The failure of the electoral process in Côte d'Ivoire underscores the extreme difficulty recovering from civil conflict through the ballot box. The origins of the Ivorian civil war are many. They combine the financial incentives and political mobilization on the basis of identities.
The Ivorian state control by a group of people reported much more than the traditional gains political control of the state apparatus. Whoever has control over the state revenue control - including natural resources and agricultural - that allow him to run a full system paternalistic clientelism to maintain its domination. Therefore lose control of the state is losing source of income and all allegiances obtained. Therefore those who benefit from the system, both in the head at the base, are ready to defend it fiercely, almost as much as those who are excluded from the wish to acquire.
greed as a factor behind the conflict is increased when combined with the mobilization of grievance identity [1] . All populations living in Côte d'Ivoire for several generations does not enjoy the patronage system that works primarily around the capital and cocoa producing regions. Northern populations are excluded and the power of Laurent Gbagbo to denigrate whole sections of these populations the very fact of being Ivorian [2] .
African political leaders are often willing to point out, rightly, the artificiality of colonial boundaries, provided few countries recognize the right of the soil. In addition a significant number of countries recognize citizenship to the inhabitants and descendants of those who lived in the country before independence is either before colonization, excluding all political rights of people who migrated so after these dates.
Having control over the state to capture its resources and run a patronage system, mobilizing identities for political purposes to strengthen the sense of belonging are factors - not exclusive - the Ivorian conflict . They allow particularly to understand why the period for holding the elections will was exceeded by five long years and why the registration of voters was so bitter and costly.
Both sides were willing to participate in the electoral process as they were convinced of their victory and their turf will remain intact. In Cote d'Ivoire, as in Burundi and Kenya, the electoral process under a peacemaker. However, victory at the polls causing not only electoral defeat, but the potentiality of the collapse of a patronage system, political parties have many difficult to accept the results and are willing to use all methods to defeat an outcome that does not suit them even if the entire population plunge into chaos.
elections in Kenya and Ivory Coast have highlighted how democracy is not limited to the establishment of electoral lists, installing booths and ballot boxes and the presence of international observers. Democracy requires shared values, shared a sense of community that makes whatever the outcome all are likely to respect the choice of urns. This requires the integrity of the person exercising the power and conviction of all that every citizen will be treated the same way regardless of his identity or his vote.
Democracy is not an electoral process and it will struggle to set itself up as the players continue to receive the election as an opportunity to annihilate his opponent any other way than by force of arms. Ending the patronage, under the guarantee in practice of power, making each individual be a citizen are the primary conditions indispensable for the establishment of a sustainable democracy respected by all.
The responsibility is left to uphold the values that those of virtue against vice, of citizenship in the mobilizations against identity, democracy and human rights against the financial interests political or friendly.
Ending colonialism requires bring down colonialism in the heads, who think they can do instead of another, as one which asserts that democracy over there is different.
The differentialist, culturalists are the heirs of the twenty-first century of colonial thinking. To end colonialism is never accept the facts that in Africa we would never accept in Europe.
[1] "greed and grievance " http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greed_versus_grievance
[2] http://alternatives-economiques.fr/blogs/giraf/2010/10/21/cote-divoire-episode-2-les-annees-gbagbo-entre-guerres-et-identifications-le-chemin-tumultueux-des-elections/#more-128
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