The study of political transitions in Africa

Abstract

This article examines some of the inadequacies of dominant Western perspectives, especially those originating from the US for studying political transitions in Africa, by focusing on the current democratic transitions. It attributes the major flaws to the hegemonic and ideological interests which these transitions are designed to serve and which underlie approaches made popular by Western scholars, to a ‘periodic’ conceptualisation of the process of transition itself, to the consequent treatment of transition in an ahistorical manner and the abandonment of previous perspectives of social and political change, and to the failure to relate transitions to the developmental needs of countries involved as determined by the peoples themselves. It discusses how these weaknesses can be overcome and outlines the requirements for a more adequate framework for studying transitions.