nance and the politics of structural adjustment. The movement for good governance and sustainable economic development in Africa emerged out of concern for the worsening economic situation in the continent. This was motivated by the economic stagnation beginning in the late 1970s and the decline at the turn of the decade in the 1980s.
This problem was variously attributed to the crisis of governance in Africa, to lack of a development ethic, and to African culture gen- erally. It was against this background that the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund launched several initiatives including structural adjustment programmes (SAPs) as a panacea for sub-Saharan Africa’s economic problems. Murunga shows that the idea of gover- nance was merely an afterthought addition to the economistic dictates of donor neo-liberalism. He examines the history and impact of SAPs on social movements, political choices and popular power in Kenya by contextualising the politics of structural adjustment within the broader framework of the agenda for political reform, and by evaluating the implications of structural adjustment for political transition and good governance in Kenya. In so doing, he unmasks the hypocrisy of adjustment prescriptors who have historically been part and parcel of the Kenyan (indeed African) problem.
In Chapter 10, Stephen Brown analyses the role played by Kenya’s bilateral and multilateral lenders and donors in the country’s demo- cratisation process. Brown’s main thesis is that the form and intensity of donor intervention in Kenya’s democratisation process shifted several times between 1989and 2002, resulting in contradictory effects. While at times donors helped bring about rapid political change, they simul- taneously sought to shape the outcome of the democratisation process, sometimes holding back aid to prevent the process from taking a form of which they disapproved. Given this conjuncture, Brown aptly describes donors as having had one foot on the accelerator and the
other on the brakes, and concludes that donors should neither expect Kenyan actors blindly to follow their preferred strategies, nor should Kenyan actors expect donors blindly to support their pro-democracy initiatives. While cognisant of the complexity and difficulty of finding common ground between external and local actors in the democrati- sation process, Brown rightly observes that greater attention to domestic priorities and strategies on the part of external actors is more likely to produce an effective road map to sustainable democracy in Kenya.
In the final analysis, the future of democratisation in Kenya resides in a power-sharing arrangement that brings together a popular decision- making unit akin to the NARC Summit; in devolving power, both poli- tical and economic, horizontally from the presidency to parliament, the bureaucracy and judiciary, and vertically to refashioned local government units; as well as in gradually including a new generation of leadership whose vision goes beyond the next general election to the next gen- eration. This eventuality is contingent upon exertion of sustained public pressure on the political class, both in government and in the opposition, to put in place a vision for Kenya’s transformation and a calculated understanding and strategic mobilising against entrenched external forces whose role in constricting the democratic space is too well known to require recapitulation. Towards this end, one very positive develop- ment in Kenya that can be described as ushering in a new dawn is the high level of consciousness and awareness among ordinary people about their role in Kenyan politics. The trap the NARC government drove itself into in the pre-election period in 2002enhances this awareness.
Upon assuming power, NARC had no option but to liberalise the air- waves and allow for greater freedom of speech and assembly. Further- more, the very acts of successfully voting out Moi and KANU, and of defeating a government-sponsored but watered down draft constitu- tion, has inspired a new sense of confidence in ordinary people to make a difference. This is important to sustain the initiative to transform the state, and it is herein that the prospects for democracy in Kenya lie.
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