Professor Michael Bratton is Professor of Political Science and at the African Studies Center at Michigan State University. He is the co-founder and co-director of the Afrobarometer, a comparative series of national political attitude surveys covering more than a dozen African countries. He is the recipient of numerous grants and awards for his work on Africa and his ongoing research there. He is also a member of the Editorial Board for the Journal of Modern African Studies and the co-author (with Nicolas van de Walle of Democratic Experiments in Africa: Regime Transitions in Comparative Perspective.
Introduction: 1. A tale of two presidents
2. Taking account of adjustments
3. Setting an agenda
4. Overview of contents
Part I. Framework: Africa's Hybrid Regimes: 5. A decade of political reforms, 1990-2001
6. Two decades of economic reforms, 1982-2001
7. Dual transitions: compartibilities and contradictions
8. Demand, supply, and regime consolidation
9. Deriving public opinion: studying public opinion in Africa
10. Competing theories, rival hypotheses
11. Towards a learning approach
12. Survey research in Africa
13. The afrobarometer: an appropriate method?
14. A quest for comparison
Part II. Popular Attitudes to Reform: Attitudes to Democracy: 15. Understanding of democracy
16. Support for democracy
17. Rejection of alternative regimes
18. Satisfaction with democracy
19. Wide but shallow
20. The extent of democracy: attitudes to a market economy: 21. The popular development agenda
22. Between state and market
23. Awareness of economic reforms
24. Support for economic reforms
25. Satisfaction with economic reforms
26. Economic patience?: economic and political behavior
27. Living standards
28. Securing economic livelihoods
29. Compliance and the law
30. Varieties of political participation
31. Defending democracy?
32. From attitudes to behavior
Part III. Competing Explanations: The Structure of Society: 33. Demographic determinants
34. Varieties of sub-nationalism
35. The burden of poverty
36. Structural models: cultural values
37. Self-identities
38. Interpersonal trust
39. An emergent individualism
40. Cultural models
awareness of public affairs
41. The spark of education
42. Exposure to mass media
43. Cognitive engagement
44. Political and economic knowledge
45. The eye of the beholder
46. Cognitive models: performance evaluations
47. Evaluating the economy
48. The corruption of the state?
49. Assessing regime performance
50. Grading the government
51. A representation gap?
52. Performance models: institutional influences
53. Associational life
54. Party identification: political participation
55. Economic participation
56. Institutional models
Part IV. Explaining Reform Constituencies: Modeling Attitudes to Reform: 57. Modeling demand for democracy
58. Modeling the supply of democracy
59. Modeling demand for a market economy
60. Modeling the supply of economic reform
61. Paths to reform: a learning process: predicting political participation
62. Voting
63. Protesting
64. Communing and contacting
64. Vote choice
65. Defending democracy
66. Political participation: cause or effect?: deciphering regime consolidation
67. The effects of 'country'
68. Demand, supply, and regime consolidation (revisited)
69. The consolidation of African political regimes
70. The correlates of consolidation
71. Economic versus political legacies
72. The study of Africa
73. Theories of social change
74. Strategies of development.
