Of Democratic Deficit, Reversals, and the Return of Coups in Africa

Western literature assumes that coups constitute the main reason for democratic reversals in Africa because they often end the democratic procedures for choosing leaders, as well as developing and managing public policy. Military takeovers also curtail the deliberation between the state and citizens. In some cases, coups are themselves a product of an erosion of democracy, at least in three ways. The first is creeping autocracy and aloofness of elected leaders often after a long period in power that generates popular discontent that invites the military to take over power. The second is the failure of democracy to build healthy civilian control over the military such that society reduces the politicisation of the military. The third is the failure of democracy to produce the development dividend, the choice dividend, resulting in choiceless and disempowering democracy. This chapter contends with conventional literature and suggests that the presumption conceptualising of military coups, in many instances, as democratic reversals, portrays an incomplete understanding of the relationship between coups and democratic consolidation.