What economic factors prevent democratic breakdowns? Since the beginning of the 20th century, more than a hundred countries in the world have transformed their political regime types into democracies. However, not every transition to democracy continued without interruption. Even though some democracies continued without any breaks, some others relapsed into authoritarian regimes via military coups. The consensus in the literature is that wealthy countries are less likely to experience democratic breakdowns. I argue that wealth alone is not enough to increase the duration of democracies. Using quantitative cross-national survival analysis, I show that temporal and international context change the impact of wealth on democratic survival. In addition, I investigate whether democratic survival is more likely in countries where national income is evenly distributed.

Thesis (M.Ed.) -- University of Limpopo, 2021 / This study investigated how educators apply democratic principles and values in their practice after two decades of democracy in South Africa. It dwells on how democratic principles and values are infused into teaching, learning and assessment in the classroom. The study followed an interpretive paradigm using the qualitative approach through a descriptive case study design. Data collection methods used included semi structured interviews, focus group interviews, classroom observations and document analysis. Purposive sampling was used with focus on Grade 10-12 educators and learners from two secondary schools in Mogoshi Circuit of Limpopo Province of South Africa. The theoretical frameworks of the study drew from the Child-Friendly Schools and Social Reconstructionism approach. Emphasis is on the upholding of children‟s rights, and the, re-dress of educational imbalances. The frameworks also recommend the promotion and integration of democratic principles and values in schools. The study concludes that educators do incorporate democratic principles and values in their teaching, learning and assessment with the promotion of attributes such as participation (dialogue), respect, equity and inclusion which impact greatly on learners‟ daily lives. However, it is not without fault that certain activities which are not child-friendly are still practised by some educators in some schools as they do not promote democratic principles and values, while some educators do. It was found that democratic principles and values are embedded in schools. However, not all educators are doing this. The study recommends further investigation on the implementation of democratic principles and values for reflection and improvement. / EDTP SETA

The project I describe in this report took place over the course of three months, coinciding with the outbreakof the coronavirus pandemic, and is the culmination of my BA in “Design + Change”. Inherent in this courseis a proposition that is central to my work here.The “Design + Change” programme covers a wide range of Design practices, and offers an overview of manypressing issues in need of socially and environmentally sustainable change. As I see it, the rubric of “Change”appeals to a sense of Urgency; and “Design” is a promising site of Agency. These two keywords have beencentral to my project from the beginning, and when brought together, I believe they make an appeal to values.Between the Urgency and the Agency of the present moment, is Crisis. “Crisis”, from the Ancient Greek,krinein, means: “to choose, to decide”. We are currently in a position of empirical urgency, but we are alsoin subjective and intersubjective crisis. Not only is the environment under threat, but so is the public realmwhich is vital for concerted action. It is increasingly common to feel that it is “easier to imagine the end of theworld than the end of capitalism”1, and maybe most alarmingly, it is harder and harder to sustain constructivedialogue about any of the crises we face with those we don’t agree with. If we want to overcome this impasse,we have to collectively entertain basic questions about how we want to live and what we want to live for.The work I detail here aims to provide fruitful answers to my carefully assembled research question:“How do I sustain myself while working towards Sustainment?”(Sustainment is the view of sustainability concerned with the long-term existence of life on Earth, and distinctfrom its pervasive, hollowed-out version, given in to the marketing of “sustainable consumerism”.)In my framing of this project I made the deliberate choice to remain consistent with this urgency even if thistranscended the boundaries of design. This approach is captured perfectly in Naomi Klein’s adage that “Thereare no non-radical options left on the table”.This project comes out of is an uncompromising curiosity for the kinds of practices that might evoke theagency to bring about meaningful systemic transformation, whether or not they are understood as design. Itis a process of “prototyping” these kinds of practices with others, since we are all designers and everything isdesigned.This was only possible, however, after taking an unflinching look at disciplines’, professions’ and employment’srole in driving change.The “method” that came out of this is the confluence of Learning (Pedagogy, research), Alternatives (Prefigurativepolitics), Together (Participatory Design, Design Activism).

Empirical findings about political behaviour cast doubt on prevailing theories of democracy. The overwhelming majority of democratic theories either implicitly or explicitly imply the necessity of widespread public participation. However, this involvement is more frequently referred to as public participation in the democratic process than as popular support. This paper questions if democracy can even be discussed without considering how popular support affects democracy. According to research, a healthy democracy system will give people a bigger say in deciding on the important issues that affect their lives. To react to the needs and views of their populace, democracies all over the world need a more robust democratic theoretic model of democracy measurement, which includes a normative criterion of popular support for democracy. Democracy should be viewed as requiring widespread support in order to be defined as democratic.

