Home pagePress CenterIn the Media Stephen Morrison, director of the CSIS Africa Program, was quoted by the Los Angeles Times, "Democracy is Losing Ground in Africa."
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Stephen Morrison, director of the CSIS Africa Program, was quoted by the Los Angeles Times, "Democracy is Losing Ground in Africa."
Election-related meltdowns in Zimbabwe and Kenya are stark reminders of democracy's fragile foothold in Africa, experts say, despite years of financial and diplomatic investment by the United States and other Western nations.
A combination of challenges unique to the continent, including worsening poverty and inconsistent international engagement, is blamed for fueling a string of setbacks. After some progress in the early 1990s, once-promising governments have regressed, particularly around election time.
"Overall, the continent has had a deflation of strong democratic leadership in recent years," said J. Stephen Morrison, Africa director at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. "In some places we are seeing that autocratic pseudo-democracies have formed." Read the article
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