Politics of power to politics of ideology

The ongoing presidential elections in the United States of America raise many important lessons for fledgling democracies around the world – especially in Africa. Of course one must appreciate and accept that the American experience in democratic process goes back some centuries unlike in much of Africa where it goes back only a few decades. If one discounts the many years wasted under military and civilian dictatorships, that experience is whittled even further down to not more than a dozen years in the best of circumstances.

That lack of experience should, however, not be an excuse for the sorry state the continent finds itself neither should it be justification for continued repression and the many undemocratic travesties perpetrated against the poor people on the continent. The whole point of history is to learn from the past in order to avoid similar pitfalls and to help make better decisions for the future. In Africa it seems quite in vogue to disregard past lessons and repeat the errors from history with the mistaken and misguided expectation that the results could be different. It is time our leaders and our people started learning the lessons from other countries’ experiences.

The first lesson for me is that politics is not just about power (raw and unbridled) but it is really and mostly about ideology. The contest between Senator McCain and Senator Obama is, at its centre, a contest of ideology – conservatism or liberalism as defined by their political parties – the Republican Party and the Democratic Party. With all his charisma and eloquence, Obama would not have progressed very far if he did not subscribe to or support the Democratic Party ideology and policies. With all his war heroism and extensive political experience, McCain would be nowhere if he was outside the umbrella of the Republican ideological framework.

While both candidates have trumpeted their bi-partisan inclinations they have been very careful not to alienate themselves from the core values and principles of their parties. In fact the candidates have had to temper their more extreme inclinations and preferences to retain their core supporters. In Africa, politics is about power and success usually accrues to the one who holds the best levers – those who control the strongest or most vicious militia, those who have the most money to buy supporters and the ruling incumbents who are able to manipulate the electoral processes in their favour. There is thus a sense of disbelief if, after leveraging all such advantages, some candidates still lose elections and refuse to concede to the victors.

The issue of ideology will also help to limit the number of parties that contest elections – or at the very least limit the number of real competitive parties. In my view, one of the problems faced in African politics is that there are too many contenders for political positions and this provides the electorates with too many options much of which are not really different. In the circumstances, the prospects of making wrong choices multiply quite significantly. Under the western democratic systems, there are few parties in contention and this enables voters to make considered and informed decisions on whom they wish to elect.


Another thing that strikes me as highly admirable about the US elections is the degree of civility with which the contestants deal with each other. I struggle to appreciate the complaints being traded between the presidential contestants about negative campaigning. Much of what I have heard is pretty mild if not downright polite when compared with the viciousness with which elections are conducted in Africa. While personal insults are traded in abundance, it’s the naked intimidation and physical violence that is the central modus operandi of African politicians. The use of state security agencies by the incumbent government is very common while there is also rampant use of private militia and vigilantes to advance one’s political goals.

The violence is systematic and those who engage in it do so with a degree of impunity as the law enforcement agencies and the judiciary have been compromised. So when people go and vote, they are likely to make their choices out of fear of the possible repercussions and usually out of self-preservation motives. One outgoing president famously remarked in a recent election in an African country “This election is a do or die affair”. Such statements provide the licence to the brutality and deviousness with which elections are conducted.

An unfortunate outcome of this kind of approach to electioneering is that the loss of political power usually heralds the end of the road for the loosing party. The successor party will employ the very same methods to entrench themselves in power until some other party emerges to dethrone them. And so it goes on and on. If loosing parties, especially ruling parties, had realistic options of coming back into power in future they would be less inclined to resist election results which are not in their favour. In the UK, for example, after many years of Conservative rule under Mrs Thatcher and Mr Major, the Conservatives lost the 1997 elections to the Labour Party. After more than ten years in power the Conservatives look like they are on their way back, if recent polls and results from local government lections are accurate indicators. In the US, the Democrats have a more than fair chance of winning against the Republicans who have been ruling for eight eventful years.

There may be some gamesmanship and a certain level of rhetorical viciousness in the election campaigns between the competing candidates and their parties in the US but there is no “do or die” nonsense characteristic of elections in Africa. As I see it, in Africa politicians have a serious disrespect of the electorate. They do not accept or recognise that the citizens can and should exercise their own free will in deciding whom they want to rule over them. Our politicians believe that they can cheat, coerce, bribe and lie to get into power. With very few exceptions, no one takes notice of these shenanigans and life goes on. One irregular election is followed by another irregular election and by another – all with unfailing regularity.

While this entire tussle for power is going on, the continent is regressing. The level of poverty on the continent is escalating, social services are collapsing, economic development has stagnated and corruption is running rampart. To tackle these evils will demand a real paradigm shift in the manner in which the business of politics is transacted in Africa. There should be a migration from the politics of power to the politics of ideology.