Proposal Defense - Saba Kidane: Post-Conflict Regime Transition in Sub-Saharan Africa: the case of Eritrea and Namibia

Proposal Defense - Saba Kidane
Post-Conflict Regime Transition in Sub-Saharan Africa:  the case of Eritrea and Namibia

Monday, August 31
1:00pm - 3:00pm
Conference Room 5183

Committee: 

Juliette R. Shedd, Assistant Professor of Conflict Analysis and Resolution, PhD, Committee-Chair
Richard E. Rubenstein, Professor of Conflict Resolution and Public Affairs, Committee-member
Jack A. Goldstone, Professor of Public Policy, PhD, Committee-member

Abstract

What explains divergence in political development among post-conflict states in Africa? Why, for example, do some post-conflict states evolve into functioning democracies, while many others fail to do so? Through a comparative case study of Eritrea and Namibia, this dissertation project seeks to explain why the outcomes of post-conflict transitions vary across states including those that share similar historical trajectories.  The post-conflict regime transition in Eritrea and Namibia resulted in different outcomes. The question then is why Eritrea followed the non-democratic route whereas Namibia began the democratic transition at independence. Part of the answer to that puzzle, this study asserts, could be found first, in understanding the political culture of the liberation groups in the two countries, second by looking into the strategy these liberation groups devised in the struggle for their independence and the way the war ended, either through military victory or negotiated settlement and how that impacted the post-conflict regime formation. Third, is the role of the international actors in the outcome of regime types in the post independence— Eritrea and Namibia.