Edinburgh Napier University

  The intense drama that has characterised Kenya’s 2017 electoral cycle has generated a debate over whether Kenya has slid back to authoritarian rule or is a resilient democracy firmly on the path to democratisation.

This briefing wades into this debate arguing that, neither a democracy nor an authoritarian regime, Kenya remains a competitive-authoritarian regime. While electoral contest is real, and widely accepted as the only means of acquiring power, the playing field remains heavily skewed in favour of the incumbents through superior organisational capacity, access to resources and command of a strong and cohesive state security apparatus.

The overriding theme of the paper is that democratisation is not inevitable; sometimes history stagnates. Marked by unbridled optimism one day and secessionist disenchantment the next, it appears that, per Dan Branch, Kenya is still stuck somewhere between hope and despair.