When analysing the implosion of political space and the rupture of social stability which has characterised the course of African history in recent years, there has too often been a tendency to focus attention on institutions, structures, and politicans. Whilst these are obviously important, such an approach tends to obscure the groundswell of new and yet barely understood social changes. Yet given that the ‘politicians’ seem unable to advance the process in which so many people have invested so much, many observers feel the need to explore alternative sources of dynamism. This is largely the reason for the current interest in the notion of ‘civil society’ which has recently become fashionable in the often cloistered world of African studies.

Prospects for political change figure prominently on the research agenda in sub-Saharan Africa, and in current debates within individual countries. Democracy is advocated not only as a goal in itself, since it is also frequently argued that elections and openness are required to make governments really responsive to the needs of the population and properly accountable for their actions. In addition, greater transparency is held to be necessary in order to make the public service behave in accordance with bureaucratic norms. Although the general principles of responsiveness, accountability, and transparency are embraced by a large number of scholars and observers of the African scene as a means of countering the detrimental effects of clientelism and personalistic rule, important nuances are found in the literature with regard to the way in which democracy is perceived to facilitate economic development in general, and presently needed reforms in particular.

On 8 and 9 April 1995, Zimbabweans turned out for an election that mostly was not. As many as 55 of the 120 parliamentary seats open for contestation had already been decided for the Zimbabwe African National Union (Patriotic Front), because the six opposition parties of the moment did not put up candidates for them. ZANU PF could also count on another 30 parliamentarians: 12 non-constituency members, to be appointed by the President of Zimbabwe, as well as the eight provincial governors; and ten chiefs elected by local chiefs, all beholden to the ruling party for carrying forward traditional powers to the post- independence era. In other words, ZANU PF was sure of obtaining 85 of the 150 seats in the House of Assembly before a single ballot was cast in the 1995 elections.

Domestic policy inadequacies have been targeted by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) as the main reason for poor economic performance in sub-Saharan Africa generally.1 The structural adjustment programmes (SAPs) sponsored by these international financial institutions (IFIs) over the past decade have sought to rectify such policies. But many countries following their advice have continued to experience economic decline, albeit according to the World Bank, as a result primarily of their failure to properly implement the recommended reforms. It was argued in the late 1980s and early 1990S that governments pursuing strong adjustment programmes, even in the face of inhospitable world economic conditions, still outperformed weak reformers.2 This analysis does not hold with the same weight for all African countries. In the case of Guinea, external factors have been equally important in explaining its economic record under adjustment.

Two conventions tend to shape appraisals of the Belgian Congo and the manner of its decolonisation. The first describes the colonial power structure as an alliance of state, church, and large corporations.1 This trinity was ‘not only… a virtually seamless web’, writes Crawford Young, ‘but each component, in its area of activity, was without peer in Africa in the magnitude of its impact’.2 The second convention typically portrays decolonisation as tumultuous, chaotic, bungled, or simply ‘gone awry’.3 Indeed, the mutiny and secession movements that followed hard upon the proclamation in June 1960 of the Republic of the Congo (renamed Zaïre in October 1971) resulted in the rapid internationalisation of responses to them, thereby demonstrating the fragility of domestic political arrangements.

A social activist with wide-ranging concern for the welfare of his society, Wole Soyinka is on record as saying that it was the death toll among students and colleagues which prompted him to become involved in road safety. These victims were among the grim statistics of accidents; for example, in 1988 a total of 9,077 people were killed on Nigerian roads, and 24,413 were injured.2 But it is clear from Soyinka's writing that his interest in ‘the road’, and the rich characters it throws up and crushes under foot, predates the slaughter of his students. Early poems such as ‘Epitaph for Say Tokyo Kid’, and prose pieces such as ‘Oga Look Properly’, testify to this, as does the work of the mid-1960s, which includes the satirical revue sketch ‘Obstacle Race’ (about the hazards facing drivers in Nigeria), his first novel, The Interpreters (London, 1965), with its memorable description of the death of Sekoni in a motor accident, and above all his play entitled The Road (London, 1965). When these are linked with Soyinka's interest in the god of the road, Ogun, it was not surprising to find a whole section of his first collection of verse described as ‘of the road’.