Tribal clashes between the Nuers (Nuer White
Army) and the Murle occurred in 2011
Note: A Ugandan rebel group, Joseph Kony’s Lord’s
Resistance Army (LRA), had been in operation in the
region until 2008, and has been reported to still
operate in and from South Sudan and, perhaps also,
in the Congo (DRC) after the Juba peace talks of 2006-
2008 fell apart. The LRA is a tribal nationalist rebel
group which, while claiming to be God’s
spokesperson (and wishing to turn Uganda into a
theocracy), promotes the interests of the Acoli
people (Acoli nationalism) (The Acolis are part of the
Luo ethnic group), who exist in both eastern South

Sudan (45.000 in 2000 census) and Northern Uganda
(2 million in 2016 census). The members of the Luo
ethnic group can be found in Ethiopia, Sudan, South
Sudan, Congo (DRC), Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania).
War Trap
Civil War (Since 2013)
• A result of the political power struggle between
President Salva Kiir Mayardit and his former deputy
Riek Machar:
• The president accused Machar and 10 other
“accomplices” for attempting a coup d’état leading
to an all-out civil war, thus starting what is now
known as the South Sudanese Civil War.
• Ugandan troops were sent in to support the
government’s army.
• 400.000 killed so far, with 4 million people displaced
in the region as a result if this war, including 1.8
million displaced internally in South Sudan.
• Peace agreement signed in 2015 in Ethiopia,
allowing Machar to come back as vice president in
2016.
• Conflict resumed in 2016 and Machar fled the
country.

War Trap
President Salva Kiir
The Context Riek Machar
It has been argued that President Salva Kiir:
•Invented a fake coup plot against himself in
December 2013 that he claimed was
conducted by his vice president Riek Machar.
•He wanted to justify a purge that would rid
his presidential guard of rival group
members. (pp. 1-2)
•Marchar is a member of the Nuer group
•Kiir is of the Dinka majority group (35%)
War Trap
So, President Kiir actually was just:
•Fearing the very event that he was claiming
was happening and
•Took a preemptive step that would
•Reduce the risk of a coup by his ambitious

vice-president, alongside whom he had
fought to conquer the independence of
South Sudan.
•
(Note: They both headed the group called
Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM)
to conquer South Sudan’s independence
(Riek now head the Sudan People's
Liberation Movement-in-Opposition-in-
Opposition (SPLM-IO) and Kiir the Sudan
People's Liberation Movement-Juba (SPLM-
Juba)
War Trap
Even though the purge failed to kill his rival,
• It did neutralize his capacity to seize power
via a coup from within.
• It certainly disrupted his political network
inside of Juba, the capital city.
• In this case, Kiir calculated or miscalculated
that the risk of civil war was less immediate
than the risk of a coup.
Note that Kiir being a member of the Dinka
majority, he would tend to always win
elections and the only sure way for Machar
to become president would have been

through a coup.
•Unfortunately for him, this purge attempt
triggered a full-scale civil war. (pp. 2-3)
War Trap
What conditions, beyond the rivalry between the
two men, favored the breaking out of Civil War in
South Sudan?
The very conditions that led to its creation: just a
few years before, the peoples of Southern Sudan
were at war against the central government of Sudan
in Khartoum. So we already had a history of
secession.
But there is also the fact that South Sudan was a
weak state from the start due to the facts that, as
newly created country, it:
• Had not yet had the time to consolidate its
authority (independent in 2011, civil war in 2013),
• Had not yet had the time to create a neutral
bureaucracy of civil servants;
• Had not yet had the time to build infrastructure
that would allow it to efficiently project state power
in remote areas;
• Had built state power and authority on the
precarious alliance of elites sitting at the top of the
state structure;

• (My Take: Role of oil and foreign actors interested
in this oil???)
War Trap
President Salva Kiir’s Miscalculation
Since Riek Machar was:
• a strong rival with credible threat capacity (he was
one of the three rebel leaders who paved the way
for South Sudan’s secession), and also
• a member of the Nuer group, which is the second
most populous ethnic group in South Sudan, he
was able to quickly mobilize allies in several states
inside South Sudan (Unity State, Jonglei State) and
organize a rebel counter offensive against the
government.
• In just 5 days, the central government lost control
of 2 states out of 10 due to defections. A third state
fell later to Machar forces. (pp. 3-4)
• While president Kiir was able to stop the progress
of the rebels, the country became engulfed in civil
war: He would not be able to fully crush the
rebellion, leading to a lasting civil conflict that
continues today. (pp. 4-5)

War Trap
So, while the alliances were crucial in wrestling
power from the Khartoum government at the time of
secession and independence,
• These alliances had not yet fully established their
legitimacy over the rest of the land and, thus, its
power remained a structure most associated with
the capital city than the countryside.
• South Sudan itself (the territory) had been the
scene of many interethnic fighting for years, and
this further weakened not only the central
government, but also the country’s unity or unity
potential.
• Riek Machar whom President Salva Kiir was now
trying to kill had helped South Sudan wrestle itself
from Sudan after he joined John Garang, the first
leader of rebel group SPLA/M and Salva Kiir as as #3
of the rebellion.
• Without the alliance of the three, South Sudan may
have never been born.
• So, the purge by Kiir destroyed the fragile alliance
between the two remaining partners and, thus,
caused a civil war (Garang gad died in a helicopter
crash 2005)

War Trap
So, here, we see the coup-civil war trap at play:
• Power sharing, at first, allowed various allied
groups to secede from Sudan (p.5-6); Note: this
is similar to many groups in other parts of Africa
muting their (European-induced) rivalries for
the sake of gaining independence.
• Power sharing ensured, while it lasted, an
equilibrium between the allied groups as long
as the alliance lasted;
• When Kiir felt that the potential for a coup was
great and, perhaps, too real due to his rival ally
representing a credible threat, he felt it safer to
reduce this potential by calculating that the
cost of civil war might be too great for his rival
to bear.
• However, he miscalculated because he failed to
realize that his rival and his allies did indeed
also have credible capability to threaten his
authority and even to sustain a rebellion, even
if such a rebellion was not ultimately able to
conquer power. (pp. 5-6)
And so we get back the conundrum.
War Trap

And so, it seems that:
•The threat of violence is necessary to
guarantee power sharing.
•But the very existence of this threat of
violence leads some rulers to anticipate the
possibility of a coup. In acting against such a
possibility, they create the very conditions of
civil war if other rival groups have threat
capacity.
•So, in the end, it becomes a real gamble,
especially in the absence of an absolute
authority capable of enforcing the
principles of power sharing and imposing
such principles onto all the partners.
•So, some rulers gamble that the cost of
getting rid of potential rivals who might
mount a coup is worth it due to civil war
being a more distant possibility than a coup.
The coup, in this case is seen as a more
present and clear danger than civil war. (pp.
5-6)
War Trap
Even if Sudan became the first sub-Saharan African
state to become independent (1956)

At the time of Sudan’s independence (1956), more
than 1/3 of civil wars in the world were in Africa.
• This affected 1 in every 2 countries in the region.
• The average civil war in Africa lasted 8 years, killing
thousands.
• Between 1956 and 2005 (49 years), 1.7 million
people died of battlefield deaths due to civil wars
(this does not include war-related consequences
such as disease and starvation) (p. 7)
Of course, this pales when compared to the 9 million
soldiers and 7 million civilians who died in just 4 years
in World War I, and 50 to 85 million fatalities that
were related to World War II, in just 5 years)
(Note: Ghana was actually in 1957, but Sudan is
often seen as ruled by Arabs, especially because it
was occupied/controlled by Egypt, which was then
under British protectorate, and Great Britain, for a
long time (1899-1956) and its location is midway
between the Arab world and the African world, so
people often make a distinction between black sub-
Saharan Africa and Arab Africa where Islamized often
blacks refuse to consider themselves as Blacks, but
see themselves as Arabs; so it all depends on whether
you see Sudan as a sub-Saharan African country or
not).
War Trap
Consequences:

