Democracy | peter dörrie

Think Africa Press: How Much Longer Can Compaoré Rule Last?

Aug

2012

On October 15, President Blaise Compaoré of Burkina Faso will celebrate his 25th year in power. To spend that much time in office, he had to run coups against two governments. In the first in 1983, he helped his friend and fellow revolutionary Thomas Sankara become president. In the second, four years later, Compaoré took ...

African Arguments: Blaise Compaoré And The Politics Of Personal Enrichment

Aug

2012

I’m extremely happy to have a piece about Burkina Faso/Blaise Compaoré published on the excellent African Arguments blog of the Royal African Society today. The article developed from this earlier rant and develops some arguments further. By African standards, Burkina Faso is not a particularly spectacular country. It is small, has a tiny population and ...

World Politics Review: In Ethiopia, Post-Zenawi Void Could Create Opening for Reform

Aug

2012

My latest piece over at World Politics Review on the continuing absence of Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi: For 20 years, Prime Minister Meles Zenawi has been the undisputed ruler of Ethiopia. Zenawi was the leader of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), which in concert with its sister rebel group from Eritrea toppled the Moscow-aligned dictator ...

Waging Nonviolence: The Arab Spring you haven’t heard about — in Mauritania

May

2012

You may not have heard of it, but the West African country of Mauritania has what is probably one of the most vibrant and active protest movements in the world today. Protests drawing tens of thousands of people (out of a total population of just three million) take place almost weekly in the capital Nouakchott, with many smaller protests happening ...

ThinkBrigade: Hunger, rebellion, coup: Mali’s crisis has its history

Apr

2012

I’m part of the new project ThinkBrigade, which brings together reporters and citizen journalists from around the world to experiment with new forms of collaborative and interactive journalism. This is my first piece for the project, but others will follow: Mali is a landlocked country in West Africa, about two times the size of France. It ...

Waging Nonviolence: Why democracy prevails in Senegal but fails in Mali

Mar

2012

People took to the streets in Dakar, Senegal, yesterday, celebrating what many had feared would never happen: opposition leader Mack Sall gained around two thirds of the vote in the second round of the presidential elections, and incumbent Abdoulaye Wade accepted defeat, personally calling Sall to congratulate him. Meanwhile in Bamako, the capital of Senegal’s neighbor Mali, ...