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Last December, when the United States and the rest of the world were distracted, absorbing the shock of an unexpected presidential win by Donald J. Trump, something quite remarkable was unfolding in West Africa.

A constitutional crisis, triggered by an incumbent president unwilling to accept electoral defeat, ended peacefully. Civil conflict was averted. Democracy restored. It was an outcome driven by a populations readiness to risk-it-all to make their votes count, and defended by regional diplomacy and international law.

Heres what happened.

On Dec. 1, 2016, opposition leader Adama Barrow defeated long-time Gambian ruler, Yahyah Jammeh, who had come to power in 1994 through a military coup. Jammeh had managed, until that day, to manipulate the States institutions for 23 years to maintain his grip. The Gambia is a tiny sliver of a country on the western belly of the continent almost swallowed entirely by Senegal, with the exception of 80 kilometer coastline on the Atlantic Ocean.

Initially, Jammeh accepted his defeat, in what the UN called a peaceful, free and fair election. And, initially, Gambians took to the streets to jubilate.

But days later, for reasons only known to him, the Gambian president changed his mind. There were serious and unacceptable abnormalities in the election, he claimed. And with those words, he moved to Plan B, diverting to the courts to overturn the ruling of the electoral commission.

Jammeh must have presumed that his plan B would play out like Zimbabwe in 2013, when 92 year-old President Robert Mugabe, in power for three decades, withstood pressure to step aside after a disputed election, with the blessing of the Southern African Development Community (SADC). Or like Burundi, in 2015, when the sitting president, Pierre Nkurunziza, ran for a third-term despite, constitutional limits on the presidency. When the opposition boycotted the vote, he won. Civil chaos unfolded, but the East African Community (EAC) gave Nkurunziza a pass.

But the 14 member-State Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), led by President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the president of the Republic of Liberia, the first woman democratically elected to lead an African nation, wasnt having it. And neither were the other 12 democratically elected heads of states of ECOWAS, many of whom defeated entrenched incumbents in their own countries. Jammeh would not be afforded the political space to hold on to power.

The case under international law was made. On Dec. 12, with ECOWAS in the lead, followed by the Africa Union (AU), and the United Nations, a unified international community called on the government of The Gambia to abide by its constitutional responsibilities and international obligations, demanding it was fundamental that the verdict of the ballots should be respected.

Then on Dec 21 the UN passed Resolution 2337, which authorized an African peace operation, the Economic Community of West African States in Gambia (ECOMIG), made up of troops from Ghana, Nigeria and Senegal.

The ECOWAS heads of state shuttled back and forth to The Gambias capital, Banjul, pressuring their colleague to leave peacefully. The group included Ghanaian President John Mahama, who just days earlier had lost his re-election bid to opposition candidate Nana Afufo-Addo. His mere presence in the group signaling to the besieged Gambian president, this is what we do in a democracy when we lose. We accept the will of our people.

But it would take the relentless defiance of the people of The Gambia, and diplomacy, backed by lethal force, to dislodge Jammeh.

ECOMIG mobilized on The Gambias eastern border and Jammeh was given an ultimatum to leave. On January 21, he signed a political agreement setting out the terms of his departure. Jammeh jetted off to exile. Adama Barrow took his rightful place as president of The Gambia. And the Gambian people returned to their jubilation.

Many are now studying The Gambia example, looking at the factors that enabled a peaceful resolution so soon after a flash point. Some, like associate Professor of International Affairs at George Washington University Daniel Williams, who examines the legal basis for the ECOMIG intervention, concludes that the Gambia conflict-resolution success was an anomaly, its small size, unique geography, universally hated leader could offer no real resistance to a unified regional response.

But for me, The Gambia is no anomaly, but indicative of an emerging Africa. Here are the takeaways.

First, democracy begets democracy. The ECOWAS heads of state were all democratically elected. Several of the ECOWAS nations, Liberia, Guinea, Cote d Ivoire, Sierra Leone, are still recovering from cross-border conflict and civil wars, and are raising their first generation of children in peacetime. West Africa has paid a steep price for their young constitutional democracies. Jammeh staying in power would have been more than a threat to regional stability, it would have signified a betrayal by each of these presidents to their own constituents.

Second, The Gambia reaffirms the value of the investment in soft power that the U.S., and other bilateral and multilateral donors have made in Africa. The U.S. did not move battle ships offshore in The Gambia, nor dispatch special operation units to protect or evacuate U.S. citizens and foreign nationals from a country exploding in civil conflict. These are actions the U.S. was forced to take in the region, repeatedly, barely a decade earlier and at tremendous cost to the military and U.S. taxpayers.

The crisis was managed by Africans themselves, in part, because we had invested in the long-game building capacity and strengthening democratic institutions.

In the recent past, across Republican and Democratic administrations, the U.S. has provided assistance to support national electoral commissions, strengthen education and healthcare systems, build civil society institutions, train investigative journalists, fortify regional organizations, insist on performance-based foreign assistance, streamline government procurement processes, stand-up anti-corruption commissions, and encourage people-to-people exchanges. And the Ghanaian, Nigerian and Senegalese forces contributing to ECOMIG received some level of US assistance over the years in the form of logistics expertise, training, engineering support, and through joint exercises with the United States Africa Command (AFRICOM).

Third, The Gambia reaffirms that the greatest export of the United States to the world is still its foundational values of freedom and democracy.

And fourth, and finally, The Gambia example reveals the thirst for participatory democracy in Africa, and the coming-of-age of a population ready to hold their leaders accountable.