•Stifling of democracy;
•Stifling of economic growth;
•Spread of conflict to neighbors (The
Great Lakes Region due to the
Rwandan and Congo civil wars; South
African imperialism during the
Apartheid era, wars of independence,
etc.)
•Displacement of thousands forced to
flee from war zones, affecting
neighboring countries dur to mass
migrations. (p. 7)
War Trap
Some Civil War Theories
1. The Weak-State Paradigm
Traditionally, scholars had first focused on economic
problems and competition over state resources by
greedy elites or excluded groups as the source/cause
of civil wars in Africa (p. 7)
Then, after a while, the focus became political and
the conclusion became that civil wars were due to the
existence of weak states in Africa. And so the weak-
state paradigm was born. (pp.8-9)
The weak-state paradigm (or explanation) basically
held that:
• Decolonization between 1945-1975 (maybe 1994?)
gave birth to a large number of weak states
(financially, bureaucratically, militarily), and, so, as a
result, civil war became possible when the state

lacked the capacity to police and control its
territory;
• As a consequence, civil wars were more likely to
occur in states where the government lacked the
capacity to police and control its territory;
• When civil wars erupted, they further weakened
the state’s capacity, leading to a vicious, self-
replicating, and self-sustaining cycle. (pp. 8-9)
War Trap
Problems with the Weak-State Paradigm:
• It assumes that where rebellion is materially
feasible, it will necessarily and automatically occur
(this is not the case since some countries with a
rebellion capacity never experienced civil wars);
• It has a deterministic logic that does not account for
other dynamic and variable phenomena;
• Some weak states have civil wars, but others do
not;
• All African countries were built (by Europeans)
based on very similar underlying issues, yet civil
wars have occurred only in half of them.
• It does not fully account for variations within the

same country and explain, for instance, why Omar
al-Bashir in Sudan was able to defeat rebellion in
the early 1990s, but 10 years later failed to contain
the insurgency in a civil war that became long-
lasting and more devastating. (pp. 9-10)
War Trap
2. The Micro-Comparative Theories of Civil War
Such theories seek to understand how
underlying structural conditions breed
explosive large-scale political violence,
especially phenomena such as rebel
formation, recruitment, territorial control,
counter insurgency, etc.
However, these micro-comparative theories
lose sight of the overall picture. Just like the
weak-state paradigm, they do not account for
the ultimate causes of civil wars (the why),
especially
•How bargaining over state power ends in
large-scale political violence, and
•Why when the central government lacks
the capacity to defeat rebels (potential or
real), it does not choose to strike a deal
with rivals to avoid a costly war. (pp.10-11)

War Trap
3. Ethnic Power Sharing Hypothesis
This hypothesis holds that:
•Groups that are marginalized and lack
representation in the distribution of state
resources, government jobs, and public
goods have stronger motives to take up
arms and violently challenge the
government.
•So, politics, or the “struggle over state
power” that has been posited in traditional
studies is a central and valid component of
the study of the causes of civil war in Africa.
•Researchers such as Wimmer and Cederman
as well as others have, for instance,
concluded that rulers can prevent the
outbreak of armed conflicts by sharing state
power with ethnic rivals. (p. 15) This is true,
but incomplete.
War Trap
3. Ethnic Power Sharing Hypothesis
Limitations:
• Too much focus is put on the grievance mechanism

as the main source of armed rebellion;
• The hypothesis, however, forgets that exclusion,
paradoxically, created opportunities for armed
rebels to weaken central government grip on power
and over society, giving them bargaining power; to
acquire this bargaining power, violence specialists
do not need specific grievances; it suffices that
they decide that they want a share of the national
pie to mount a rebellion, and this can occur even
when they were part of the dominant coalition
• So, a regime seeking to survive must elicit local
support through its own ethno-political networks
to stamp out any attempt at armed rebellion; it does
so by using cooperative counter insurgency
mechanisms.
• The theory also fails to account for why a ruler
would willingly choose to exclude a politically
relevant ethnic group at the cost of risking civil war.
(p. 16)
War Trap
4. The Informal Institutions Theory
Roessler proposes a theory that he calls the
“Informal Institutions Theory”, which he wants
to add to the two others in order to provide for a
way to fully account for why some countries
with similar underlying issues fall into civil war
and why others do not.

• His theory, thus, seeks to take into account
meso-level elements such as the informal
institutions on which (real) political authority
rests in weak states (Note: wink, wink à Benin
and its attempt to give political voice to the
country side and do away with the extractive
institutions that exploited Beninese
peasants?????)
• In other words, Roessler suggests that there is
an (informal) institutional basis for peace in
weak states that do not experience civil war,
despite such states having the same underlying
problems as those that end up in civil war. (p.
11)
According to Roessler, thus, political institutions,
whether formal or informal, have a mediating
effect and role on the risk of large-scale political
violence.
War Trap
And so while existing scholarship has relied on
theories that identified political instability and
incoherent political institutions (such as anocracy: a
regime not fully democratic and not fully autocratic,
such as in countries that hold multi-party elections,
but that have rigged institutions not favoring
alternation of power) as determinants that can help

to predict the possibility of civil wars, their conclusion
that such wars were the result of a power struggle
between the elites and the citizens over
democratization or autocratization, may have been
misinformed or limited. In other words, the idea that
these civil wars were due to contestation over the
rules of the game was not entirely correct. (p. 11)
Roessler thus observes and agrees with other
theories that:
• In weak states, politics revolves not so much over
the rules of the game than over the redistribution
of power and wealth between competing networks
of “violence specialists”;
• In weak states, stability relies on factors such as a
“dominant coalition” built upon such elements as
elite accommodations, hegemonial exchanges, and
“shadow state structures.” (p. 12)
War Trap
Dominant coalition
A dominant coalition, in multilayered ethnic
societies as we see in Africa, is a series of
informal bargains and deals that a group of
violence specialists (mostly in the elites)
makes in which they agree to refrain from
violence and work together to share

exclusive access to the central government
and its control over state resources.
Dominant coalitions are thus coalitions of
profiteers and as long as the coalition holds
and prevents other coalitions from acquiring
power, the peace holds and works. (p. 12)
Problems:
In situations where dominant coalitions exist,
most of the society is usually excluded.
War Trap
So, how does peace gets maintained?
Well, there is the central role that
patronage plays in the structuring and
maintenance of these coalitions:
•Patronage is a transversal system
whereby elites all sit on top of various
social strands (ethnic, tribal, clanic,
etc.) that each constitute patron-client
networks, beginning from the top to
the bottom;
•Inside of each patron-client network
of patronage-related corruption,
trickle-down power and opportunities
occur, thus providing the illusion of a
transversal system of shared power
and economic attainment.

War Trap
This works very differently in systems
where only the elites are allied and
there exists no patronage system.
•Without an efficient patronage
system, the coalitions would crumble.
•This is because each leader of a
coalition, whether at the top level or
inside of the mini-coalitions that rely
on the network, is left to maintain his
own network while being watched
and monitored by the other coalition
members. (p. 12)
War Trap
Where patronage systems are efficient, they
provide for the ability to mobilize
counterinsurgency forces that are always ready
to defend the network at all level of the
coalition (to safeguard the interests of the
coalition), and such solidary would not only allow
them to quickly identify reactionary forces from
within or from without, and weaken any attempt

at rebellion, no matter where it comes from.(pp.
12-13).
Note: Rwanda failed to overthrow President Laurent-
Désiré Kabila despite being the country that helped
Kabila topple Mobutu in 1997 and become the third
President of Congo (DRC); Kabila had managed to build
internal Congolese coalitions that were able to save him
from the planned Rwandan coup once he began to not
abide by Rwanda’s commands; even as Rwanda had him
assassinated in 2001, Rwanda failed to install another
puppet, as the Congolese managed to keep power after
the coup attempt, even though their choice was to install
Kabila’s son as President. This inevitably means that Kabila
had, before his death, managed to consolidate internal
coalitions that were able to sustain his regime, which
caused Rwanda to try to destabilize such and place
another person. But the Rwandan coalition now lacked
support in the country and, thus, failed. Kabila had at his
disposal the diamonds and other minerals produced by his
country to consolidate his networks through effective
patronage.
War Trap
Patronage, Ethnicity, Civil War, and the
Postcolonial State in Africa
Patronage networks have tended to be
ethnically based in Africa:

•Tribalism as a legacy of both the slave trade
and European colonialism has tended to
define these networks and, thus, the
resulting kinship associations have tended
to dominate other elements such as class,
party, national identity, state or even
ideology. (pp. 13-14)
•So, to survive and maintain a viable
postcolonial state, dominant coalitions
within these states had to be able to
federate different ethnic groups via a
coalition of their elites. (p. 14)
War Trap
Ethnic power sharing based on coalitions of
kinship associations that use patronage as
their glue has, consequently, and
paradoxically, turned out to be the most
important institutional framework for
preserving peace in weak African states.
So,
•Where ethnic power-sharing principles
work, they preserve peace.
•But where ethnic power-sharing principles
break down, we get a recipe for civil war.
In other words, for peace to be maintained in
weak African states, there has to be:

