Citation

Berg‐schlosser D. Eur. J. Polit. Res. 2008; 47(3): 269-306.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2008, John Wiley and Sons)

DOI

10.1111/j.1475-6765.2007.00768.x

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

This article, first, identifies democratic, authoritarian and ‘praetorian’ political system types in Africa on the basis of major current indicators. It then systematically tests a broad variety of hypotheses concerning the historical, social-structural, socio-economic, political and institutional determinants and performance characteristics of these system types. A macro-quantitative synopsis attempts to identify the most ‘parsimonious’ overall constellations of factors in this regard. This is supplemented by a macro-qualitative analysis of major ‘conjunctural’ conditions identifying the main groups of cases and their determining factors in a ‘contradiction-free’ manner. The conclusions point to the decisive importance of ‘governance’ aspects in the future.