Movement legacy’ and neoliberalism as political settlement in Uganda’s political economy

Rubongoya, Joshua B.

doi:10.5040/9781350223721.ch-004

Cited by 3 publications

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“…In addition, factors such as violence, playing a key role in ensuring political support and electoral success to Museveni's regime (Anderson & Fisher, 2016), and religion, maintaining the capacity to mobilise people and influence public debates (Alava & Ssentongo, 2016; Bompani & Valois, 2017) also cause inevitable repercussions on the country's social contract and government legitimacy. State‐citizen relations , moreover, are heavily affected by patterns of patronage, frequent under the colonial rule, and still widely used as a ‘neopatrimonial’ political bargaining tool (Médard & Golaz, 2013; Rubongoya, 2018; Titeca, 2018) not only during elections, but also in day‐to‐day interactions. This heavily politicised environment can be further explained, for example, by the existence and importance of Local Councils (LC 3 ), introduced in 1993 and granted with political, administrative and fiscal powers.…”

Section: Study Context and Methodologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Follow the hand that feeds you? The effects of non‐governmental cash transfers on citizenship

2023

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Cash transfers (CT) are increasingly used as fundamental components of countries' poverty reduction and social protection strategies. Yet not much is known about how these interventions shape beneficiaries' relations with the state and citizenship in general, and even less evidence is available on how CTs distributed by non‐state actors affect the aforementioned variables. This paper analyses how a non‐governmental universal unconditional mobile CT (a small‐scale universal basic income experiment), handed out by a foreign NGO in a rural Ugandan village, influenced citizenship. The article zooms in on effects on recipients' perceptions of the state and interactions with government representatives, where both could potentially yield repercussions on the broader social contract. The study implements matching techniques and social network analysis to explore how the transfer influenced citizenship over time. Results suggest that the CT generated a positive effect on the non‐state actor's legitimacy, without necessarily causing a lasting impact on the legitimacy of the state. Major impacts were recorded in the treatment village's ‘call‐to‐action’ network, highlighting patterns of change in beneficiaries' relations with local duty bearers, such as the crowding out of (multiple) local leaders by an external actor linked to the CT project. These findings confirm the possibility of inducing unintended effects in local communities through CT initiatives implemented by non‐state actors.

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Section: Study Context and Methodologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Follow the hand that feeds you? The effects of non‐governmental cash transfers on citizenship

2023

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Generational populism and the political rise of Robert Kyagulanyi – aka Bobi Wine – in Uganda

Melchiorre

2023

Review of African Political Economy

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This article analyses the political rise of the Ugandan opposition leader, Robert Kyagulanyi, aka Bobi Wine, arguing that he has a deployed a novel type of generational populism – a mobilising political discourse which frames the struggle between ‘the people’ and ‘the elite’ in generational terms, defining the former in relation to their status as youth, and in antagonistic opposition to an elite, which is depicted as defending a gerontocratic political order. At a theoretical level, the article broadens political science’s conception of populism, by introducing a new subtype of the political phenomenon which demonstrates the importance of intergenerational dynamics in the construction of the discursive categories of ‘the people’ and ‘the elite’. While it argues that Kyagulanyi’s success demonstrates the potential of populism in African countries to electorally challenge incumbent regimes, by helping to build political coalitions across ethno-regional lines, incorporating previously excluded social groups into the political process, it concludes by stressing that Kyagulanyi’s political project has failed to offer any real ideological alternative to the neoliberal orthodoxy that has characterised President Museveni’s Uganda over the last four decades.

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The Politics of PoEs in Uganda

Hickey,

Bukenya,

Matsiko

2023

Pockets of Effectiveness and the Politics of State-Building and Development in Africa

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Uganda’s impressive level of economic performance over much of the past three decades has often been linked to the performance of certain ‘pockets of effectiveness’ (PoEs), including the Ministry of Finance, the Bank of Uganda, and, more unevenly, the Uganda Revenue Authority. The extension of presidential protection to these (and a few other) PoEs has been central to their success, as have been high levels of international support and the appointment of ‘technopols’ to lead these organizations for prolonged periods. These technopols have proven capable of managing both the political and technical aspects of their briefs, with some playing a more prominent role in Uganda’s governance and public life than elected ministers. However, the performance of these organizations has varied considerably over time, with all coming under considerable pressure following the increased dispersal of power from the early 2000s onwards within Uganda’s erstwhile ‘broad-concentrated’ political settlement. This chapter explores how the interplay of political settlement dynamics and organizational leadership shapes public-sector performance in Uganda, and how Uganda’s PoEs have increasingly become entwined with the politics of regime survival, rather than any wider state-building project. This process has been closely shaped by international ideas and pressures, with key PoEs used by President Museveni to signal Uganda’s legitimacy within the neoliberal economic order from the early 1990s. This neoliberalized process of state-building has had a profound impact on Uganda’s development trajectory and left Uganda without the capabilities required to pursue alternative developmental agendas.

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Movement legacy’ and neoliberalism as political settlement in Uganda’s political economy

Cited by 3 publications

References 0 publications

Follow the hand that feeds you? The effects of non‐governmental cash transfers on citizenship

Follow the hand that feeds you? The effects of non‐governmental cash transfers on citizenship

Generational populism and the political rise of Robert Kyagulanyi – aka Bobi Wine – in Uganda

The Politics of PoEs in Uganda

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