•a dose of both tribalism and efficient ethnic-
based patronage
•built around a dominant coalition of elites
(most of them from different ethnic groups)
•relying themselves on kinship associations
that they control, for peace to work and be
maintained. (p. 14)
Wow!
War Trap
4. The Informal
Institutions Theory
Note: In Gabon, this has worked very well
thanks to the oil revenue that allowed the
Bongo regime to survive through virtually
corrupting everyone in the country through
money bags or positions in the government.
Any leader who dared to express opposition
was immediately lured into a post of Minister
in the government, offered cars, villas, huge
salaries, and their opposition quickly died
after they got used to the high life. In Gabon,
the patronage system has therefore worked
very efficiently, so much so that Bongo, who is
from a strong minority group, managed to
subdue the Fang people (the majority group)
into never attempting to overthrow him,

thanks to the illusion of power sharing that
made a Fang always Prime Minister (this
changed in 2016). Fang leaders, however,
became experts in faking opposition in order
to be “noticed” and get their turn in
government.
War Trap
Postcolonial African elites that opted for ethnic
power sharing to maintain peace used the same
institutional model consisting of Big Men embedded
in rival ethnic groups. This allowed them to mobilize
support and collect information outside of their own
group; this allowed them to thwart possibilities of
armed rebellions.
But there was a difference between the colonial state
run by Europeans and the Postcolonial state run by
Africans:
• In the post-colonial state, there was lack of the
absolute institutional authority that Europeans
used to maintain peace via police force and
military brutality, and in a context in which
Europeans had absolute monopoly on the
production and acquisition of weapons of mass
murder.
• And so various groups in the African postcolonial
state were able to demand access to all levels of
government and declare/defend their right to share
of the spoils of the state, which the apartheid and
exclusionary system of colonialism did not allow

(Under the colonial state, Africans could only be
used as agents of colonial control, but without
power-sharing opportunities) (pp. 16-17)
War Trap
The Coup Conundrum in Africa
Power sharing, however, while providing a recipe for
peace, also provided the potential for coups.
By accommodating ethnic strong men (Big Men)
within the central government structures and power
circles, rulers lowered the cost that their rival faced
for seizing power via a coup.
In other words, ethnic power sharing provided
incentives for coup attempts by ethnic rivals.
The old OAU model (Organization of Africa Unity
(1963-2002), ancestor to the current African Union),
which usually recognized regimes on the simple
basis of who controlled power in the capital city
(even when the new rulers had no control over vast
regions of the country) unwittingly encouraged
coups. (p. 17)
The statistics are thus mindboggling. In the 45 years
between 1956 and 2001:
• 188 total coup attempts were registered in sub-
Saharan Africa;
• 80 of those coups succeeded; (p. 18)

War Trap
• So, a ruler who took power in Africa via a coup or
even other means had to calculate how much
power he wanted to share with rival groups in
order to prevent them from growing strong enough
to begin to represent a threat that could end up
overthrowing him. To prevent this from happening,
• Such leaders would give prominent military and
security positions to members and leaders of their
own ethnic group (in fact, we have even seen cases
of rulers importing soldiers from other countries to
serve as their presidential guard or even presidential
militia, to prevent coup and assassination
possibilities) or their own family (nepotism).
• Eliminating Big Men from rival groups from real
power would also allow such rulers to eliminate the
coup threats and increase the cost (effort) that
rivals faced to capture state power. This had the
result of confining rivals to the difficult solution of
armed rebellion. If they had no means of mounting
such a rebellion, then the risk of civil war was
reduced and the ruler’s bargain/gamble would
potentially work; (p. 18)
War Trap

•While this was potentially a good strategy,
it did not often work where the ruling
regime lacked the means of control over
rival ethnic groups and the means to
effectively counter a rebellion without
resorting to indiscriminate ethnic violence
(turning to tribal nationalism as a way of
mobilizing his own kinship association
against all others)
•And such strategies, in turn, had the
paradoxical effect of leading to the
opposite results: it increased the mistrust of
rival groups that saw in such strategies an
unwillingness to share real power. (p. 18)
War Trap
So, whether a leader makes a choice that leads to civil
war or a coup, these are often the result of conscious
strategic choices and calculations that rulers make in their
attempt to secure power in the highly uncertain
environment of the postcolonial state. And so:
• When they try to coup-proof their regime from rival
ethnic networks (by excluding them), this often confines
their country to civil war as the only remaining way of
overthrowing them. In this case, exclusion of others
from the circles of power may appear, even if
temporarily, as the best option.

• But, at times, rulers may even choose to risk civil war as
the best option if they think or know rival groups do not
have the real capacity to take control of the capital; in
this case, even if the war breaks out, they believe the
rival may not be able to take the capital and all they risk
is peace talks in which they would have the upper hand
and, with time, they may win through mere war fatigue
(p. 19)
• But when civil war becomes as strategically costly as a
coup (in contexts where all rival groups have the
capacity to be a credible threat in potentially mutually
destructive fashion), BOTH inclusion and exclusion can
lead to the same result of coup and civil war potential.
(p. 19)
War Trap
This leads to a few overarching principles
(which still lead to a conundrum):
•When a rival group increases its
mobilization potential, the strategic benefit
of excluding it from power sharing
decreases; a leader may be well advised, in
this case, not to exclude that group;
•Power sharing can become the best option
if the ruler calculates the cost-benefits of
both the threat level of the rival groups and
his own group’s societal power and

mobilization capability; in this case, if the
threat level of the other group is credible
and may lead to a civil war, then a leader
might find it better to share power and risk
a coup since the civil war and a potential
defeat could prove too costly for himself and
his entire group;
War Trap
• Conditions must therefore be created so that power
sharing can become self-enforcing, so that no group
would be able to derive an inventive to exclude the
others; in other words, the cost of exclusion must be
such that it would constrain both the ruling group and
the aspiring group to a respect of the threat balance.
In other words, where all groups have equal threat
capability, the likelihood for peace to be maintained in
greater.
• In this last case, both the threat of a coup and civil
war are present, but the dissuasive effect of the
mutual destruction threat creates self-enforcing
mechanisms that can prevent both the coups and the
civil wars. (pp. 19-20)
• But for any self-enforcing relationship to work and
hold in a way that can increase the trust that rival
groups would have in each other’s commitment to
the power-sharing arrangements, there must be
agreed-upon rules and these must be formalized to

ensure the even distribution and peaceful transfer of
sovereign power whenever such changes occur;
• There is no guarantee of durable stability if each BIG
Mam would still want, at some point, to become the
BIGGER man amongst them all! (p. 20) There has to be
no commitment problem.
War Trap
Case Study: The Darfur (Sudan)
• In the early 1990s, Sudan’s Islamic Movement had a
well-developed political network in Darfur. This
averted civil war.
• In the early 2000s, the Islamic networks were
dismantled and civil war erupted.
War Trap
Explanation
Omar al-Bashir had basically sought to coup-
proof his regime when he dismantled these
Islamic networks and this triggered
exclusionary situations that caused the
excluded rival groups to re-establish
themselves as competitors for state power,

especially the Hassan al-Turabi group, who
had been co-conspirators with al-Bashir to
seize state power in Sudan in 1989.
Problem was that their earlier power sharing
agreements had been informal and could
only lead to distrust. This created a
commitment problem.
Note: al-Bachir came to power in 1989 in a military
coup that ousted the democratically elected
government of prime minister Sadiq al-Mahdi; he had
disagreed with the Prime minister’s attempt to begin
negotiations with rebels in the south).
War Trap
Explanation
So, al-Bashir’s purge led to unintended
consequences:
• Economic and political grievances among
Darfurians increased: North vs. South schism
was created.
• Incentives for rebellion by the non-Arab groups
he had excluded increased: He lost their
support networks and, thus, the capacity to
benefit from cooperative counterinsurgency (pp.
23-24)
• In opting for exclusion, al-Bashir had in fact

chosen the option of civil war as one that was
more viable and beneficial to him than risking a
power-sharing arrangement with al-Turabi that
could create a credible coup risk: so, for him,
the cost of civil war was outweighed by the risk
of a coup. Al-Bashir calculated that the war
could never result in al-Turabi seizing power via
armed rebellion. (p. 24)
War Trap
Case Study: The DRC (Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Sudan’s issue was mostly a political issue:
But what if one added a natural resources
issue to the equation, as in the DRC
(Democratic Republic of the Congo)? (p. 26)
But even considering the rest of the possible
causes that led to the civil war in the Congo
(DRC), the real issue often remains that of
the breakdown of the informal alliance
between co-conspirators.
In other words, it is mostly the breakdown of
the alliance between co-conspirators (Paul
Kagamé of Rwanda and his Rwandan Patriotic
Front and Laurent-Désiré Kabila of the
Congo) that led to the Congo civil war, but
with large regional consequences.
Kagame tried to overthrow Kabila via a coup
after first helping him take power in the
Congo by helping his rebellion overthrow
Mobutu. (pp. 26-27).

