ABSTRACT
Africa's politics are now widely studied and extensively written about, but scholars are inevitably still constrained by their sources. Without obviously comparable data, Africanists have been dissuaded from conducting 'large-n' projects. Investigations into the identity politics of ethnicity in Africa have allowed us to appreciate much about mobilization and electoral politics in particular. While African states have rarely fought against each other since the 1950s, civil conflicts have been all too common. Military coups and insurrections have been multiple, to be sure, but a study of patterns and trends in African conflicts reveals peaks in intensity at the end of the Cold War and a more recent decline. Democratic electoral politics promises more accountable and effective governance, and rule-bound leadership. South Africa is often identified as a leading democratic light, but has often been kept out of the headlines by the continuing failure of democratic institutions in neighbouring Zimbabwe.
