Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- Notes on Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Chronology of the Fourth Republic
- List of Abbreviations
- Foreword: Democratization and Nigeria's Fourth Republic: Successes and Challenges
- Nigeria's Fourth Republic: An Introduction
- PART I Democracy and the Nigerian State
- PART II Party Politics, the Presidency, and the International Community
- PART III The Political Economy: Oil and Economic Reforms
- PART IV Electoral Governance, Civil-Political Society, and Conflict
- Afterword: Nigeria's Long Search for a Viable Political Order
- Bibliography
- Index
Foreword: Democratization and Nigeria's Fourth Republic: Successes and Challenges
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 March 2024
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- Notes on Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Chronology of the Fourth Republic
- List of Abbreviations
- Foreword: Democratization and Nigeria's Fourth Republic: Successes and Challenges
- Nigeria's Fourth Republic: An Introduction
- PART I Democracy and the Nigerian State
- PART II Party Politics, the Presidency, and the International Community
- PART III The Political Economy: Oil and Economic Reforms
- PART IV Electoral Governance, Civil-Political Society, and Conflict
- Afterword: Nigeria's Long Search for a Viable Political Order
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
The theme of this book is a very important one. All over the world, democracy seems to be facing an existential crisis. In his latest book, Ill Winds: Saving Democracy from Russian Rage, Chinese Ambition, and American Complacency, Larry Diamond captures the essence of this crisis. He writes:
After three decades in which democracy was spreading and another in which it was stagnating and slowly eroding, we are now witnessing a global retreat from freedom. In every region of the world, autocrats are seizing the initiative, democrats are on the defensive, and the space for competitive politics and free expression is shrinking. Established democracies are facing relentless scandals, sweeping citizen disaffection, and existential threats to their survival (Diamond 2019b: 11).
There is no Nigerian exceptionalism to the picture painted by Diamond, but the Nigerian picture exemplifies why democracy is a journey full of potholes, hills, valleys, and undulating lands rather than a destination with a clear roadmap.
In the period preceding Nigeria's transition to democracy in 1999, especially since the annulment of the 12 June 1993 election, I spent my time literally at the barricades, seeking to democratize and humanize power in Nigeria. In the last decade, I have become one of many placed in positions of power, holding power in trust, and seeking to deploy power in the service of public good. Therefore, in addressing the question of successes and failures of Nigerian democracy in the last two decades, my reflections really centre around understanding the relationship between fighting against and fighting for. While much of what we did during the years of the democracy struggle was constructed as a struggle against unaccountable power, it was also a struggle for accountable power, a struggle for life, for liberty and for the pursuit of happiness – as the American credo would have it. Our resistance at the barricades was consequently not only to stop power from violating the commonwealth and the people's will, but also one geared towards putting it in the service of the common good to create a life more abundant.
The context and process of that journey to democratization is, however, as important as the eventual outcome.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Democracy and Nigeria's Fourth RepublicGovernance, Political Economy, and Party Politics 1999-2023, pp. xxxix - liiiPublisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2023