Kenya should invest in soft power to shield its liberal democracy from crisis

The head of European Union Election Observer Mission to Kenya Marietje Schaake (right) with Press officer Paul Anderson addressing journalists on July 3, 2017. PHOTO | DENNIS ONSONGO | NATION MEDIA GROUP

What you need to know:

  • Some 50,000 NGOs in the developing world are receiving $10 billion from international financial institutions.
  • In Kenya, populism linked to ethno-nationalism has shown contempt for institutions.

For decades, it was said that when the West sneezes, Africa catches a cold.

Today, the West is sneezing from the twin-crisis of liberal democracy and populism. And Africa’s new experiments with liberal democracy are down with a chronic flu.

Kenya’s August 8, 2017 and the October 26 electoral crises exemplify this.

The country may have successfully pulled back from the brink, but the dilemma of liberal democracy is far from over.

ELECTION

Politically sponsored vigilante violence has undermined the right to vote in no less than 25 constituencies in the recent election.

A looming winter of opposition-sponsored boycotts and protests to force dialogue, unity government and power-sharing casts a dark shadow on the country’s economy.

Geopolitically, Kenya’s recent electoral crisis exemplifies the gradual decline of the global pre-eminence that liberal democracy enjoyed after the fall of the Berlin Wall (The American Interest, October 16, 2017).

This was based on the democratic peace theory that posits that democracies rarely go to war with one another, which gave rise to democracy promotion.

Democracy promotion is still a priority for western donors, governments and United Nations agencies. Sadly, in Africa, it is laced with the West’s deep-seated cultural colonialism.

The central plank of the West’s “democracy promotion” is “an opposition strategy,” exemplified by the support for Morgan Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) in Zimbabwe and Raila Odinga’s Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) in Kenya.

DIPLOMATIC

This support is revealing four characteristics. One, think tanks in western capitals are offering ‘global’ platforms to opposition leaders and diplomatic leverage to their policies, which are sometimes inimical to the rule of law and stability in Africa.

In this regard, on October 13, 2017, Chatham House, the leading British think tank, hosted Raila Odinga as its guest speaker in an event dubbed: “Kenya’s Next Test: Democracy, Elections and the Rule of Law”.

Similarly, on November 9, 2017, shortly after Kenyatta was declared the winner of the repeat election, Odinga was a guest speaker at a low-key event at the Washington-based think tank, Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) on another sensationalized topic, “Overcoming Kenya’s Political Crisis and Advancing Democracy, Rule of Law, and Stability”.

His host, William Mark Bellamy, is a controversial former US ambassador to Kenya under George W. Bush (2003–2006).

The second level of opposition support is the channeling of massive resources to ‘opposition figures’, outfits and allied groups to win elections or to support projects to undermine governments considered illiberal.

PETITION

Some 50,000 NGOs in the developing world are receiving $10 billion from international financial institutions.

In 2013, the African Center for Open Governance (AfriCog) was funded to the tune of Sh56 million ($560, 000), the bulk of which went to financing its petition against the March 4, 2013 election and ICC-related activities in Kenya.

The third plank of opposition support is the deployment of ‘distinguished scholars’ from universities in the former empires as columnists to sway public opinion.

Ahead of the 2013 and 2017 elections, Kenya witnessed a barrage of ‘academic tourists’, mainly from British universities, serving as columnists in local papers.

The fourth strand of the West’s opposition strategy are well-coordinated diplomatic interventions by Western diplomats styled as “the International Community” and some election observer mission through media statements and reports.

Rogue diplomacy and meddling in international affairs to support the opposition has become increasingly institutionalised.

Reading through the European Union Observer Mission’s report on the Kenyan election, it is hard to tell who copied from who: NASA or EUOM!

DEMOCRACY

There are reasons galore why Kenya should no longer depend on its traditional Western partners to secure its development and democracy.

The West itself is facing bouts of democratic recession and woes. America is trying to come to terms with Russia’s hacking said to have tipped the balance of victory toward its preferred candidate in the 2016 American presidential election.

Besides the victory of illiberal parties in Hungary and Poland after 2015, rightwing populists have been gaining electoral ground across Europe.

Populists share the contempt for institutions, see themselves as messiahs and the sole authentic defenders of the “true” people.

In Kenya, populism linked to ethno-nationalism has shown contempt for institutions, the rule of law and disregard for the doctrine of ‘peaceful transition.”

Resurgent China is providing “the China model,” a blend of pro-market policies under “democratic centralism” now hailed as a stabilizing model to secure development and advance democracy.

However, China’s real lesson to fragile democracies like Kenya is the need to harness the technologies of soft power to safeguard the gains made in democracy, development, stability and sovereignty.

GLOBAL AFFAIRS

China’s growing ‘soft power’ influence in global affairs has insulated it from external onslaughts.

It has invested in its state media enterprises such as CGTV, Xinhua News Agency and the People’s Daily, which offer positive image of China and to counter negative coverage by Western media channels such as the BBC, CNN, or Deutsche Welle.

Moreover, its Confucius Institutes and other people-to-people initiatives have not only effectively promoted the study of the Chinese language and culture but also fostered a positive image of the Chinese state and its economic progress.

In investing in soft power, Chinese companies have moved to influence American movie, media and information companies. Recently, Beijing has purchased AMC, the second largest chain of movie theatres in America.

SOFT POWER

Chinese companies such as the HNA Group, Beijing’s largest and most effective business conglomerates, have established a charitable foundations as key soft power instruments to directly fund a variety of “philanthropic” activities and to fund studies supportive of China.

In New York, HNA has set up the second largest foundation in the United States, with $18 billion in assets.

This is a wake-up call for Kenya to invest in the technologies of soft power to ward off negative democracy promotion, secure its development and consolidate democratic peace.

Prof Kagwanja is a former Government Adviser and currently heads the Africa Policy Institute