Hessenberg-Sobolev matrices and Favard type theorem

We study the relation between certain non-degenerate lower Hessenberg infinite matrices G and the existence of sequences of orthogonal polynomials with respect to Sobolev inner products. In other words, we extend the well-known Favard theorem for Sobolev orthogonality. We characterize the structure of the matrix G and the associated matrix of formal moments MG in terms of certain matrix operators.The research of I. Pérez-Yzquierdo was partially supported by Fondo Nacional de Innovación y Desarrollo Científico y Tecnológico (FONDOCYT), Dominican Republic, under grant 2016-2017-080 No. 013-2018. The authors thank the reviewers for theirs constructive comments and suggestions that helped to improve the clarity of this manuscript. Open Access funding provided thanks to the CRUE-CSIC agreement with Springer Nature

Dilemmas of Military Disengagement and Democratization in Africa

Summary This article contends that one of the first tasks of new African democracies is to bring military establishments under democratic control. Although it might seem armies are now in retreat from politics, this has been ‘demilitarization by default’, resulting from economic and fiscal retrenchment and massive cuts in external military assistance, rather than from considered policy choices. Those attempting to tame the armed forces permanently face a series of dilemmas: for instance how to discourage reinstitutionalization of repressive governance behind ‘democratic’ forms; how to implement cuts, without further damaging the morale and effectiveness of the armed forces; and how to demobilize troops without worsening unemployment or proliferating private armies beyond the control of the state. RESUME Les dilemmes présentés par le désengagement militaire et la démocratisation en Afrique L'auteur de cet article affirme que l'une des toutes premières tâches des démocraties nouvelles en Afrique serait d'amener les établissements militaires sous le contrôle démocratique. Même s'il peut sembler que les armées veuillent se retirer du sphère politique il ne s'agirait vraisemblablement que d'une ‘démilitarisation par défaut’, résultant à la fois d'un retrenchement économique et fiscal et aussi, des très considérables réductions dans l'assistance militaire de provenance extérieure, plutôt que l'effet de schoix politiques réfléchis. Ceux qui voudraient maîtriser les forces armées de manière plus permanente font face à une série de dilemmes, à savoir: comment décourager la réinstitutionalisation de la gouvernance répressive sous guise ‘démocratique’; comment instaurer des compressions budgétaires sans toutefois porter d'entraves encore plus sévères au moral et à l'efficacité des forces armées; et comment démobiliser les troupes sans empirer le chômage ni faire proliférer les armées privées au?delà du contrôle de l'état. RESUMEN Dilemas de la desmilitarización y la democratización en el África El artículo sostiene que una de las tareas prioritarias de las nuevas democracias africanas es poner a las organizaciones militares bajo su control. Aunque en apariencia los ejércitos se han retirado de la política, no es sino una desmilitarización por defecto, resultante de una racionalización fiscal y económica y de cortes masivos en la asistencia militar externa, más que de una decisión consciente y deliberada. Quienes quieren mantener a las fuerzas armadas bajo control se enfrentan a una serie de dilemas, por ejemplo, cómo impedir la reinstitucionalización de gobiernos represivos de apariencia democrática, cómo implementar recortes presupuestarios sin perjudicar más la moral y la efectividad de las fuerzas armadas, y como desmovilizar a las tropas sin aumentar el desempleo o ayudar a la proliferación de ejércitos privados fuera del control del Estado

The Strategic Shuffle: Ethnic Geography, the Internal Security Apparatus, and Elections in Kenya

For autocrats facing elections, officers in the internal security apparatus play a crucial role by engaging in coercion on behalf of the incumbent. Yet reliance on these officers introduces a principal‐agent problem: Officers can shirk from the autocrat’s demands. To solve this problem, autocrats strategically post officers to different areas based on an area’s importance to the election and the expected loyalty of an individual officer, which is a function of the officer’s expected benefits from the president winning reelection. Using a data set of 8,000 local security appointments within Kenya in the 1990s, one of the first of its kind for any autocracy, I find that the president’s coethnic officers were sent to, and the opposition’s coethnic officers were kept away from, swing areas. This article demonstrates how state institutions from a country’s previous authoritarian regime can persist despite the introduction of multi‐party elections and thus prevent full democratization.Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/136510/1/ajps12279_am.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/136510/2/ajps12279.pd

High stakes and low bars: How international recognition shapes the conduct of civil wars

When rebel groups engage incumbent governments in war for control of the state, questions of international recognition arise. International recognition determines which combatants can draw on state assets, receive overt military aid, and borrow as sovereigns—all of which can have profound consequences for the military balance during civil war. How do third-party states and international organizations determine whom to treat as a state's official government during civil war? Data from the sixty-one center-seeking wars initiated from 1945 to 2014 indicate that military victory is not a prerequisite for recognition. Instead, states generally rely on a simple test: control of the capital city. Seizing the capital does not foreshadow military victory. Civil wars often continue for many years after rebels take control and receive recognition. While geopolitical and economic motives outweigh the capital control test in a small number of important cases, combatants appear to anticipate that holding the capital will be sufficient for recognition. This expectation generates perverse incentives. In effect, the international community rewards combatants for capturing or holding, by any means necessary, an area with high concentrations of critical infrastructure and civilians. In the majority of cases where rebels contest the capital, more than half of its infrastructure is damaged or the majority of civilians are displaced (or both), likely fueling long-term state weakness

Strategic satisficing : civil-military relations and French intervention in Africa

Few issues are more important yet less understood than outside interventions in intra-state conflicts. Under what circumstances do intervening states further their interests and when, contrarily, do they plunge into quagmires? France is a critical case. It is, statistically, the world’s second intervenor and earned the sobriquet of Africa’s gendarme through frequent interventions in African wars. The ability of such a medium-sized state to intervene with greater regularity and ostensible success than larger powers raises questions about how France manages its interventions. Do French interventions draw on the French Army’s distinctive “school” of population-centric counterinsurgency, which emphasizes the need to militarize governance in pursuit of comprehensive victories? Or do the French Fifth Republic’s civil-military institutions encourage policymakers to carefully regulate force’s employment in pursuit of limited ends? This study draws on declassified archives to test which approach most characterizes French interventions. To preview my conclusions, strategic satisficing—the use of minimal force for short durations to produce satisfactory outcomes—distinguishes the Fifth Republic’s interventions from other powers’ practices and prior French counterinsurgencies. This particular form of interventionism enables France to influence a disproportionately large number of intra-state conflicts and maintain a network of security agreements with African states.PostprintPeer reviewe

Togo: Thorny transition and misguided aid at the roots of economic misery

The parliamentary elections of October 2007, the first free Togolese elections since decades, were meant to correct at least partially the rigged presidential elections of 2005. Western donors considered it as a litmus test of despotic African regimes’ propensity to change towards democratization and economic prosperity. They took Togo as model to test their approach of political conditionality of aid, which had been emphasised also as corner stone of the joint EU-Africa strategy. Empirical findings on the linkage between democratization and economic performance are challenged in this paper because of its basic data deficiencies. It is open to question, whether Togo’s expected economic consolidation and growth will be due to democratization of its institutions or to the improved external environment, notably the growing competition between global players for African natural resources