War Trap
Rationale for Africa as a whole: Principles of the
Ethnic Coup-Civil War Trap
(according to Roessler) (p. 25)
• Ethno-political networks are essential to
understanding the causes of civil war in Africa;
• All sub-Saharan African countries potentially
face an ethnic coup-civil war trap conundrum;
• Ethnopolitical groups incorporated into central
government structures through power sharing
are less likely to rebel through armed conflict,
but more likely to usurp power via a coup
d’état;
• Ethnic exclusion (and purge) may forcefully
neutralize the coup threat posed by rival
groups, but will increase the risk of civil war as
a result;
• Ethnic inclusion may neutralize the civil war
threat by rival groups, but will increase the risk
of usurpation of power through a coup d’état
as a result;
War Trap

• Rulers are significantly more likely to purge the
very allies and co-conspirators that helped them
come to power than members of rival groups who
did not participate in the process of power
usurpation with them (purging of rival groups =
ethnopolitical purge);
• But when such ethnopolitical purges do occur, they
often lead to risks of civil war and/or large-scale
political violence;
• Rival groups often fail to agree on formalized
power sharing structures, preferring instead
informal agreements that increase distrust and,
thus, lead to a commitment problem;
• In cases where there is a commitment problem,
each of the rival groups usually seeks to
eliminate/purge the others from the power
structures (ethnopolitical purge), thus triggering
processes that inevitably increase the risk of civil
war.
War Trap
• Where all groups have equal threat capabilities, peace
and power sharing are more likely to be sustained by

self-enforcing principles inspired by the threat of mutual
destruction. In this case, power sharing becomes self-
enforcing, despite there being equal threats of coups
and of civil wars.
• In this last case, both the threat of a coup and civil war
are present, but the dissuasive effect of the mutual
destruction threat creates self-enforcing mechanisms
that help prevent both the coups and the civil wars. (pp.
19-20)
• But for any self-enforcing relationship to work and hold
in a way that can increase the trust that rival groups
would have in each other’s commitment to the power-
sharing arrangements, there must be agreed-upon rules
and these must be formalized to ensure the even
distribution and peaceful transfer of sovereign power
whenever such changes occur;
• There is no guarantee of durable stability if each BIG
Mam would still want, at some point, to become the
BIGGER man amongst them all! (p. 20) There has to be
no commitment problem. So the self-enforcing
mechanisms that guarantee mutual destruction must be
dissuasive enough to discourage rebellions and coup
attempts. (p. 25)
War Trap
Most wars in Africa seem to result from this
coup-civil war trap conundrum (p. 27)

Thus, the question becomes: What did those
states where no civil war occurred do that
managed to foster the conditions for
sustained peace within their territory,
despite having the same underlying
structures as other African countries?
War Trap
It appears that:
•Power sharing is more likely to emerge
when both the ruling group and a given
rival group mutually possess strong threat
capability as measured by their respective
size and distance from the capital city;
•So, when both groups constitute large
groups that are also close to the capital, the
incentive to share power is greater, despite
the increase in the coup risk that comes with
power sharing; in such a case, the coup risk
is greater than the civil war risks, but there
is incentive to share power despite such a
risk. When the balance is well established,
the civil war risk is muted.

War Trap
Rationale for Africa as a whole: Principles of the Ethnic Coup-
Civil War Trap
• But when the issue is between a large group against
small ones, especially those located far from the
capital, the incentive to share power is not there and
ethnic exclusion tends to become the norm; In this
case, only a coup risk would exist among the elites in
the capital and civil war risk would be replaced by
coup risk since the smaller groups locate far from the
capital are assumed to pose no significant coup or civil
war risk if purged from power structures. In this case,
the civil war risk is also muted. (p. 27-28)
• Proximity to the capital and size of rival groups are
thus a good determinant that can help to predict if
the likelihood of civil war exists are not;
• For instance: if a group is sizable and, thus,
represents a credible threat, its situation far from
the capital becomes a civil war risk, yet the same
group, close to the capital, would paradoxically
pose only a coup risk due to its proximity having
likely forced a power sharing agreement with the
ruling group. But that’s a civil war risk that some
leaders might want to take because of the
remoteness of the threat and its distance from the
capital;
War Trap

Rationale for Africa as a whole: Principles of the Ethnic Coup-
Civil War Trap
• But when the issue is between a large group against
small ones, especially those located far from the
capital, the incentive to share power is not there and
ethnic exclusion tends to become the norm; In this
case, only a coup risk would exist among the elites in
the capital and civil war risk would be replaced by
coup risk since the smaller groups locate far from the
capital are assumed to pose no significant coup or civil
war risk if purged from power structures. In this case,
the civil war risk is also muted. (p. 27-28)
• Proximity to the capital and size of rival groups are
thus a good determinant that can help to predict if
the likelihood of civil war exists are not;
• For instance: if a group is sizable and, thus,
represents a credible threat, its situation far from
the capital becomes a civil war risk, yet the same
group, close to the capital, would paradoxically
pose only a coup risk due to its proximity having
likely forced a power sharing agreement with the
ruling group. But that’s a civil war risk that some
leaders might want to take because of the
remoteness of the threat and its distance from the
capital;
War Trap

So, the main problem with current and previous
scholarship on civil war, according to Roessler, is
that:
• It has not sufficiently incorporated the study of
informal political institutions into their civil war
models;
• Roessler believes that it is actually with the
informal alliances that the solution lies: these
informal alliances may, in fact, constitute the main
determinants that can best help to predict where
civil wars and coups might occur. Where these
alliances break down, coups and civil wars are likely
to occur.
• Rulers try to avoid civil wars as much as possible,
but their willingness to maintain peace through
power sharing is constrained by the uncertainties
that come with incorporating ethnic rivals into the
power structures of the state.
• And this may at times lead them to accept the risk
of civil war to avoid the risk of a coup, or vice versa,
depending on the context.
War Trap
In a nutshell, thus, Roessler is arguing that
without rulers using the often invisible
informal institutions that determine real

authority and provide for some type of
legitimacy through the creation of dominant
coalitions and effective patronage, the
simple exclusion and/or inclusion of rival
groups will not often work and will
eventually lead to either a coup and/or civil
war. The building of dominant coalitions
around effective patronage networks will,
thus, be the best determinant for peace.
The Road to African
Nationalism (Part I)
The Rise and Curse of
the “Nation-State”
Acemoglu & Robinson: “Three African Chiefs ” (pp. 404-419)
First, back to Acemoglu & Robinson
Three Tswana Chiefs sailed to England in 1895 to
plead for their Tswana states to be saved from Cecil
Rhodes, who had been organizing the wholesale
takeover of territory by Whites in Southern Africa
not only in what would become later known as
Rhodesia (current-day Zimbabwe, that first became
independent under British white-minority rule as
Rhodesia, then after a black nationalist rebellion
guerilla that lasted 15 years from 1964 to 1979, the
“Rhodesian Bush War”, became the republic of
Zimbabwe under black rule in 1980), but also in

Bechuanaland (current-day Botswana, the became
independent in 1966); (p. 404-405)
These three African kings were therefore those who
would help to pave the way for the country later
known as Botswana.
Notable Facts:
• Explorer David Livingstone (1813-1873) converted
King Sechele to Christianity. (p. 404)
• First translation of the Bible into an African
Language was in Setswana (Language of the
Tswana people) (p. 404)
Southern Africa around this time (1895) was a
region of turmoil not only between Africans and
Europeans, but also between Europeans
themselves for the control of the area (Britain,
Germany, the Boers/Afrikaners). (p. 404)
Cecil Rhodes singlehandedly took over huge
swaths of land in the areas now known as
Zambia (independent in 1964) and Zimbabwe.
(p. 405)
Prior to the Europeans, the Tswana had already
been developing indigenous forms of
government that were both centralized and
pluralistic: The power of the chiefs was
constrained. (Read p. 407)

