The downward trend in democracy worldwide accelerated in 2021. In Africa, restrictions due to covid-19, insecurity, and political tensions were added to a series of coups in the sub-Saharan region.

The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) has just published its 2021 report on global democracy, which ranks countries worldwide based on the democracy level. The ranking features 50 African countries except for Seychelles, South Sudan, Somalia, and Sao Tome and Principe.

Following the same trend as in 2020, the global democracy level has declined in 2021. The average score in SSA fell to 4.12 last year from 4.16 in 2020. As in previous years, only Mauritius ranks in the "full democracy" category, but the country's score fell from 8.14 to 8.08, although it moved up one place in the global ranking. More than half of the countries in SSA (23) are considered authoritarian.

EIU attributes the decline in democracy mainly to deteriorating performance in the areas of electoral process and pluralism, civil liberties, and political culture. The resurgence of coups, against a backdrop of security tensions, has undermined the democratic systems of countries in the region. In West Africa, Mali went from a "hybrid regime" to an "authoritarian regime" in 2020. The country kept the same category in 2021, due to the second coup led by Colonel Assimi Goïta in May 2021.

In Guinea, President Alpha Conde was ousted in September by Colonel Mamady Doumbouya, while in Niger an attempted coup was foiled in March. Sudan, which had entered a democratic process since the fall of Omar al-Bashir in 2019, also suffered a coup in October 2021. This resulted in the overthrow of the transitional government led by civilian Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok. Overall, 16 of the 44 countries in sub-Saharan Africa recorded a decline in their score, the most significant being Guinea (-0.80) and Mali (-0.45) falling to 147th and 119th place respectively. They are followed by Benin (-0.39), Congo-Brazzaville (-0.32), and Angola (-0.29).

Despite these poor performances, 14 countries in the region have improved their scores over the past year. For example, while Mauritania moved from the authoritarian category to the hybrid category, Zambia's score rose by 0.86 points. What helped Zambia is the organization of peaceful presidential elections in August 2021 at a time when tensions appeared imminent.

On the whole continent, including North and sub-Saharan Africa, only Mauritius is in the "full democracy" category, six African countries are imperfect democracies, 16 are hybrids (halfway between authoritarian rule and democracy), while the remaining 27 are classified as authoritarian by the EIU. 

As a reminder, the EIU's Democracy Index has been providing an overview of the state of democracy worldwide for 165 independent states and two territories since 2006.

Moutiou Adjibi Nourou