The Chadian Party System: Rhetoric and Reality

In Chad a pluralist system of political parties rather than factions has been over a decade in gestation. After an examination of the background to Chad's democratic transition, the rules governing party formation are considered and the relative implantation of the five main parties assessed. The performance of the parties in the two sets of elections held since President Idriss Deby came to power in 1990 is outlined and evaluated. A final analysis considers five potential functions that Chadian parties might perform to contribute to democratic consolidation: representation, conflict resolution, making government accountable, institutionalizing democracy and regime legitimization. It concludes that Chadian parties remain personalist, regional and ideologically shallow. Many parties retain factional tendencies and the return to a politico-military posture remains an option.