Benin continues to slide toward autocracy
Benin’s April 11 elections have many analysts increasingly concerned that the country is following a recent pattern of democratic decline in Africa. In 1991, Benin was the first former dictatorship to hold multiparty elections in Africa’s post-Cold War wave of democratization. According to one measure of democracy — the “two-turnover test” — Benin consolidated its democracy in 1996, when a second incumbent president lost reelection.
Political scientists define democracy as a system with contested elections — which means the opposition has some chance of winning. That wasn’t the case in Benin, where President Patrice Talon took steps to ensure his victory before a single vote was cast last month.… Seguir leyendo »