Nations & States: Southern Sudan

These last weeks have been full of history defining moments for followers of international relations and concepts of governance.  At this point even if one were uninterested, it would take a great deal of channel hopping and willful ignorance to remain uninformed over the climes of political change in the Middle East.  Receiving significantly less TV time so far has been the effective formation of a new state around an old nation.

In the wake of last month’s referendum over secession, by the will of near 99% of voters Southern Sudan is set to become its own state.  The democratic nature of this decision to split as well as the Presidency’s respect for the results without further conflict should be subjects to take pride in.  At the same time, the expressed desire positive relations between the states is a hopeful example of the positive impacts of democratic choice.

A great deal more might be said about the separation of Sudan on an international scale.  The situation might be observed in part as an example of clashes over influence and resources between other nations.  On the other hand it might be observed as an example of the ability to change states through diplomacy, development and forms of “soft power” rather than warfare.  For the moment I’d rather focus purely on the issue of statehood, and wish the people of South Sudan luck in their democratic experiment.

Gaming the (electoral) system

Guest post from David Jandura, a student in the MA in Democracy and Governance Program. David takes a look at Sudan’s electoral system:

In the world of electoral system design, there are advantages and disadvantages to the many types of systems that exist.  It would probably be incorrect to say that any one system is “better” than another, because better is dependent upon what your priorities are.  One of the many advantages of a proportional representation, or PR system, for example, is that it does a relatively good job of ensuring that electors’ votes accurately translate into who is elected with less “wasted votes.” While it may be wrong to say which system is better, however, I don’t think it’s wrong to look at a system and question what its priorities are.  Sudan is a good case in point.  The nation claims to have a parallel system, which includes a significant amount of PR seats, yet the Sudanese have managed to create a PR tier that doesn’t actually deliver any of the advantages the system is designed to provide.

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FY 2011 US D&G Funding

Freedom House has recently released its analysis of the Obama Administration’s FY 2011 budget request for D&G programs (which the US Government calls Governing Justly and Democratically). Overall, it is a pretty good picture, although there are some troubling signs. Continue reading »

How the pros stuff ballot boxes

This is great.

Sudan election, day 3

Still more from Deborah on the election as seen from Juba:

Today was supposed to be the final day of polling, but because many polling stations opened late or not at all on the first two days, the government decided to extend voting through Thursday, April 15. I’ll be staying in Juba for the remainder of polling, but will only catch the beginning of counting here.

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