Monarchical traditions here were not
hereditary either and the Tswana chiefs, it
seems, were very preoccupied by their ability to
keep these “non-despotic institutions” in the
midst of increasing white incursions and
encroachment (p. 406-407)
Most societies in sub-Saharan Africa became
victims of the extractive institutions that
Europeans were busy introducing all over the
continent (p. 409)
Such extractive institutions would naturally
conflict with traditional Tswana government
systems where the rulers were real
emanation of the people and, thus, were
perceived as having legitimacy and, thus,
enjoyed authority over their people that
came from such legitimacy in their dealings
with the British. (p. 409)
A number of countries in Southern Africa at
the time were ruled by white minorities
(South Africa, Namibia (Independent 1990
after black insurgency), Rhodesia); the white
minorities here did not want independent
countries run by blacks (p. 409)

Most African countries after independence
reproduced the types of extractive,
exclusive institutions that existed in colonial
times; what saved Botswana is that, owing
to the old chiefs securing a protectorate
agreement with Britain that allowed them
to keep some of their old ideas about
government, they were able to quickly
implement inclusive economic and political
institutions after independence (p. 410).
It was also important that 79% of the
population of Botswana was of Tswana
origin, which further allowed its traditional
systems to be spared the destruction of
British colonialism (p. 410)
The Tswana traditional institutions were not
unique in Africa. They may have just been
lucky that some of their institutions
survived the destructiveness of colonialism;
so the least colonial impact one has, the

more likely it is that an African society would
be stable (Read p. 411)
Botswana was also lucky to be spared the
types of extractive institutions that had
existed in most of the areas where the British
and the French had organized the terms of
trade. Botswana was thus able to set up its
own marketing board thanks to the fact that
the British had not set up any and this gave
them some economic independence as well
as the ability to to set up inclusive economic
institutions (p. 411)
Interestingly, the Tswana chiefs knew, as
they prepared their trip to London in 1895,
that if the British and other Europeans came
to know about or discover precious minerals
in their lands, their autonomy would be over.
(Read pp. 411-412)
So, in response to the discovery of
diamonds, Chief Seretse Khama quickly
moved to create a law saying that the
diamonds belonged to the Tswana nation as
a whole, not just to the part of Tswana land
and not just the Tswana tribe that he
controlled as chief. This helped to maintain a
sense of unity among all Tswana tribes and
spared them competition over the mineral
resources (p. 412)

This was not the case in Sierra Leone and
other sub-Saharan African countries where
diamonds fueled and sustained civil wars (the
notorious “Blood Diamonds”) (p. 412)
Although some of the policies adopted by
the chiefs to consolidate the power of the
state look like those taken by France and
other European countries, what the chiefs
did in Botswana created the type of
centralization that quickly enshrined the
powers of the state as controlled by Africans
in replacement of those of the chiefs (pp.
412-413)
They also quickly organized educational
policies that taught Setswana and English in
schools, thus avoiding too much linguistic
fragmentation among the Tswana people (p.
412)
So, inclusive institutions prevented wars
over diamonds discovered in the 1970s.
There was less incentive to overthrow the
central government because of investments
in infrastructure were well redistributed
across the country and the need for the types
of patronage systems that prevailed in other
parts of Africa after independence was
reduced (p. 413)
Botswana is, thus, a rather unique case that

does show that societies less affected by
colonialism tend to do better in sub-Saharan
Africa than those affected by it.
There was also a soft case of African
nationalism by chiefs that were able to avoid
becoming agents for the destruction of their
people.
Davidson “The Black Man’s Burdern” (pp. 197-
242)
The Road to African Nationalism
Many African nation-statist elites thought of
the European nation-state model as holding
the promise of real social and political
development at the time of independence
(p. 197).
But the first signs of disillusionment were
already as visible as the early 1960s and
1970s.
•Nigeria: Biafra secession civil war (1967-
1970);
•Ghana: Coup against Kwame Nkrumah
(1966);
•Uganda: spread of tribalism
•etc

Davidson “The Black Man’s Burdern” (pp. 197-242)
•And many other nationalists were still
fighting anti-colonial wars, such as those
against Portugal (Angola, Mozambique) and
white settlers (South Africa, Rhodesia,
Namibia) (p. 198)
•The Cold War also created issues that
became part of Africa’s political landscape
(p. 198)
Throughout the process that saw Africans
transition from colonial rule to rule by
Africans after independence, people inside
and outside of Africa confused progress with
modernization: African elites and their
European advisors (those who came back to
advise Africans about how to run the
countries as neocolonialists) thought that
modernization meant the wholesale
importation of non-African scenarios and
solutions (Africa and Africans had to reject
themselves and self-alienate in order to
“modernize”) (p. 199-200)
Hence the contradiction of a Liberia that, as
a country manufactured by the United
States, was supposed to be civilized, yet
produced only barbarism with its civil wars
(1989-1997;1999-2003), wars that came to
symbolize the contradictions it inherited from

its colonial legacy (p. 200)
At first, many Africans and well-
meaning non-Africans were optimistic
when “signs of civilization” began to
emerge in the form of banks,
universities, schools, cars,
urbanization, paved roads, with many
beginning to be run by Africans
themselves. “Modernization” seemed
like a real thing (200-201).
And so people thought the nation-state
model was a success (p. 201).
Indeed, there seemed initially to be no
quarrels among most of these new
nation-states and with Ghana becoming
independent in 1957, things looked
good (p.201-202)
But the colonial borders left behind by the
colonizers started to show their inefficacy
pretty quickly:
•They were carved through and over ancient
trades routes

•They were carved over indigenous nations
(ethnicities) and, thus, these colonial
borders that did not respect natural
regions, territories and ethnic groupings
caused ethnic segmentations that, at once,
separated kin groups from one another
while, at the same time, amalgamating
different nations together inside of borders
that now began to create antagonisms and
divisions: It became hard for Africans to
adjust to these new segmentations and
amalgamations, and this naturally led to
the phenomenon of “tribalism” and
created a “tribal problem” where there was
none before;
•The new states (or forceful nation-states)
were doomed to be “highly leaky” as
indigenous people sought to maintain the
links to their kin and trade associates
across the borders, which then triggered
the phenomenon of illegal migrations and
smuggling of both people and goods, a
phenomenon that became and common
place endemic over time. (pp. 202-203)
The colonial borders, thus, were both a
failure and a curse whose consequences
were going to worsen with time.
Another expectation was that the new
nation-states would quickly become

democratic based on the French, American
or British models. But, to do so, they would
have to create political parties and
parliamentary systems just like in the West
(p. 205);
But the problem was that in Europe,
societies were already used to being
established in the form of stratified social
classes that,
• in Feudal times organized society along the
lord vs. serf opposition, with the serf being
maintained in that position by blood and
privilege (and even by religion);
•Then, after the revolutions, an elitist
bourgeoisie established itself as the
dominant group, but with the emerging
middle-class beginning to assert its power,
power that was built over 150 years since
the revolutions;
•There was also the emerging working class
(that the middle-class began to manipulate
on its way to seizing power) in the new
European nation-states that had begun to
assert themselves in the 19th century (pp.
205)

But, in Africa, there had not been, before
the Arabs and Europeans, many societies
built around feudal systems and clearly
identifiable social classes. So, Africans were
not necessarily prepared for the sudden so
called “modernization” along such social
classes as had been practiced in Europe since
the Middle Ages on the one hand, and then
following the Industrial Revolution on the
other (p. 206)
But, Arab (7th century) and European
intrusions (15th century) triggered a system
of territorial, regional, ethnic, political, and
commercial competition that suddenly and
abruptly flowed into African party politics
and parliamentary structures after
independence, as opposed to social classes
as was the case in Europe (p. 206).
This basically ensured that political competition
would not be able to follow class structure and
competition, but ethnic contours. In other
words:
• There was just not enough time for economic
classes similar to those in Europe to form since
Africans were thrust into these new nation-
states without having been prepared to
manage their economies and without a

distinctive bourgeois or middle class due to
very few Africans being trained and integrated
into the colonial economies while Europeans
were there.
• The Africans’ only point of reference for social
belonging was therefore the ethnic group that
one belonged to: this automatically caused
political parties to take an ethnic contour,
hence the birth of what Europeans called
“tribalism” (p. 206) (Note: Tribalism refers to a
society organized along tribal or ethnic lines; it
takes a negative connotation when leaders in
such societies begin to advocate for policies and
ideologies meant to favor some groups in
exclusion of others).
Because Europeans noticed Africans lived in
ethnic groupings that they called “tribes”,
they confused the very conflicts that they
and the Arabs had triggered among
indigenous people with traditional tribal
rivalries and even began to actively divide
Africans into tribes without understanding
how they had initially been organized; they
even fabricated such “tribes” where there
had been none before (p. 206)
•But what was triggered was not even
tribalism, but something worst called
clientelism and its lot of corruption and
patronage systems.

