Pauline H. Baker is associate director of the Congressional Program at the Aspen Institute in Washington, D.C., and has conducted extensive research on South Africa.
Fifteen years after the wave of democratization crested in Africa, the region still grapples with an economic malaise that is disappointing popular expectations and undermining the legitimacy of electoral regimes.
In Africa today, investment flows in and civil societies grow stronger, yet many of the continent's leaders continue to behave autocratically, defending their privileges against the spread of law-based rule.
Malawi is a “hard place” for democracy—its economy struggles and state capacity is weak. So how has it avoided the pitfalls that have doomed so many others?
