The Role of the West in Promoting Democracy in East Africa

Abstract

This article sets out to provide a general assessment of the extent to which democracy promotion programmes of the Western donor countries to the East African countries facilitate the attainment of meaningful democratic institutions and processes.  Based on the trends and content of democracy promotion programmes in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda since the adoption of the multi-party politics in the 1990s, the article attempts to show that rather than enhancing popular participation, democracy promotion programmes by Western donor countries and multilateral and organizations are largely intended to achieve political order and macroeconomic stability rather than democracy per se. Technical and procedural support to democracy promotion tends to underplay the influence of the underlying structural and political factors inherently entrenched into the political system.  As a result, the bulk of democracy promotion fund is mainly directed at reforming the state without necessarily democratizing it.