•These patronage and clientelist systems
caused a sociopolitical phenomenon
whereby state leaders, in order to preserve
power and maintain their grip on power,
had to secure (therefore “buy”) the
support of regional, local or “tribal” leaders
by allocating to them state resources in a
way that ensured they would not rebel
against the central government.
•The problem with the patronage system
was that it caused each leader, and not just
the president of the country, to work hard
to win the support, not of a given social
class, but of his/her tribal kinsmen and
women, thus reinforcing the tribal and kin
relationships within each group as opposed
to exploding and scattering them into (non-
existent) socioeconomic classes.
•This, in turn, encouraged ethnic/tribal
competition for state resources, even within
each ethnic group as each leader within
each ethnic group sought to show he or she
best defended the interests of the group or
the region.
•Additionally, developing access to state
resources became a must for each leader as
each sought to leverage such access to buy
support among his own people; this practice

gradually became the norm of political
activity in Africa, and morphed into a race
for the spoils of political power (p. 206-207).
•And the reason why things evolved this
way mostly had to do with the various
forms of rivalries that Africans had
developed first during the slave trade days,
but also under a colonial system that often
pinned African ethnic groups against one
another in a bid to better control them;
•Thus, the phenomenon of corruption that,
more than anything else, killed African
economies over time, was born, not
because it was part of the underlying
cultures, but because it was triggered by
the borders that forced the ethnicities now
fighting for access to state resources within
these fabricated states to find a way to
defend their own interests (or, in many
cases, the interests of their now corrupt
leaders who in many cases exploited these
rivalries to their advantages, just like
Europeans had done before
independence).
In other words, in Europe, the structure of

political parties and the parliamentary
systems became class-based whereas, in
Africa, it became based on regional and/or
ethnic kinship considerations. Consequently,
the political model in Africa, whether based
on multi-party politics or single-party
politics, became a model based on
clientelism and patronage (p. 207).
Democratic practice itself became an
illusion. During colonial times, Africans
became used to the model of governance
that the white colonizers used: one with very
rigid and dictatorial laws and government
systems meant to keep Africans under firm
control.
Colonial authorities ruled by decree and not
by democratic dialogue or laws. This manner
of ruling arbitrarily became the norm and
example that Africans were exposed to on a
daily basis. To them, this was the
“modernization” that Europeans were
talking about (Read p. 208).
So, the reign of dictatorship, from the
start, was almost unavoidable and
bureaucracy and clientelism as used by
Europeans in the colonies became the
same thing: they encouraged dictatorship
and the practice of patronage (that is,
corruption) (pp. 208-209).
In the end, the political content,

configuration and landscape of the new
nation-states in Africa narrowed down
into groups (ethnicities) and individuals
(corrupt elites) with command or access
to state resources as opposed to
institutions. And this created a rigid
opposition between the cities, where the
educated elites and, therefore, state
power resided, and the rural areas, that
became almost ignored in the
mathematics of power in the new nation-
states. In other words, real political
power was now wielded by city-dwelling
educated elites, to the detriment of
traditional forms of authority and social
organization (p. 209)
Authoritarianism and bureaucracy (non-
elected government policy-makers, officials
and groups working within an administration,
often with the negative connotation of
corruption and inefficiency that goes with it)
became allied and led leaders of the new
states that had initially relied on foreign “aid”
(as well as neocolonial “assistance”) to begin
to use such aid to not only advance their
own personal interests, but also to build the
clientelist and patronage systems that would
help them stay in power (p. 209)
So, in Africa, power at the time of
independence could never really be about

any class-based ideology. In fact, in Africa it
did not really matter whether a given
government was socialist or capitalistic
(these ideologies made no sense in societies
not culturally organized along economic
class lines): The results were always the
same, that is, the conditions for endemic
poverty were created. (p. 210)
What followed, thus, for most African
countries after independence was an almost
immediate decline in production in rural
areas since wealth and status no longer
came from work in the fields and farms, but
from, on the one hand, bureaucratic status in
the cities (being a civil servant in the
administration), and, on the other hand, the
patronage system.
Political parties, because of their ethnic
make-up, began to function on the basis of
the patronage model: use of state resources
to “reward” individuals for electoral support,
leading to people at every level of the party
beginning to “sell” their electoral support in
exchange for the scraps of state resources
that those in power were willing to give
them. Political parties and becoming a
political party member became the main
way to ascend to socioeconomic status, and
not hard work in the fields and farms (p.
210).

Thus, even after independence, African
governments kept the economic models that
they had inherited from Europeans and that
basically relied on the exploitation of rural
producers to generate wealth for the state; in
Ghana, for instance, the government had initially
kept the British model that essentially milked the
peasants, leading to their impoverishment (p.
201-211).
But the mistake, of course, would be to assume
that, once independent, the Europeans left for
good and ceased to intervene in the affairs of
their former colonies:
• They had left advisors behind: most African
elites were not prepared to run the new
countries they inherited;
• The goods that used to be produced in colonial
times for colonial economies (that is,
European economies) continued to be
produced and follow their old patterns, and
their commercialization and sale prices
continued to be controlled internationally by
the former colonial powers (the buyers were
often the former colonial powers) (p. 211)

This situation led to disastrous
consequences:
•It caused rural farmers to cease to produce
for sale and only of local consumption, due
to terrible terms of trade that began to
cause extreme poverty in the countryside,
leading to all (farmers, people and states)
becoming poor and dependent on “foreign
aid” and the importation of food that they
actually could be producing locally (Read p.
211);
•In most cases, the state-controlled
economies died and most trading became
informal, leading to smuggling becoming
the natural response of peasants and
farmers to the predatory international
economy in which the formal economy
functioned. Countries such as Benin,
Senegal, etc. became subject to, and victims
of, this phenomenon, which caused huge
economic losses to the state as well as
generalized poverty (p. 213)
Additional issues:
•The nation-states transmitted to the
Africans became awkward constructs;
•They became contradictions between what

gradually emerged as state
authoritarianism and the expectations of
state democracy that the populations were
looking for;
•They also encouraged growth in illegal
trade; leaders were forced to close their
eyes on this illegality to avoid collapse of the
state (p. 215)
Yet, nowhere in pre-Arab and pre-Europe
Africa was there ever famine (pp. 215-216).
Explanations for this poverty after
independence became, of course, that
African agricultural practices and knowledge
were too primitive and, thus, could not
produce enough food for Africans.
The solutions were, thus, that Africans had
to:
•Abandon their primitive agricultural
methods and “modernize” by importing
foreign experience, knowledge and
technology
•Adopt agricultural development plans that,
in most cases, were inherited from colonial
practice, plans that, ultimately, would prove
inadequate and ill-adapted to how Africans
approached agriculture (pp. 216-217).

