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Analysis, scores and results

Governance and leadership in Africa: measures, methods and results

Measuring the delivery of political goods in Africa

Authors: R. Rotberg (ed)
Publisher: Institute for social and economic research and policy University of Columbia, 2009

Full text of document

Governance is the delivery of political goods to citizens by governments. This paper looks at the Ibrahim Index of African Governance,diagnostic tool which produces overall rankings of governanceattainment. It is aimed at enhancing performance and improving lives ofAfricans through better governance. The Index evaluates 48 African countries, employing 57 indicators to measure governance across the five categories of political goods:

  • Safety and Security, including National Security and Public Safety
  • Rule of Law, Transparency and Corruption
  • Participation and Human Rights - free, fair and competitive elections, oppositionparticipation, press freedom and respect for civil rights
  • Sustainable Economic Development – categorized by economic indicators
  • Human Development - poverty, health and educational opportunity.
The paper delves into the theory of governance and then offers the following hierarchy of political goods, beginning with which it considers to be the most important:
  • The supply of security
  • Rule of law
  • Citizens’ free, open and full political participation
  • Sustainable economic opportunity
  • Human development.

The document highlights the importance of finding an objective way to measure governments’ performance. To do so, it is essential to specify the outcomes that citizens demand under each political good. The Ibrahim Index strives for transparency and simplicity in selecting the indicators using objectively derived scores that can be replicated. It provides more than single-indicator assessments of performance that are updated annually to track changes over time.

    The paper also assesses other indexing methods i.e. the World Bank’s Worldwide Governance Indicators, Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index, the UNDP’s Human Development Report and Freedom House’s Freedom in the World Report among others.

    The paper presents the following results:

    • African governance is improving
    • 34 of 48 governments have begun delivering improved results
    • Top governance performers are many small well managed countries
    • The least well-governed countries are those countries perpetually at war with themselves.