Democratic resilience in Africa: elections, opposition, and social movements

In the last decade, a consensus has emerged that we are now witnessing a global democratic decline. The democratic backsliding consensus is also extended to the African continent. Reflecting global trends, African incumbent leaders have strategically used the law and courts to control the contestation for power and participation, and also used sovereigntist claims to shield themselves from external scrutiny and pressures. But, three decades into the continent's multiparty era, politics in the region reflect a status quo: Democratic levels have largely remained the same since the 1990s. Seeking to explain this equilibrium of partial democratization, we revisit the arguments of “democratization by elections” and link the focus on elections to the study of social movements. Addressing cases that have experienced episodic challenges of autocratization, we argue that the routinization of elections has contributed to building democratic resilience against the autocratic ambitions of incumbents. Competitive elections provide a formal mechanism for translating the demands of social movements into political change, fostering greater accountability and institutional adaptability. Our analysis shows that social movements emerge in response to these episodic challenges of autocratization and that they – in doing so – strategically borrow from past movements while employing symbolic resonance to mobilize and sustain participation.