Parliaments in Africa: Representative Institutions in the Land of the ‘Big Man’

Abstract

This paper analyses the perceptions among survey participants, of African parliaments and presidents and examines their citizens' attitudes towards the coexistence of these two institutions. It aims to determine the way citizens rate their parliaments compared with their presidents. It further seeks to answer the question of whether Africa remains the continent of the 'big man', where absolute power lies with an individual, feeding clientelistic relationships. In the decades following the transitions to independence, most of the continent was marked by a proliferation of monoparty regimes; in many cases, these were almost one-man regimes. A majority of the leaders symbolised, at an early stage of independence, the birth of the nation itself. Many times these presidents have sought to extend their incumbency perpetually. However, over the last two decades this scenario has changed considerably. Monoparty parliaments have been replaced by multiparty parliaments and executives, and presidents have found themselves needing to share their leadership of the nation with parliamentarians. Not much is known about how these emerging parliaments have been operating, but the little that is known tells us that they have faced a lack of institutionalisation and still struggle to assert their independence from strong executives. It is therefore reasonable to expect that parliaments will be perceived as dormant institutions in the public eye.

A Systems Thinking Perspective on Evidence Use in Parliaments

“…Africa, parliaments are reclaiming power from years of one-party states and dictatorships which left them weak and incapable of holding the executive arm of government to scrutiny and account (Cohen, 2019). Various studies have shown that because of local and international pressure to democratise, parliaments on the African continent are becoming more assertive and more involved in scrutinising government policies and expenditure (Azevedo-Harman, 2011;Draman, Titriku, Lampo, Hayter & Holden, 2017;Adar, 2018;Notshulwana & Lebakeng, 2019).…”

“…Institutions act as filters of evidence which is produced and presented to members of parliament. The institutional filters act in two ways: they can encourage evidence that supports existing institutionalised political ideas (or 'policy paradigms') or they can block evidence that could transform institutional political ideas that may present new challenges (Azevedo-Harman, 2011;Parkhurst, 2017). The authors argue that in some cases, institutional filters influence role players such as evidence producers (including internal parliamentary staff and external producers)…”