Democratic reform, poverty in Africa are symposium topics, Oct. 24-26

A major symposium at Cornell on democratic reform and poverty alleviation in Africa will take place Oct. 24-26. The event is sponsored by Cornell's Institute for African Development in collaboration with the university's Poverty, Inequality and Development Initiative and Binghamton University's Center on Democratic Performance.

Justice Johann Kriegler of the Constitutional Court of South Africa, that country's highest court, is the keynote speaker. His talk, "Democratic Reform in Africa," will take place Thursday, Oct. 24, at 6 p.m. in the Biotechnology Building's first-floor conference hall on Cornell's campus. It is free and open to the public.

Krieger is perhaps best known for chairing South Africa's electoral commission in 1994 during the country's first racially inclusive elections. In 1999, he served in a similar capacity in East Timor during that country's referendum. As a lawyer in South Africa, he was actively involved in the promotion of human rights and was founding chairman of Lawyers for Human Rights there.

The symposium, which follows on Friday and Saturday, Oct. 25 and 26, in 700 Clark Hall, is also free and open to the public. Participants are world-renowned practitioners, policy-makers and researchers in the field of good governance and poverty reduction -- scholars, economists, lawyers and political scientists. No registration is necessary to attend, but attendees are asked to send their names and affiliations in advance to ciad@cornell.edu or call 255-5499.

A wave of democratic reform began to sweep across Africa more than 15 years ago, in part because of the failure of authoritarian rule to promote sufficient economic development and respect for human rights. Since then, some scholars of Africa and the developing world assert that democracy is becoming a global entitlement, promoted and protected by the collective international process. In addition, the international community increasingly is stipulating that economic aid must be conditioned on good governance. Africans themselves in the New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD) have devised standards for economic and political governance.

While democratic reform in Africa has been slow and difficult to achieve, sufficient time has passed for those interested in political and economic development to begin to assess what progress Africa has made in recent years. The link between governance and development and poverty is gradually being accepted, but some key interrelationships between elements of the two sectors remain open to debate. This symposium will highlight issues that cut across the political and economic reform spectra and will look at obstacles to democratic reform. Two key subtexts will be: institutions and their role in governance and poverty alleviation, and key actors in the process of democratic reform and economic development.

Muna Ndulo, director of Cornell's Institute for African Development, says that, with the elaboration of the NEPAD initiative, the time is right for such a conference. He and Jackie Sayegh, the symposium's organizer, hope that participants will share successful civil-society strategies that have been used to advance good governance and reduce poverty, which in turn, may lead to disadvantaged populations gaining more control over their lives.

Symposium participants include: Ann and Robert Seidman, professors emeriti of law and economics, Boston University, and former economic advisers to political leaders and governments in Africa and Asia; Joel Barkan, professor of political science, Iowa University; Penelope Andrews, professor of law, City University of New York School of Law; Peter Tikirambudde, executive director, Human Right Watch, Africa division; Tsatsu Tsikata, former chief executive, Ghana National Petroleum Co.; John Hatchard, professor, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London; Brian Levy, manager, public sector reform and capacity-building unit, World Bank; Colleen Lowe-Morna, former chief executive, South African Gender Commission; Daniel Manning, attorney, Greater Boston Legal Services; Chaloka Beyani, professor, London School of Economics and Political Science; Thomas Lansner, adjunct professor, School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University; and Reg Austin, director, programs, rules and guidelines division, International IDEA.

Also participating, from Cornell, are: Ravi Kanbur, professor of economics; Robert Kent, professor emeritus of law; David B. Lewis, professor of city and regional planning and director of the Cornell Institute for Public Affairs (CIPA); Gil Levine, professor emeritus and acting executive director of the Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies; Sandra Greene, professor and chair of the Department of History; Porus Olpadwala, professor and dean of the College of Architecture, Art and Planning; and Kifle Gebremedhin, professor of civil and environmental engineering; and Edward McMahon, director of the Center on Democratic Performance at Binghamton University.

In addition to the main sponsors cited above, the symposium is supported at Cornell by the Einaudi Center, CIPA and the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology. For more information on the symposium, contact Sayegh at 255-6849 or visit http://www.einaudi.cornell.edu/Africa/.