As for the generosity of Europeans, there is
much doubt:
•Europeans had popularized the fallacy that
they had spent their wealth on Africa and
Africans. It was actually the opposite: the
Colonial powers had squeezed and fleeced
Africans in ways never seen before:
•The British put in 40 million pounds (to its
own manufactures and experts established
in Africa), but extracted 140 million pounds
between 1945 and 1951 alone (p. 218-219)
•In the Belgian Congo, 1% of the population
was white, but they owned 95% of the total
economic assets in the colony and 88% of
private savings belonged to foreigners (p.
219)
•The extraction of wealth from the colonies
was not halted by the transfer of power to
Africans at the time of independence:
these former colonial territories remained
under the overall financial and commercial
domination of the West, and the West
continued to dictate the course of political
life (supporting or overthrowing regimes),
especially at height of the Cold War (pp.
219-220)
•The pace of poverty accelerated in Africa:

in just 5 years between 1875 and 1980,
most African exports dwindled in value due
to unfavorable terms of trade dictated by
Western powers (Europeans and Americans)
(Read p. 220);
Of course, generalized poverty caused a
decline in both moral and political values in
African leaders now forced to grapple with
the impossible task of managing the new
nation-states into which they were thrust
with no preparation (pp. 221-222).
What solutions were considered?
The need for more democracy:
•Except that those who advocated for this
tended to push for Western-type models,
such as parliamentary democracy;
•But the reality was that the West never
pushed for real democracy in Africa as this
would quickly turn against its interests
(which only dictatorial regimes that they put
in place and control could protect); the
West, thus, was actually to downgrade and
crush the old indigenous systems that had
provided effective public forms of control
over institutions and people (as in
Botswana), that is, Africans’ own sense of
communal democracy (Read p. 223)

In other words,
•Traditional European thinking about Africa
has never seen Africa as a possible or viable
source of democratic thought or practice
(Read p. 224)
•And the West has tended to reject any
form of nationalist thought in Africa as
communist, subversive behavior or
tribalistic behavior, and current turmoil in
Africa has appeared to confirm such
Western stereotypes when, in fact, all those
issues were caused by Western intrusion
and continued meddling (Read p. 224);
•What Europeans called “tribalism” in the
context of the new nation-states that they
forced upon Africans was actually natural
attempts by various groups to subvert the
imposed-nation state prison they were
now forced to share, in a vain attempt to
reassert their national identity and protect
their interests in the context of multiethnic
states that too often were forced to become
oppressive from the start because of their
ungovernable structure (Read pp. 224-225).

It can, therefore be asserted that colonial
powers, not Africans, created tribalism in Africa
(p. 225)
• Not only because of the modern borders that
artificially triggered ethnic conflicts within the
independent African states;
• But also because of the older ethnic rivalries
that has been triggered by the slave trade:
wherever this trade occurred, it strengthened
kinship (ethnic) associations in response and,
thus, allowed for both protective and defensive
reorganization within each group;
• And so, while the slave trade triggered the
birth of slave states in Africa and gave birth, in
West and Central Africa, to states whose main
economic activity now revolved around the
trade of humans, in addition to that of gold
and ivory, these states were unable to fully
provide security for all those within their
control. This led to a reinforcement of kinship
(tribal) relationships ho fell under their political
influence. as a defense and protective
mechanism (Read p. 225-226)
The same phenomenon naturally
continued within the postcolonial
states:
•Failure of the African nation-states

after independence naturally led to a
reinforcement of kinship (tribal)
associations and structures as a way
of providing security for each of the
groups now “imprisoned” inside of the
colonial borders left by Europeans (p.
226);
•Most of the political parties that
erupted in Africa on the cusp of
independence in the 1950s and 1960s
or later in the early 1990s as a result
of the fall of the Soviet Union were
usually kinship (ethnic) based (p.
227).
What the colonial borders inherited from
colonization did, thus, was to prevent the
birth of democracies since:
•States in which competitive kinship
corporations/associations existed as a
political tool (as opposed to competitive
class associations) could not viably produce
stable democratic states.
•Any failure of the state almost always led,
in such cases, to potential of ethnic
warfare, especially during the 1980s, which
became known in Africa as the decade of
the AK47 (Read p. 227-228)
•And, thus, several military regimes

emerged in some countries throughout
Africa that came to power for the specific
goal of defending the interests of specific
groups (Rwanda and South Sudan are
extreme examples of this) (p. 228).
Generally, failures of the state in Africa have
been attributed to failures of persons
(ignorance principle) as opposed to failures
of institutions. But, in reality, the nature and
structure of postcolonial societies as they
now existed in Africa could not meet the
requirements of the Western parliamentary
model. Why? Simply because:
•The Western parliamentary model relied
on the prior existence of social classes,
especially an hegemonic middle class: There
were no hegemonic middle classes in
indigenous African societies prior to the
Arabs and Europeans, and there were still
none immediately after independence due
to most Africans having been excluded from
colonial economies due to the extractive
institutions created in the colonies by the
colonial powers;
•The void caused by the absence of classes

was, thus, naturally occupied by kinship
corporations (groups organized around the
violence and domination of one group over
the other in their mutual attempt to control
access to state resources and, therefore
state power) (Read p. 230)
• In the end, most governments turned into
military regimes since they alone, and not a
non-existent middle class or the masses,
had the power to actually quickly change a
regime: This is how the coup d’état culture
as a way of removing regimes was born in
Africa; and while each military regime
often used the argument of saving people
from oppression to justify the takeover, it
often itself quickly became oppressive as
there was no real way of actually preserving
power; there was simply no middle-class
structure capable of sustaining or
promoting durable democratic principles
and rule (p. 230)
So, while African nationalism has been
primarily anti-colonial (and thereforesome
sort of continental colonialism) before
independence, after independence, a new
type of nationalism emerged that had
nothing to do with class or the need to
improve the social conditions of citizens.
Africans now claimed nationalisms that

became expressions of violence within the
new countries and translated into a culture of
coups and civil wars:
•Murder of Lumumba in Belgian Congo
(1961)
•Coup against Kwame Nkrumah (1966)
•Etc.
Ideologically, one saw the emergence of
regimes defining themselves as Marxist
pushing Marxist policies and proclamations
that made no sense and did not work either
(Benin, Zaire, Congo) (pp. 230-231)
The Benin Case
The case of Benin is a bit notable because its
government succeeded somewhat in its
attempt to economically link city to provinces.
Benin may have benefitted from the fact that,
having no mineral wealth, it was somewhat left
mostly alone by Western powers (a little bit).
So, it began to consolidate a state that was
minimally able to allow for some economic and
political voice by rural people (p. 237);
Benin survived also because the state allowed
its populations to operate illegally in a way that
allowed for a freer and illegal flow of

merchandise across its borders. Benin thus
became a sort of smuggling entrepot and base
for one of the world biggest smuggling
operations under the complicit eye of the state.
By allowing its borders to remain porous
according to, perhaps, old ancient trading
practices, Benin allowed non-city people to
prosper and, thus, allowed them to continue to
produce and trade unimpeded by the state.
The Benin Case
The downside of this was that:
•90% of Benin’s trade was in the informal
sector;
•The state lost control of its economy,
ceding most of it to the informal sector, that
thus triggered some sort of productive
illegality.;
•This is because official state channels had
proved disadvantageous to the farmers
because they were linked to the
international market responsible for
impoverishing them (p. 238)

This parallel, informal economy, however,
gave the state some political stability. In
other words, if the state had tried to become
intrusive and attempted to take control of
trading via taxation and other impositions,
the state could have collapsed. (p. 237)
The Benin Case
The Benin state did go through some of the
troubles that most African countries went
through at the time of independence.
•It went through ethnic strife and several
military coups for 12 years after its
independence in 1960, until Mathieu
Kérékou took power via a coup in 1972.
•Benin thus underwent several
transformations under the dictatorship of
Mathieu Kérékou and did not undergo
another coup after 1972, due to, probably,
the “official illegality” that Kérékou had
accommodated in the economy of the
country. (p. 237)
•Benin also implemented ways for rural
communities to be represented in politics
without having to be rich, notables,
educated or familiar with French culture;
(pp. 238-239)

The Benin Case
•Even if economically poor by modern
standards, Benin became the only West
African country besides Senegal to develop
sustained democratic practice since 1990
following the upheavals that forced Kérékou
to open the country up to multi-party
politics. Kérékou lost the first democratic
election to Nicéphore Soglo in 1991. Since
then, Benin has cultivated a durable and
credible democracy.
Now, while Benin has represented a
potential model of the ways in which
African economic systems could thrive by
opening up their borders to regional free
trade and finding ways of involving rural
communities in political decision-making (as
used to be the case in pre-Arab and pre-
European times), it has still not been able to:
•Fully develop a coherent approach to this
system (p. 239)
The Benin Case
And it has still not been able to:
•Harness the economic energy generated by
the informal sector in a way that translates
into state control and, thus, prosperity that

would benefit all (p. 239)
•Fully extirpate itself from the curse of
tribalism: even if multi-party politics seem
to be working there for now, it is still mostly
based on the inescapable model of kinship
corporations, one that is ill-suited for the
European parliamentary model that the
country is following (Read p. 239)
What, then, about African nationalism
and the way African countries were
able to become independent?
In many cases, Africans had to fight
militarily to conquer their
independence. For this, they organized
armed resistances in such Portuguese
colonies as Angola and Zimbabwe, but
also in others such as Namibia, South
Africa, Kenya, among others.
In some others, Independence was
directly granted due to the
decolonization atmosphere that
became inescapable after World War II
(pp. 240-241)
What is Africa?

