Development as a collective action problem: Addressing the real challenges of African governance

There is growing expert consensus that the better government that sub-Saharan Africa needs is not so easily identified with the usual concept of good governance. For some years, there have been calls for governance reforms to be based not on Northern ‘best practices’ but on case-by-case diagnostics, so that the priorities and modalities attain a ‘good fit’ with the particular needs and possibilities of specific countries.