“The Politics of Peace in Mozambique: Post-Conflict Democratization 1992-2000″, is by Carrie L. Manning, who spoke in our class this week.
The author elucidated something that many of us know intuitively but don’t always articulate our objection to. Manning wants the reader to understand that democracy is a process rather than an election.
In the introduction reference is made to the so-called “high order game” (Tsebelis). This is where the incentives of staying in the politics game are high, even as the risks of political participation are less and less. This situation in Mozambique was created by International Donors, the UN and other players who invested money, human capital and varied resources in making sure that the end of the war was final and that democracy took root (50%+ of Mozambique’s budget in 1999 was from international aid). Because of this investment the pressure and accountability from all sides (Renamo, Frelimo, Donors) became intensified and ‘constrained’ the actor’s ability to opt-out of the transition to a multi-party democracy.
Based on this “game”, Renamo and Frelimo have engaged with one another in a maturing and progressive way since the beginning of the end of their civil conflict in 1992. Manning says that this engagement – or negotiating process – will affect the actors faith in the process and their commitment to it without their having anticipated it.
In other words, democracy isn’t defined by having an election based on one-vote-per-citizen. It isn’t defined simply by the existence of a multi-party system. Rather, democracy is, and should be, a process rather than a term, a document, rhetoric. Manning asserts that in new democracies the electoral process is rather an opportunity to see the country’s faith in and commitment to the essential democratic institutions that will create the grounding for their continued maturity and development as a democratic state.
I like this phrase on page 17 of her book: “The question of how democracy might contribute to the resolution of civil war becomes less of a puzzle when one looks at democracy not as the outcome of years of political tolerance, moderation, and socioeconomic development, but as a system of institutionalized nonviolent conflict between organized political forces.”
Democracy has to be applied, understood, utilized differently in different contexts.
In Harry G. West’s book Kupilikula he quotes Cameroonian scholar Achille Mbembé as encouraging those studying democracy in Africa to think of ‘African languages of power’ — in this case, democracy interpreted through Mozambican reality. In Mozambique, democracy foremost is a way to maintain peace and manage conflict with weapons like: law, words, campaigns, elections, public opinion, political aggression…and not the physical brutality of the 80′s.
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Manning also spoke about the evolution of Renamo as an armed proxy army of South Africa, into a different entity that embodied rural grievances and the discontent of those disillusioned by Frelimo, the “New Man”, aldiamentos and perpetuation of ethnic oppression that eerily echoed Portuguese discrimination. Perhaps it was due to this evolution in Renamo’s composition that it was deemed appropriate to facilitate their transition into a democratic party.
Still…reading accounts of violence by the bandidos armados in the library today, I felt sick.
I am starting to get more and more interested in this election and what it means to Mozambicans.
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