The Logic of External Reform Resistance

Dana M. Parke and Matthew D. Fails
Additional contact information
Dana M. Parke: Department of Political Science, Oakland University, Rochester, Michigan, USA
Matthew D. Fails: Department of Political Science, Oakland University, Rochester, Michigan, USA

Journal of Developing Societies, 2014, vol. 30, issue 2, 145-167

Abstract: Thanks in large part to survey efforts such as the Afrobarometer, scholars have developed and tested a variety of theoretical models explaining why citizens in sub-Saharan Africa hold supportive or, conversely, dissatisfied attitudes toward the economic and political reforms of the last several decades. Much of this research highlights citizens’ rational evaluation of the new regimes’ performance as the critical component. In this article, we advance an alternative argument, namely that citizens also care about the origins of these political and economic transformations. When citizens view these changes as externally imposed, they are less likely to develop supportive and satisfied attitudes toward the process of economic reform and democracy. Original interview data from Dakar, Senegal strongly supports our argument. The findings have important implications for a continent where economic and political institutions have long been shaped by outside actors.

Keywords: public opinion; democracy; economic reform; Africa; Senegal (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0169796X14525694 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:jodeso:v:30:y:2014:i:2:p:145-167

DOI: 10.1177/0169796X14525694

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Journal of Developing Societies
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().