Emerging legislature or rubber stamp? The South African national assembly after ten years of democracy

This paper examines the role of the South African National Assembly in comparative perspective by discussing the experience of the Assembly since 1994 in comparison to the development of legislative institutions elsewhere in Africa. The paper thus begins with an overview of seven sets of variables that seem to drive the process of legislative development across the continent, and then turns to the South African case. The “conventional wisdom” (CW) on the National Assembly—usually by observers who have spent little time at Parliament—is that the body is little more than a rubber stamp of the ruling African National Congress. The paper explores the validity of this view concluding that it is not inaccurate—to a degree. The combination of ANC’s supra majority, its organisational culture and modus operandi, and South Africa’s system of proportional representation all reduce the independence of the legislature. The paper then examines five dimensions of the legislative process and argues that the CW reflects only part of the reality. The National Assembly is not a mere rubber stamp. More interesting from a theoretical perspective, the same variables that facilitate or undermine the emergence of the legislature as an institution of countervailing power elsewhere in Africa, apply to the South African case as well

Why CDFs in Africa?: representation vs. constituency service

Since 2002, constituency development funds (CDFs) have been established in nine African countries, and another two countries have created “approximations” of CDFs in that they address the perceived need by members of the legislature for budgeted funds to spend on the development of the districts they represent. Thus, just under one-quarter of the 48 countries in sub-Saharan Africa have adopted some type of CDF. In this paper, we consider three alternative explanations for the apparent popularity of CDFs. Using data from the African Legislature Project and Afrobarometer, we find that the best account of the rise of CDFs is that while MP rightly perceive the need to maintain close contact with their constituents, they wrongly believe that their constituents look to them mainly for “pork.” Instead, African constituents’ primary expectations of their MP is that they regularly visit the district to learn what is on their minds, and to then quite literally “re-present” or transmit these views back to the central government via the legislature. In other words, while citizens desire stronger representation of their needs at the centre, MPs respond by delivering services and favours at the periphery (i.e. the district) thinking mistakenly that the CDFs are the answer to what the public wants. We also find little evidence of “good governance” advocates that CDFs lead to increased corruption or entrench MPs in office

Politics and the peasantry in Kenya: the lessons of Harambee

As anyone familiar with Kenya knows, Harambee, or self-help is a pervasive phenomenon which engages just about all rural dwellers, many city dwellers, most politicians and many state personnel. The widespread popularity and political significance of self-help has been documented in the literature for over a decade. Most studies, however, have assumed a rather homogeneous peasantry, and failed to examine the differential popularity of self-help in terms of the varying material circumstances of different strata within the Kenyan peasantry. This essay is addressed to the neglected question of what, precisely, is the social base of self-help. Based on survey research data from 2,075 respondents in seven districts, this paper argues that Harambee is particularly popular among "small" and "middle" peasants - those who own between one and ten acres of land. The paper further argues that the landless obtain benefits from Harambee projects as virtual "free riders" while "rich" peasants (those owning more than twenty acres) subsidize the poorer elements of the community through what is in effect a progressive form of local taxation. Whether "rich" peasants support Harambee, to the extent of their ability to pay, however, is an unresolved question

"Hometown" voluntary associations, local development and the emergence of civil society in Western Nigeria

This paper examines the membership and activities of one type of intermediary organization, the "hometown" voluntary association in the context of Western Nigeria, with the purpose of extending our understanding of the significance of these organizations for the process of local development and for the evolution of civil society and state society relations. Through a detailed examination of the membership, activities, internal structure, and external linkages of three hometown associations, we shall delineate the importance of similar organizations in rural communities across the continent

The African Legislatures Project: First Findings

This report presents the "first findings" from the African Legislatures Project or ALP. The report is based on the preliminary coding and analysis of data obtained from research in six countries-Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia, Namibia and South Africa (MP survey findings from South Africa are not presented as that element of the project is still in progress). Because the purpose of ALP is to achieve a comparative understanding of legislative institutions across Africa, and is funded from multiple sources, we have adopted the practice of including data from as many countries as possible when we present findings from the project. Field research for ALP began in late February 2008 and is expected to continue through the end of 2010 as the work proceeds seriatim in 18 African countries

Metabolomics as a Hypothesis-Generating Functional Genomics Tool for the Annotation of Arabidopsis thaliana Genes of “Unknown Function”

Metabolomics is the methodology that identifies and measures global pools of small molecules (of less than about 1,000 Da) of a biological sample, which are collectively called the metabolome. Metabolomics can therefore reveal the metabolic outcome of a genetic or environmental perturbation of a metabolic regulatory network, and thus provide insights into the structure and regulation of that network. Because of the chemical complexity of the metabolome and limitations associated with individual analytical platforms for determining the metabolome, it is currently difficult to capture the complete metabolome of an organism or tissue, which is in contrast to genomics and transcriptomics. This paper describes the analysis of Arabidopsis metabolomics data sets acquired by a consortium that includes five analytical laboratories, bioinformaticists, and biostatisticians, which aims to develop and validate metabolomics as a hypothesis-generating functional genomics tool. The consortium is determining the metabolomes of Arabidopsis T-DNA mutant stocks, grown in standardized controlled environment optimized to minimize environmental impacts on the metabolomes. Metabolomics data were generated with seven analytical platforms, and the combined data is being provided to the research community to formulate initial hypotheses about genes of unknown function (GUFs). A public database (www.PlantMetabolomics.org) has been developed to provide the scientific community with access to the data along with tools to allow for its interactive analysis. Exemplary datasets are discussed to validate the approach, which illustrate how initial hypotheses can be generated from the consortium-produced metabolomics data, integrated with prior knowledge to provide a testable hypothesis concerning the functionality of GUFs