Democratic Pluralism and Unconventional Political Participation: The Case of Africa
Jeff William Justice
Campbellsville University
Samuel S. Stanton, Jr.
Grove City College
Presented at the Annual Meeting of the Midwest Political Science Association
1-5 April 2009, Chicago, IL
Democratic Pluralism and Unconventional Political Participation: The Case of Africa
Russell Dalton’s Citizen Politics offers a wealth of theory regarding political culture and mass political participation. Among these is an investigation into protest politics, including the forms in which it may take and who is more likely than not to engage in such behavior. Among other things, he noted that those who adhere to post-materialist politics are among those who are most likely to protest. Other demographic factors affecting an increased likelihood of protest behavior include ideological position (the left wing is more likely to engage than the right), age (younger people are more likely, education (higher levels increase protest behavior likelihood), dissatisfaction with government (higher levels lead to increased protest activity), and group membership and party attachment (the presence of either increases protest likelihood).
While Dalton’s research on mass political behavior has spawned numerous papers, articles, and books – including this one – we also note that his work limits its geopolitical concentration primarily on developed states, particularly the United States, the United Kingdom, France, and Germany. With some developing states attempting to re-establish themselves as liberal democracies, it becomes useful to determine the utility of these models beyond the industrialized states that they now cover. To be sure, even in areas where the population appears to support democratization and democratic government, there can be groups that do not support such governance and that may make efforts to derail it. Additionally, political cultures in those areas might still find democratically-unconventional means of participation to be acceptable alternatives as forms of public expression, especially if they do not have a long history of democratic governance.
In this paper, we seek to extend these models to the politics of developing states, in this case those found in Africa. We concentrate on protest politics in this article, focusing on the forms of protest – or “unconventional” – political behavior, to see whether the model can be extended into developing regions. Using the Afrobarometer, we examine several African states in various stages of democratization and with varying degrees of democratic stability to test the external validity of this work. Since the most recent wave of the Afrobarometer asks only about protest marches, we will use this as our dependent variable in the models we test here.
Literature Review
In addition to the demographic factors noted above, Dalton’s findings illustrated one other concept that we must address here, and that is the existence of post-materialist ideology. Inglehart’s (1971, 1989, 1997, 2003); see also Inglehart & Flanagan, 1987; Abramson & Inglehart, 1987, 1995; Inglehart & Abramson, 1999) pioneering work in this area is quite well-known, suggesting that as those living in peaceful, materially-comfortable industrialized societies are increasingly likely to adopt an ideological position that he termed “the new left,” which would emphasize societal well-being, advancement of individual participation in society, and other issues beyond the “material.”
Inglehart asserted that post-materialists would not generally be found in developing societies, as those who were not materially well-to-do we were concerned with bread and butter issues such as putting food on the table, keeping a roof over their heads, and so forth. He also asserted that post-materialists would not be found within societies unless they had known peace for at least a generation, which is to say that there would need to be a generation that had never known times of struggle. Furthermore, he noted that post-materialists would always be a minority within any given industrialized society.
Dalton (2008) asserted that post-materialists would be more likely to engage in unconventional political participation than materialists, largely because of their minority position. With materialists being in the majority, they should have full access to a democratic political system and its institutions through linking institutions, to include political parties, interest groups, and the media. Post-materialists, however, would have far greater difficulty accessing the formal institutions of a given political system, owing to their minority position within society. This would make it numerically difficult to gain representation in any democratic institutions, such as national parliaments, even if they were to be represented through political parties or other such linking institutions.
What is painfully obvious is that unconventional participation is not entirely driven by post-materialist ideology, and there can be no doubt that such behavior does exist in developing countries. For instance, the international press reported on a high level of social unrest and violence in the wake of the disputed presidential election in Kenya in 2007, and we also have the constant barrage of stories emanating from Zimbabwe relating to continued political unrest there as a result of persistent allegations of rigging of democratic elections and political violence directed at opposition party supporters. Despite multiple criticisms of Inglehart’s theory, Dalton went with his version of it in his explanation for the factors that lead to unconventional political participation. For sake of simplicity as well as replication, we will go with it as well. Hence, it is our expectation that post-materialism will not drive the unconventional participation that does exist in Africa, even if it is present all.
We are not of the opinion, despite our position on post-materialist values in the African context, that it is totally invalid. We do believe – and the prior literature supports this – that other factors that Dalton postulated as positively correlated to increasing the likelihood of unconventional behavior will continue to hold true in developing areas. We do not necessarily take the point that post-materialist attitudes are completely irrelevant, even if – as we expect – they are nearly absent. One of Inglehart’s key positions that a person on his “new left” will hold is a desire to increase people’s voice in their society. Democracy has the ability to do this, seeing as it is a pluralistic form of governance, and so we will assert that the degree of pluralism in a given polity will influence the likelihood of unconventional behavior. We will address this matter first and then turn our attention to the thrust of Dalton’s theory.
Lijphart (1999) wrote that the most effective form of democratic government is one that allows a wider variety of voices, opinions, and positions to be heard. Majoritarian systems tend to stifle the people in that they only allow a scant few groupings to have access to representation in democratic institutions. Anderson and Guillory (1997, see also Griffith, Plamenatz, & Pennock, 1956; Anderson & Tverdova, 2001) built on this hypothesis and found that those who are on the losing end of democratic processes can develop negative attitudes toward democratic governance. Conversely, systems with more inclusive representational arrangements and more opportunities for government-by-consensus tend to have higher degrees of supportive attitudes toward democracy.
