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African Journal of Political Science
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Michigan State University. Libraries
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Nigeria
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- Description:
- This essay examines the causes and other factors which induce internal population displacement in Nigeria. It argues in opposition to traditional explanations that population displacement is a complex problem most often arising when the rights of a group are violated or denied; or when the physical security of members of the group is threatened. The nature of the state is a major causal factor inducing population displacement, especially where it is unable to ensure access for all its citizens or accord them adequate physical security.
- Date Issued:
- 1998-12-01T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- African Journal of Political Science
- Description:
- This essay addresses an important variable in Nigerian politics, namely, ethnicity and the ways in which it affects the conduct of national affairs. It represents an effort at theorizing the role and place of ethnicity in the transition from authoritarianism in a multi-ethnic setting such as that represented by Nigeria. Drawing on historical evidence on the ways in which ethnicity was constructed in colonial and post-colonial Nigeria as well as the wide literature on the subject, an attempt is made to demonstrate the centrality of the variable to Nigerian politics but without suggestion that it is the sole or most important determinant of political outcomes. Indeed, it is argued that there are other important variables, such as class, which not only affect the political process but also impinge on ethnicity. The ways in which ethnicity influences the different phases of the transition from authoritarianism are discussed drawing on the Nigerian experience.
- Date Issued:
- 2000-12-01T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- African Journal of Political Science
- Description:
- Military regimes in Nigeria exhibit patrimonial characteristics such as personal rule, absence of separation between the public and private realms, patron-client administrative networks, veneration of the ruler, massive corruption, ethnic/sectional-based support, and repression of opposition and violation of human rights. Most of the dangers posed by military rule to democracy is not really because of its intrinsic authoritarian posture, although it is the most perceptible. It is the patrimonial tendency in military rule that creates the most transcendent and pernicious effect on democracy because of unconcealed ethnic/sectional alignment of regimes. This generates inter-ethnic acrimony and rivalry, in effect, delegitimizes the state and state power, and consequently, engenders a hostile environment to the growth of democracy.
- Date Issued:
- 2000-06-01T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- African Journal of Political Science
- Date Issued:
- 2000-12-01T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- African Journal of Political Science
- Description:
- Three times has post colonial Nigeria tried to operate a democratic constitution; three times have these attempts generated centrifugal conflict. Defective constitutions, inherently corrupt politicians and class struggle as explanations have limited causal logic. The recurrence of conflict only under particular conditions has tended to indicate the validity of the structural explanation, and the phased succession a cyclical interpretation. How valid is the discernment of cycles in Nigeria's political history? If the claim that "historical events are unique" is not demonstrated to follow from the nature of events, that "history repeats itself" becomes an equally possible hypothesis. All history, therefore, is reasoned history. Yet, the phases of the Nigerian conflict cycle: Northern hegemony - Southern challenge (Crisis) - military rule, indicate a struggle to appropriate the state and reveal the existence of conflict units, the needs of which are usually sought and met in the same manner. Could these conflict cycles be said, therefore, to have immanent causes?
- Date Issued:
- 1998-12-01T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- African Journal of Political Science
- Description:
- This essay examines the role which the Nigerian media played in the transition from military rule to elected civilian government. It observes that the immediate political context of the transition was a post-Abacha liberalizing military administration as well as a resurgent civil society. This context meant that the media was able to play a relatively robust role in reporting and influencing the transition although the fact that the Abdulsalami Abubakar regime refused to repeal several "death decrees" targeted at the media remained a key constraining factor on the boldness and imaginativeness of the press in its reporting and monitoring of the transition. Furthermore, while the media, in all its plurality, offered coverage to all of the political parties, it was equally clear that the better financially-endowed People's Democratic Party (PDP) which also emerged as the dominant party was able to win greater advantage over the two other political parties, namely, the All People's Party and the Alliance for Democracy, through the purchase of advertisement space in the print and electronic media. On the whole, the Nigerian media played its role in the transition with credit and whatever weaknesses are observed in its performance and in the skewing of the outcomes of the transition owe more to the shallowness of the transition itself and less to the shortcomings of the media.
- Date Issued:
- 2000-12-01T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- African Journal of Political Science
7. Last card
- Description:
- This article critically examines the depth of the reforms and elections that underpinned Nigeria's recently concluded political transition. It also analyses the important challenges confronting democratic consolidation in the face of the "imperfect" nature of the political transition, revolutionary pressures from below and factional struggles within the hegemonic elite -- all of which have direct implications for the social contract and the national question. At the end it is argued that this transition is Nigeria's last chance -- and except it transfers real power to the Nigerian people, the current struggles could signpost grave portends for the Nigerian Project.
- Date Issued:
- 2000-12-01T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- African Journal of Political Science
- Description:
- Ethiopia has embarked upon what it claims to be a novel experiment in "ethnic federalism". The ruling Ethiopian Peoples' Revolutionary Democratic Front has asserted that it is intent on forthrightly addressing the claims of ethnic groups in the country of historic discrimination and inequality, and to build a multi-ethnic democracy. The essay critically assesses this effort, concentrating on the emerging relations between the federal and regional state governments. Particular attentionis given to the strategy of revenue sharing as a mechanism for addressing regional inequities. Where appropriate, comparisons are made with the federal system in Nigeria, Africa's most well-known federal system. The article concludes that, while there may be federal features and institutions normally found in democracies, Ethiopia has not constructed a system of democratic federalism. Moreover, rather than empowering citizens at the grassroots level, Ethiopia tightly controls development and politics through regional state governments, with very little popular decision making in the development process.
- Date Issued:
- 2002-06-01T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- African Journal of Political Science
- Description:
- This paper examines some of the dominant social movements in Nigerian politics since independence; the causes and character of the struggles waged by them - students, workers, peasants and the Nigerian Left. It argues that these struggles constitute the mainstream of the struggles of the popular masses and achieved significant political, social and economic results. They were however limited in their overall impact on the Nigerian political economy because they lacked unity and political largely as a result of the weakness of the Nigerian Left.
- Date Issued:
- 1996-12-01T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- African Journal of Political Science