Yes / The history of the electoral process in Sierra Leone is at the same time tortuous and substantial. From relatively open competitive multi-party politics in the 1960s, which led to the first turnover of power at the ballot box, through the de facto and de jure one-party era, which nonetheless had elements of electoral competition, and finally to contemporary post-conflict times, which has seen three elections and a second electoral turnover in 2007, one can discern evolving patterns. Evidence from the latest local and national elections in 2012 suggests that there is some democratic consolidation, at least in an electoral sense. However, one might also see simultaneous steps forward and backward – What you gain on the swings, you may lose on the roundabouts. This is particularly so in terms of institutional capacities, fraud and violence, and one would need to enquire of the precise ingredients – in terms of political culture or in other words the attitudes and motivations of electors and the elected – of this evolving Sierra Leonean, rather than specifically liberal type, of democracy. Equally, the development of ‘electoral rituals’, whether peculiar to Sierra Leone or not and whether deemed consolidatory or not, has something to say as part of an investigation into the electoral element of democratic consolidation.1 The literature on elections in Africa most often depicts a number of broad features, such as patronage, ethno-regionalism, fraud and violence, and it is the intention of this article to locate contemporary Sierra Leone, as precisely as possible, within the various strands of this discourse.

Currently, rhetoric is considered a negative term. This dissertation uses rhetoric as a normative term serving simultaneously as both the central story line and storyteller. Rhetoric is both the object of study and the lens through which to study. A field study was conducted with the Roanoke County administration. The rhetorical patterns of administrative leaders were observed and documented in their day-to-day activities. Rhetoric is the conceptual glue both highlighting and pulling together different layers of understanding. At the level of theory development and application, this includes building conceptual linkages between leading and organizing. In practice, public administrators know that leading and organizing occur as an integrated whole. Methodologically, a new technique to study the rhetoric of leading and organizing is introduced within the Roanoke County field study. At a normative level, the linkages discovered in the rhetorical discourse of leading and organizing reveal a greater understanding of democratic governance. The field study provides insights into leading and organizing that are also constitutive of a normative position regarding democratic governance. / Ph. D.

This thesis offers an alternative of political leadership through a literature review of democratic theory as categorized into three models: classical, elitist, and egalitarian. The three models considered an ethical, an institutional, and an economic institutional postulate of political elites and their relationships. Still, the democratic elitist model emerging as the dominant model has been challenged by the egalitarian model enforcing economic institutional elites to be accountable to mass interest. As a competing idea, the egalitarian democratic model has been analyzed for its desirability over the democratic elitist model. This study is worthwhile in instigating an underscored concern surrounding economic institutional elites in the scope of accountable political elites, and in calling forth a further study on the preferred alternative, democratization of economic institutional elites.

No description available.

Girl child education has been a challenge for many African countries due to the patriarchal gender order of communities. This is not different in the Democratic Republic of Congo where son preference is still rife. This study sought to explore how girls in rural Lubaland in DRC experience their schooling in relation to the traditional gendered practices. A qualitative approach to research was employed within an interpretive paradigm. Young school going girls were purposively selected from two rural schools in Malemba and Mwanza. A total of 18 girls became participants to the study. Data were generated through the use of drawings and focus group discussions to explore how the girls saw themselves as girls and students at home, on the way to school and at school. This was done in order to understand how they experience their schooling lives. The findings revealed several gendered challenges that the rural girls experience daily in terms of gaining access to and succeeding in schools. The challenge of son preference and gender role stereotyping created challenges for girls at home, while lack of facilities for girls’ sexual health and long distances to school created challenges for girls on the way to school. At school the girls experienced challenge of being unable to afford school fees and corporal punishment. If these challenges are to be eradicated, there is need for all stakeholders in education, including traditional leaders and communities to deconstruct the gendered dynamics that position women and girls as subordinate and not deserving of an education. This study has implications for educational planning in the Democratic Republic of Congo for girl children to get better access and success in their education. The findings also highlight the need for more concerted efforts to understand the experiences of schooling girls across DRC in order to influence teacher training and educational provisioning that is girl friendly.

Thesis (MTech (Business administration in entrepreneurship))--Cape Peninsula University of Technology, 2015. / Interest in the domain of Entrepreneurship is growing considerably. Nevertheless, the plan of this study is to discover the distinctiveness of entrepreneurship in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The cutting-edge hostile environment for business developments of underdeveloped countries. In the case of the DRC, entrepreneurship is developed under life-threatening conditions, rarely seen elsewhere. These extreme conditions for entrepreneurship are present as the result of transitional particularities and the marginalised context deriving from political circumstances surrounding the DRC. Apart from the barriers and particularities of a business environment derived mainly from a transitional phase, the political situation has heavily influenced entrepreneurial developments in the country.