Democratization in Sub-Saharan Africa : An Empirical Analysis

Abstract

This research attempts to find answers to the questions of why Sub-Saharan African countries vary greatly in their levels of democratic institutionalization even though their democratic transitions happened almost simultaneously. Do multi-party systems permitting competitive elections pave the way for democracy or is democratic institutionalization better explained by other structural attributes or variables? To this end, this research explores various factors to explain democratic processes in the Sub-Saharan region of Africa. The five major approaches to explaining democratization, which include modernization, elites, civil society, political culture, and international relations, are tested by analyzing empirically the data having to do with political development throughout the countries of Sub-Saharan Africa. From our analysis, we found that the two social variables of freedom of the press and corruption have more explanatory power for differing levels of democratization in the region.