Abstract
Decentralization is the governance reform tackled all around world at the beginning of 21st century. Africa is not exception in this tide. African Countries started Decentralization reform for an aid conditionality as donor countries and international organizations demanded. Decentralization was initiated several years after the opening of democratic transition in Africa.
After about 10 years from its starting, decentralization has given not only governance reform, but also has made political change and turbulence in African countries. The political influence of decentralization is extending from the local level to the national level, then to the international relations.
In African political studies, the election had not been considered as the core issue of study in military and one party regime era. However, political scientists have begun to focus on elections in Africa while democratization slowly progress though in much difficulty.
The studies negatively evaluated elections in African countries. For example, it was believed that election does not realize democratic consolidation. And the election is manipulated and limited by state power. These arguments have been categorized as a new type of the Authoritarianism perspectives. However, we should not miss the aspects that experience of regular repeats of elections has also given positive effects in African politics.
This article analyzes the series of Presidential election (2006), National Assembly election (2007), and local election (2008) after the full-scale enforcement of the decentralization (2002–) in Benin. Benin has received a good reputation as a democratization model in African continent.
This article tries to understand the political influence of decentralization in Africa through field research on each election held in Benin. I hope that this work contributes to understand correlation between decentralization and democratization in Africa.
