Africa Archive

The deadly conflict in South Sudan, itself the culmination of a long-running power struggle within the ruling Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, is increasingly drawing in neighboring countries driven by disparate security and economic interests, further complicating the crisis and efforts to reach a resolution. The U.N. has accused both sides of South Sudan’s split of committing human rights abuses in the conflict, which has so far claimed an unknown number of lives, displaced an estimated 900,000 people both inside and outside the country and shows no signs of letting up. An agreement to cease hostilities was violated even before its […]

When Meles Zenawi, Ethiopia’s leader of more than 20 years, died in August 2012, many anticipated significant and potentially destabilizing change. Past political transitions in Addis Ababa had been violent and settled at the barrel of the gun, so the precedents were worrisome. Meles’ eulogies emphasized his individual brilliance and his personal role in bringing development to the modern Ethiopian state. What would happen with the strongman gone? Could the strong and effective authoritarian developmental party-state engineered under Meles’ leadership sustain itself without him? Instead of instability, the ruling Ethiopian Peoples’ Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) quickly moved Deputy Prime Minister […]

Since the early 2000s, Algerian politics have been generally understood as a behind-the-scenes struggle between, on one hand, President Abdelaziz Bouteflika and his regional and administrative allies and, on the other, the military intelligence service chief, Mohammed “Tewfik” Mediene. Over the past several months, however, Algeria’s deep politics have risen to the surface, exposing the main fault lines between the country’s most powerful political camps. With the April presidential election approaching, Algeria’s elite appears locked in dispute at the highest levels. Proponents of a fourth term for the aging and ailing Bouteflika are charging ahead, while his institutional rivals are […]

In theory, South Africa’s national and provincial elections, to be held on May 7, should give the opposition its best opportunity to date to erode support for the African National Congress (ANC) and to advance a realignment of South African politics. The ANC has had a difficult and unsuccessful period in government since the 2009 election, beset by problems of leadership, internecine strife, countless corruption scandals, confusion over economic policy and daily “service delivery” protests. The country’s post-1994 nadir came in August 2012 with the killing by police of 34 striking miners, a tipping point for many who had previously […]

The most recent replenishment of the World Bank’s International Development Association, a fund through which the bank provides grants and loans to poor countries, involved attempts to enlist more support from the so-called emerging donors—developing countries that have only recently begun giving aid to other developing countries. In an email interview, Sadika Hameed, who works with the Project on Prosperity and Development at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, explained how developing countries contribute to each other’s economic growth through trade and aid. WPR: What has been the recent trajectory of “South-South” trade? Sadika Hameed: Following the financial crisis […]

With growth still lagging after the financial crisis, countries in the developed and developing worlds alike are looking to new trade agreements, closer financial integration and reforms to global economic governance to raise their economic outlooks. This WPR special report looks at the prospects for the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, the Pacific Alliance and the future of the dollar, among other topics, through articles published in the past year. Trade and Integration Opportunity Knocks for Obama on TradeBy Edward AldenJan. 8, 2013 With TPP and TTIP, U.S. and EU Reassert Control Over Rules of Global TradeBy […]

What do you see when you look at the Central African Republic (CAR)? The crisis in the previously largely unknown former French colony is becoming a Rorschach test for international policymakers. Few would deny that the CAR has endured a hellish breakdown of basic order that has claimed at least 2,000 lives and forced a quarter of the country’s 4 million citizens from their homes. But is this simply a humanitarian disaster that needs to be stopped through rapid military action? Or is it a case of a failed state that demands a long-term effort to rebuild the government’s capacity […]