Citizen Engagement: Insights from Afrobarometer’s flagship report

Democracies do not sustain themselves.

Among the many things that keep a democracy vibrant and strong is the extent to which citizens stay engaged in democratic processes.

On July 8, Afrobarometer launched its second flagship report, African Insights 2025. The report focuses on citizen engagement.

Using 10 core indicators of citizen engagement and drawing on data from Round 9 (2021-2023, 39 countries) of the survey, the report unpacks the self-described civic habits of African citizens.

The report also highlights trends in some of these core indicators. 

In this piece, I will discuss my six key takeaways and the implications of the findings for citizens and leaders.

Six Key Insights

First, the civic engagement habits of people with low incomes.

The political participation and civic engagement literature tends to argue that poverty is a barrier to how much citizens can participate in democratic processes.

Illustrative examples often used are the burdens of voter registration and the ease of travel to polling stations on election day. 

Afrobarometer challenges us to rethink this narrative within the African context.

On the ten core indicators examined in the report, African citizens who are poor are more engaged in the democratic process than those who are not poor. 

Second, there is a decline in the percentage of citizens who feel close to political parties.

Across 29 countries examined on this, the number of citizens who identify with a particular political party has declined significantly from six out of ten (56%) in 2011 (Round 5 survey) to four out of ten (42%) in 2023 (Round 9 survey).

The decline is more pronounced in countries such as Cabo Verde (-23), South Africa (-24) and Mozambique (-28).

Given some of the critical roles political parties play in democracy, it begs the question: What is fueling this citizen detachment from them?

Third, is the use of protests as a form of collective action? As per the report’s findings, this is the least used collective action tool by African citizens, where only nine per cent report engaging in protests.

I often argue that active citizenship is costly. Some of the tools of active citizenship are more costly and riskier than others.

When one thinks of protests and how the State chooses to respond, sometimes with a heavy hand, including the use of police force to quell demonstrations, it comes as no surprise that Afrobarometer found that African citizens.

Fourth, who do African citizens contact to discuss or draw attention to matters concerning them?

The report looks at four key persons – traditional leaders, local government councillors, members of parliament and political party officials.

Across the countries examined, on average, traditional leaders are the most contacted, while members of parliament are the least contacted.

Citizens may have different reasons for contacting a particular institutional leader.

This finding points to two things- a) the continued importance of traditional leaders who are unelected and b) the worrying detachment of citizens from their members of parliament, who are essentially their elected representatives at the national level.

Fifth, are the gender gaps in citizen participation. Across the various indicators of citizen engagement examined in the report, women can be described as less engaged than men. On some of the indicators, the gaps are much broader than others.

The gender gaps are more pronounced in countries such as Sudan, Nigeria, Mali, Ethiopia and Mauritius, but less so in places such as Botswana, Seychelles and South Africa.

Nonetheless, there is a need for African countries to continue working on improving women's participation in our democratic spaces.

Sixth, the engagement habits of the youth raise concerns about how well our democracies are creating spaces and incentives for this demographic group to participate fully. For example, when it comes to voting, only six out of ten youth (63%) indicated voting in the most recent election, compared to eight out of ten (81%) among the non-youth population.

These gaps are observed in other indicators, such as attending community meetings, contacting traditional leaders, or contacting local government councillors. 

Implications of the report’s findings

To describe the report as insightful and revealing is an understatement.

It points us to areas of strength (citizen participation in voting) upon which countries can build democratic resilience efforts.

It also exposes some of the fault lines of citizen engagement that can create perverse incentives for those with ill intentions to undermine democratic governance.

This Afrobarometer report can then be seen as a call to action not just for citizens but also for institutional leaders.

For citizens, the report calls upon us, in my view, to examine and renew our civic habits and make the improvements where needed.

For leaders, it calls upon them to examine their contribution to some of the fault lines observed and make improvements. 

The writer is the Project Director, Democracy Project.