ABSTRACT
This chapter assesses public participation in recent constitutional reform processes in Senegal and in the Central African Republic (CAR). The choice of case studies straddles francophone Africa's perhaps most and least stable democracies. In the early 1900s, the territory of today's CAR was subsumed into French Equatorial Africa, while Senegal was folded into French West Africa. Prior to decolonization, Leopold Sedar Senghor and Barthelemy Boganda represented Senegal and CAR respectively in France's Union Assembly, which also served as the Constituent Assembly for France's Fourth Republic. Once the 1958 community framework entered into force, Senghor proclaimed Senegal's independence, while Boganda sealed that of CAR. Disparities in respective political economies may have instilled a deeper sense of constitutionalism in Senegal – including in its army – than in CAR, where coup leaders have repeatedly legitimized unconstitutional power grabs by submitting new constitutions to referenda. CAR's constitutional vacuum required adoption of an entirely new constitution prior to electing a new president.
