An African Perspective

The world financial crisis that hit the world in 2007 has now become a systemic global economic crisis that affects socially, economically and politically, all the countries and regions differently depending on their level of development and grade of insertion in the world economy.

Over the last decade Africa has gone through major breakthroughs in terms of economic growth, poverty reduction and access to basic social services, but in spite of that, 36.2% of the its population lives on less than one dollar per day. The current economic crisis has evidenced that this progress to date could be washed away and that much needs to be done to achieve the Millennium Development Goals in the region.

In their response to the economic crisis, African governments, along with international organizations, will have to address the challenges resulting from the current economic crisis in conjunction with finding solutions to other critical issues Africa has been severely hit by, e.g. poverty, food security, global warming, human rights and peace-building, whose management will be crucial in strengthening democratic values, good governance and human development.

In line with this, Members of the Club of Madrid, Members of the Africa Progress Panel and other prominent experts and decision-makers, gathered on November 3, 2009 in Accra, Ghana to discuss the political impact of the crisis from an African perspective and to formulate practical recommendations to the political institutions and policy-makers in charge of responding to the political challenges arising from the crisis, at a global, regional and national level. This report offers a summary of the key points and recommendations that were raised at the meeting as input to the Club of Madrid’s annual conference on the topic in November, 2009 in Madrid.

Source: Club de Madrid

Gorbachev's revolution

NOT ONE OF the grey men who assembled this week 25 years ago to pick a successor to Constantin Chernenko, the greyest of all leaders of the Soviet Union, had any idea what they would set in train. Within hours of his death the Politburo had earmarked the youngest among their number, Mikhail Gorbachev (54), to become the last secretary general of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. He would later become the first and last President of the Soviet Union and, despite himself, its gravedigger.

Although he would pass from power widely reviled at home – hated by ordinary people for the economic and social impoverishment that would follow him, and by communists for betraying their state and losing their empire – history and the world will judge him more kindly as one of the century’s outstanding figures.

A committed communist and party man, later not averse to using the old methods, Gorbachev was not picked as a reformer. If he believed in it he kept it largely to himself. But he found that to implement his top-down economic programme, “ perestroika ”, he needed to counterbalance the inertia of his own party’s conservatism with a bottom-up revolution, transparency, or “ glasnost ”. Relatively free elections followed. Necessity opened his eyes gradually to the revolutionary logic being ushered through the door he had opened.

Historian Orlando Figes has compared Gorbachev to Columbus, “setting out with high ideals to find one thing and achieving something better by discarding them”. In other respects he was straight out of Russian history: a second Alexander Kerensky, one of the architects of Russia’s first 1917 revolution who would be swept away in its second by the uncontrolable, pent-up forces he had unleashed.

The shaking loose of the party from its control of the state would shake Gorbachev’s own hands from the levers of power, just as the rise of nationalism would break up the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact and would make his position as president redundant, and the world a different place.

On the sidelines now, Gorbachev recently returned to familiar ground, accusing Prime Minister Putin’s government of trying to initiate a modernisation programme for Russia from the top down, “practically without the people”. And he attacked the ruling United Russia party of seeking a monopoly on power “like the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, only worse”. It seems that although much has changed in Russia, much has not.

The Irish Times. Saturday, March 13, 2010

The Club of Madrid was launched following the Conference on Democratic Transition and Consolidation (CDTC), held in Madrid, Spain, in October 2001. At that unprecedented gathering, 35 heads of state and government from Europe, the Americas, Asia and Africa met with more than 100 of the world's most respected scholars and policy experts to discuss the problems of building democracy from both a theoretical and practical point of view. The CDTC looked at eight core issues, including constitutional design, the legislature and its relations with the executive, the judiciary and its relations with the executive, anti-corruption measures, the role of armed forces and security forces, reform of the state bureaucracy, strengthening of political and social pluralism and of political parties, and economic and social conditions. In four days of intensive discussion between the leaders and experts, the two groups were able to identify areas of agreement and disagreement, and formulate practical recommendations for strengthening democracy around the world. For more on the CDTC, go here.

The Club of Madrid's primary asset is its membership, which includes almost 90 distinguished former heads of state and government of democratic nations. The Club of Madrid seeks to leverage the first-hand experience of its members to assist countries with critical elements of their democratic transition or consolidation. A distinguished group of scholars, former policy makers and political leaders provides additional advice and assistance on a wide range of issues. The Club of Madrid is supported institutionally by the Fundación para las Relaciones Internacionales y el Diálogo Exterior (FRIDE) and the Gorbachev Foundation of North America (GFNA), the original sponsors of the 2001 conference.

Source: Club of Madrid