Gurr and Moore (1997) go so far as to suggest that the mere presence of democracy can depress the likelihood of protest behavior, particularly if it is able to permeate throughout a given society. Presumably, democracy gives groups with a grievance the means of air it. When democracy is not present or it is present, but the group-at-hand does not have access to representation in it, protest behavior becomes more likely. Lindburg and Moore (2008) note that this is especially true in Africa. So long as a democratic regime is able to deliver good government and, thus, gain legitimacy, it should not have to worry about coup attempts from the military or others. Matlosa (2007) wrote that African democratization must co-exist with development, and that the entire process must be pluralistic and de-politicized in order to have any chance at success.
Not everyone agrees that democracy and pluralism can be used to foster peaceful relationships. Inglehart counters the above to an extent in a work in which he notes that democratization and democracy itself is not necessarily about the expression by the masses, but rather it is a system established by and through political élites (2003). Bratton and van de Walle (1992; see also Griffith, Plamenatz, & Pennock, 1956) similarly noted that élite behavior is what drives protest politics among the masses. Whenever corruption exists among élites, it can be a catalyst to escalation of protest behavior, particularly when a political system is orchestrated in such a manner – such as a single-party system – to keep those who have political power in power. Justice (2005) found that when groups lose confidence in democratic institutions and find that they have no other way to make their voices heard, they will support political organizations willing to resort to unconventional or even destructive means to promote their political agenda, particularly those on the left wing and those with post-materialist leanings.
Saith (2007) also raised doubts about the benefits of democracy, asserting that there must be a “reservoir of social capital” present in order for it to successfully exist and questioning whether such a reservoir ever existed in Africa. Of particular note, Saith wrote that African democracies were protected from neither internal nor external pressures that could serve to destabilize them. Similarly, Sorenson (1993) collapsed Dahl’s eight classical criteria for democratization to solidify into three broader criteria, among those being the need for high levels of pluralism, respect for civil liberties involving free expression, and fair competition among those involved in the process. Saith doubted that such conditions could be fulfilled, as African political élites tended to exclude potential threats from political systems and stifled people’s ability to speak freely.
Spiro (1994) also argues against democracy as a stabilizing force that brings peace, suggesting that neo-Kantian literature saying that democracy does equate to peace is based on flawed methodology that does not take into account a relative dearth of dyads controlling for democratic-democratic state pairings. While Spiro takes his argument from a state-as-an-actor perspective, one could draw from this the inference that having a democratic state does not guarantee internal peace, either. Skocpol (1988) wrote on international implications of internal conflict, postulating that revolutions and other forms of disruptive political participation can lead to opportunities for neighboring states, not to mention their tendency to spill over national borders.
Turning now to the demographic features Dalton raised beyond ideology, much has been writing about the impact that educational levels have on political behavior. He noted that the presence of higher levels of education improved the likelihood of not only unconventional participation, but of conventional means as well, and literature examining the impact of education on political participation in developing states corroborates this theory. He also found that protest behavior tends to be the purview of younger citizens and those who claim group membership. Political efficacy, however, was not a consistently significant predictor of protest behavior, according to his work.
As a point-in-case, Nayek (1970) examined the political situation in India during the 1960s, with an emphasis on the behavior of university students. He found that educational levels do correlate to increased political awareness and desire to take the political initiative, and that pluralistic, inclusive discussions regarding political institutions lessened the likelihood of protest behavior among student populations. Speaking in the African context, Wade (2007) argued that education is critical for democratic government to succeed, in that it builds a sense of trust in others, which leads, in turn, to a greater faith in democracy and its institutions.
Hypotheses
Based on previous research on unconventional political behavior and consideration of the African context, we offer nine (9) hypotheses. These hypotheses consider the dynamics of the relationship between various factors of democratic pluralism and unconventional political behavior. Pacific democratic society requires citizens understand democracy, participate in democratic behaviors, believe in the efficacy of political competition, be generally satisfied with democracy, and agree that laws are generally useful means of governing and solving societal problems. So, in addition to offering a number of hypotheses, we group them according to these principals.
As we mentioned earlier we are considering protest behavior as the primary means of unconventional participation, and this serves as the dependent phenomenon in our hypotheses. We fully recognize that other forms of unconventional political participation exist, upto and including violent political behavior. However, we choose to focus our work on the highest form of non-violent, unconventional political participation for two reasons. One reason is practical—namely that available data lends itself to studying this form of unconventional behavior. The second reason is we are not studying causes of violent behavior, which is studied in detail in the conflict processes, particularly civil war and ethnic conflict literature.
Hypothesis one deals with understanding democracy. As people gain greater understanding of democracy and realize that greater personal liberty comes with democracy we should expect them to be more willing to engage in unconventional participation.
H1: As the level of understanding democracy increases, unconventional political
behavior increases.
Hypothesis set two (H2) deals with participation in democratic behaviors. The primary form of participation in democracy by citizens is voting. We recognize in our hypotheses that voting is often accompanied by perception of the fairness of the election, so we test both actual voting and perception of fairness in elections. We generally regard unconventional behavior as decreasing when political participation increases.
H2: Where voting increases, unconventional political behavior decreases;
H2a: Where fairness of elections increases, unconventional behavior decreases.
Hypothesis set three (H3) examines the perception of efficacy regarding democracy. We consider the general support for democracy among people, the perception of democracy’s extent in a country, the satisfaction with democracy, and perception of the relationship of party competition to conflict in relationship to unconventional behavior. Our general proposal in this area is when efficacy increases, unconventional behavior decreases.
H3: When support for democracy increases, unconventional behavior decreases;