The Issue of Poverty and The Origin of Poverty
This class is a story about the history of Africa and how it
shaped African Politics.
Let’s tell that story.
First, the question: What is Africa?
Very simply: A continent (not a country)
But a continent whose history is mostly defined by
colonialism and foreign intrusions that, actually, caused the
underdevelopment of the continent.
If is, first and foremost, the continent of black people (the
Africans) into which other racial groups settled. Various
ancient groups changed the face of Egypt beginning with
the Assyrian invasion of the 9th century BCE and ending
with the intrusions of the Arabs in the 7th Century and the
colonization by Europeans beginning in the 15th century.
Looking at Africa from the 21st century backwards provides
a misleading picture. The assumption tends to be that what
we hear and see of Africa today (wars, famine, disease,
poverty dictatorships, etc.) is how Africa has always been
and, thus, derives from an inherently flawed African
character.

Principles of African Societies
Bicultural African Societies
(Non-Muslim)
Tricultural African Societies
(Muslim)
Macro-Structure of Postcolonial African Societies
(Mengara, p. 289)
Note: Because Islam penetrated Africa well before European
colonization, tricultural African societies have three competing
civilizations.
To understand Africa today, actually, requires lots of
deciphering and
peeling away of various layers of foreign influence (Africa
today is a
mix of indigenous vs. Islamic vs. European cultures) (See
Mengara
2001, pp. 288-291).
Acemoglu & Robinson (pp. 45-69)
Let us see one instance of this deciphering and peeling away in
Daron
Acemoglu and James Robinson’s book, Why Nations Fail
(2012).
Acemoglu and Robinson tackle the notion of poverty in Africa

and
how Westerners (Europeans and Americans) have often
approached
this issue.
They argue that, 50 years ago the difference in economic
development between African countries and several others in
Asia
was not that great, yet today, you find that sub-Saharan African
countries represent the bulk of what constitutes the poorest 30
countries in the world today. 50 years ago, for example,
Singapore
and South Korea would not be among the 30 richest countries in
the
world today (Acemoglu and Robinson, pp. 45-48).
The question, however, is: Why? (this is one of the questions
we will
be trying to answer in this class)
Acemoglu & Robinson do begin to analyze the source of this
situation.
They essentially identify three dominant and pervasive
theories/hypotheses that they argue do not and cannot work
when
trying to both identify and solve the cause of poverty in Africa:
1. the Geography Hypothesis,
2. the Culture Hypothesis, and
3. the Ignorance Hypothesis.
That these three theories are still seen as surviving today to
explain
issues of poverty in Africa shows how pervasive and long-
lasting old
stereotypes of Africa have been and have continued to influence

modern economic and political theory.
1) The Geography Hypothesis (pp. 48-56)
This theory essentially holds that geographical location (and
environmental
(effects of the sun on body and mind) factors have shaped the
cultural as well as
intellectual/mental capacity of humans, causing those in hot,
tropical climates
with poor soils for agriculture to become disease-ridden,
primitive, lazy, despotic
and, therefore, poor, while those living in temperate and/or cold
climates with
rich soils for agriculture grew healthy, industrious, civilized,
democratic and,
consequently, rich (pp. 48-49). This theory even argues that the
availability of a
large number of plant and animal species that can be
domesticated is a
determining factor in the economic and technological
trajectories of nations (pp.
51-52).
Acemoglu & Robinson say: “Bullshit!!”
• Geography and the theories derived from it cannot account for
differences
between northern countries and southern countries;
• People in North and South Korea are essentially the same, yet
the South is

among the 30 richest countries in the world and the North
among the 30 poorest
(p. 49);
• East and West Germany had totally different economic and
political outcomes,
despite being both in Europe (p. 49);
• Tropical areas such as Central and Southern America (Peru
and Mexico)
produced the great material Inca and Aztec civilizations, while
the native
populations living in North America (United States and Canada)
did not (pp. 50;
52-53);
• If it is true that the simple fact of domesticating animals and
practicing Western
types of agriculture is what explains Western wealth, how come,
then, that
settler colonies in South America such as Mexicans and
Peruvians, countries built
over the lands formerly occupied by the Aztecs (Mexico) and
the Incas (Peru) are
dramatically poorer than those of the settler colonies of North
America (USA &
Canada)? (p. 52).
• Even if the gap in income and well-being between Africans
and Europeans was
not that great at the time when the Portuguese first sailed
around the coasts of
Africa in the 15th century, how come the gap, since then, has
drastically
widened? Why did the contacts and transfers of knowledge and
technology

between Africans and Europeans did not allow Africans to
“catch up”? (p. 53-54)
• What, then, happened?
• Acemoglu and Robison say: “Colonialism and imperialism!!”
(Read p. 55-56)
2) The Culture Hypothesis (pp. 56-63)
This hypothesis essentially links one’s culture (and even
religion) to one’s level of
prosperity. Thus, according to this theory, the beliefs, values
and ethics of a people
can be determining factors that help to explain why some
nations/races are poor
while others are not. Africans are thus seen as lacking work
ethics (lazy), lacking
religion (they indulge in witchcraft, magic and superstition) and
are averse to
technological innovation (primitive) (p. 57).
Acemoglu & Robinson say: “Bullshit!!”
• While social norms do indeed inform a people’s attitude
towards change and
innovation, these factors (religion, national ethics, indigenous
values) are not
able, in themselves, to explain why inequality has persisted
around the world
despite the West, for example, having imposed its cultural
norms and religion

on the rest of the colonized world (p. 57);
• Although Protestant ethics were hailed as the cultural element
that fueled the
economic successes of England and The Netherlands in the
modern era, the fact
the French were Catholics did not prevent them from also
becoming prosperous
later on and compete for world dominance with England (p. 60).
• None of the economic successes of Asia (Japan, China) have
nothing to do with
Christianity, yet they are booming economically with China
now arguably
becoming the world’s most dominant economic power (and they
are just getting
started! (p. 62-63);
• There is much more to the economic situation of Islamic
countries than religion
that can explain why some are poor or others rich, so the fact of
many of these
being poor has no direct correlation to Islam (p. 61-62) The
Chinese and
Japanese are not Christian, yet they are thriving.
• Does the English language offer special attributes that make
those who speak it
more prosperous than those who don’t? So why are countries
like Nigeria, India
or Sierra Leone behind? (p. 62)
• How about European vs non-European culture? Well, why then
are the much
larger groups of descendants of Europeans who run Argentina
and Uruguay

poorer compared to those of the United States and Canada? And
how come
Asian countries (that have virtually no noticeable members of
European
descent) are doing so much better than those of South America,
which have
plenty of European descendants? (p. 62)
• How come that, in the 15th Century, Mbanza, capital city of in
the Kongo
Kingdom, with its 60,000 citizens, was equal in size to Lisbon
and larger than
London with its population of 50,000 around 1500, yet the
Kongo Kingdom
quickly dwindled after the Portuguese arrived there in 1483 and
its King Nzinga a
Nkuwu converted to Catholicism to become King João I? And
how come the gun
had seemed to flourish there more than other technologies and
knowledges that
the Portuguese are said to have brought with them? (Read, pp.
58-59)
2) The Culture Hypothesis (pp. 56-63)
What, then, happened?
Acemoglu and Robison say: “Colonialism and imperialism!!”
• And, later, post-independence African governments” (Read p.
pp. 59-60).

• For the Kongo kingdom, colonialism brought a curse: slavery
(which explains the success of guns used to capture the slaves
that the Portuguese wanted); the pressures and incentives for
slavery, in fact, did not come from within, but from the external
demand that arose from the presence of Europeans (Read p.
60).
• For Muslim countries, colonialism and imperialism also
played a
role (Read p. 61);
• Difference in institutions and institutional histories often
account for various economic situations (p. 63), and sometimes
institutionalized racism can even slow down economic
potential in countries with indigenous, native populations that
have been excluded from economic opportunities due to racism,
so that their poverty level often pulls down the level of
economic prosperity of the whole nation (This may be the case
in South America, for instance, but also in South Africa where
about 75% of the land is still, 24 years after the end of
Apartheid, in the hands of whites, who make up only 8% of the
country’s population);
• Other factors are, actually, more important, such as the level
of
trust and/or cooperation among people; for instance, culture
cannot explain the fact that North and South Korea essentially
house the same people in terms of language, ethnicity and
culture, yet the South is rich and the North is poor (p. 58);
3) The Ignorance Hypothesis (pp. 63-69)

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