Democracy, Colonization, and Human Capital in Sub-Saharan Africa

This article examines an empirical anomaly. In most developing regions, poor democratic nations enroll more primary school students than their authoritarian counterparts. Regime type, however, cannot account for the wide variance in enrollment in Africa. This study demonstrates that colonial heritage is a good predictor of primary school enrollment for low-income countries in Africa. Additional analysis shows that colonization's impact on education has not diminished since independence. Rather, the initial differences in enrollment between the former French and British colonies have grown over time. The results hold important implications for the study of political institutions and their impact on economic development. Even after they no longer exist, political institutions can have substantial lingering effects on important developmental outcomes. David S. Brown is an assistant professor of political science at Rice University. His work has appeared recently inThe American Political Science Review, Political Research Quarterly, and inComparative Political Studies. His work focuses on the political economy of development and is based on cross-regional work with specialization in Latin America. Specific areas of interest are human capital, democracy, and the international determinants of domestic politics.     

Crisis,violence and political succession in Africa

This article examines African leadership succession and the effect of crises on the orderliness of succession. The data set consists of 102 successions from 1963-1988, using the African Contemporary Record as our major source. We divide 102 successions into those which are 'regulated,' or rule-directed, and those which are not. We find that about a third of all successions were regulated, and that the presence of a political crisis is the critical obstacle to a regulated succession, more important than either economic or cultural crises. We also find that economic performance is a significant long-term factor in a country's succession record.     

South Africa in a comparative study of industrialization

The peculiarities of South African society, where class, ethnic, linguistic and national cleavages overlap, tend to obscure the process which have led to industrialization. This is unfortunate because a study of South African social structures may shed light on the wider problems of development. An attempt is made in the article to compare political and economic developments in South Africa with similar developments in Tsarist Russia, Imperial Germany and the American South. It is suggested, for example, that the German ‘marriage of iron and rye’ has a counterpart in the relationship between maize and gold in South Africa and that similar political consequences follow. The organization of the South African mining compound is considered, in its formulating effect upon the peculiar process of urbanization in South Africa. This particular form of urbanization has resulted in the creation of a very considerable surplus for investment, the implications of which are discussed.     

Economic Evaluations,Economic Freedom,and Democratic Satisfaction in Africa

This article assesses the relationship between democratic satisfaction and micro and macroeconomic factors in Africa. Studies have shown that economic factors represent a cornerstone of the democratic process. However, research has rarely accounted for the effect of economic freedom on satisfaction with democracy, and its conditional role on the effect of citizens’ economic evaluations, particularly in the context of Africa where democracy is still developing. Using various rounds of the Afrobarometer, the article analyses the link between citizens’ evaluations of the economy and economic freedom with their satisfaction with democracy in 32 African countries between 2002 and 2013. First, the findings show that the openness of the economic context and positive economic evaluations are associated with an increase in democratic satisfaction. Second, economic freedom and economic evaluations appear to have a conditional association with democratic satisfaction. In fact, positive economic evaluations are a less important factor for democratic satisfaction in contexts that have a freer economy.     

Looking toward 2000, and beyond: Some developmental tendencies in organizations

Based on our combined readings of partially overlapping literatures, and spiced by our consulting experience and instructional work with employees at all levels, this essay identifies 14 developmental tendencies that seem to have a reasonable chance of becoming dominant features of our exploring organizational landscapes. The effort can be labelled “future scan,” with the focal length varying from tendencies that are already observable in numbers of cases to those that seem noteworthy despite their rarity.