Today, former president Jammeh is living in exile in Equatorial Guinea, where President Theodoro Obiang, another entrenched leader, has been in power since 1979, long past his expiration date. But his time will come too. History is marching on.

K. Riva Levinson is President and CEO of KRL International LLC a D.C.-based consultancy that works in the worlds emerging markets, and author of "Choosing the Hero: My Improbable Journey and the Rise of Africa's First Woman President" (Kiwai Media, June 2016), Silver Medal winner Independent Book Publishers Award, Finalist, Forward ReviewsINDIES Book of the Year Awards.

The views expressed by contributors are their own and are not the views of The Hill.

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Africa's example: How democracy begets democracy - The Hill (blog)

New York Times

How Autocrats Can Triumph in Democratic Countries New York Times Today, the most common way for a democracy to collapse is through the actions of an elected incumbent, not a coup or revolution. Hugo Chvez, elected to four terms as president of Venezuela, used his time in office to dismantle the institutions of ...

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How Autocrats Can Triumph in Democratic Countries - New York Times

The Republican war on local democracy is a top-down effort to prevent Americans from voting where they live to protect the environment, preserve their communities, promote public safety, respect civil liberties, organize fair elections, raise wages, guarantee family and medical leave for workers, and welcome immigrants.

While the Trump administration's assault on sanctuary cities as part of the aggressive anti-immigrant agenda promoted by the president and Attorney General Jeff Sessions gets a good deal of attention, the federal and state pre-emption of local ordinances and local processes that ensure voters have a voice has accelerated as President Trump and House Speaker Paul Ryan have taken power in D.C. and Trump-style governors and Ryan-style legislators have placed their imprints on Republican-controlled states across the country.

Encouraged by groups such as the American Legislative Exchange Council, with an authoritarian agenda dictated by corporate-allied funders such as billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch, the top-down politicians in states across the country have attacked local democracy at the county, city, village and town levels of government. And in few states has the gubernatorial and legislative overreach been so extreme as in Scott Walker's Wisconsin.

But voters are starting to push back by pushing out politicians who go along with top-down and anti-democratic policies.

In Wisconsin, resistance came about recently after a bill was introduced in the Legislature that proponents said would streamline the process for towns to withdraw from countywide zoning. As originally written, the legislation would have made any vote by town residents on opting out advisory rather than binding, taking the decision out of the hands of voters and giving it to the town board.

As the Republican-controlled Legislature advanced the legislation, residents of the town of Middleton in Dane County caught wind of what was happening. They wanted to send a clear signal that the town should protect the right of residents to have a say. Dissatisfied with what they saw as failures of focus and advocacy on the part of the town chairman and a key Town Board member, challengers stepped forward to highlight the local democracy issues that came into play as the state Assembly was considering the zoning bill in March.

But the April 4 election was only a few weeks away, and the filing deadline to get on the ballot had passed. So the local-democracy candidates had to mount write-in bids.

We just decided the way to win this was to knock on every door in the town of Middleton that was physically possible, said Cynthia Richson, a town plan commission member, who took on the incumbent town chairman. Former Town Board member Richard Oberle challenged an incumbent board member who,as The Capital Times reported, had pushed for a zoning opt-out law that was signed in 2016 and had also backed the bill that "would have relegated resident votes to advisory, as opposed to binding.

Both Richson and Oberle won their write-in bidsin a result that shocked local political observers and made news well beyond Dane County.

Rightly so, as the town of Middleton election was about more than local issues. It was about defending local democracy at a time when too many politicians in Madison and Washington are attacking it.

The challengers were opposed to opting out of Dane County zoning. But the primary focus of their campaigning was the right of citizens to have a say when big decisions are being made. Number one, explained Oberle, is to make sure the citizens are allowed to have a vote on this opt-out issue and get informed about it so they can make a good decision.

The opt-out bill, which is still pending, was eventually changed to restore a vote by town residents, and the wranglingover zoning has continued. Different sentiments have been heard in the town of Middleton and in towns across Dane County. But this is about more than zoning and land use. This is about democracy.

When you cut the people you are elected to represent out of the process, thats going to haunt you, said Dane County Executive Joe Parisi, a critic of the zoning opt-out bill. People in our community overwhelmingly want us to manage our growth in a manner that maintains the quality of life and the character of our community. And people want to have a voice in how we grow.

There are voters in Dane County towns who have agreed with Parisi, just as there are voters who have disagreed.

Whats essential is that the process remain open and transparent, that barriers to civic participation be removed, and that voting is easy, inclusive and definitional.

Thats something conservative Republicans in the Legislature do not understand.

They have little respect for local democracy especially when local democracy might trip up the plans of development interests that make substantial campaign donations.

If write-in candidates mounting last-minute bids on behalf of local democracy can win in the town of Middleton, they can win in other places as well. And a new generation of contenders can take on the Republican legislators who so frequently disrespect and disregard the will of the people who live in Wisconsin towns, villages and cities.

Newly elected town of Middleton Chair Cynthia Richson got it right when she said after her write-in win: I would hope that it would be a reminder and perhaps a wake-up call to other representatives who may be deciding that once they get elected that they can pursue any agenda they personally want to as opposed to reaching out to their electors and taking public input.

Share your opinion on this topic by sending a letter to the editor to tctvoice@madison.com. Include your full name, hometown and phone number. Your name and town will be published. The phone number is for verification purposes only. Please keep your letter to 250 words or less.

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Editorial: Rejecting the Republican war on local democracy ... - Madison.com

Elif Shafak is a Turkish novelist and essayist whose works include The Bastard of Istanbul, The Architects Apprentice and Three Daughters of Eve. The WorldPost interviewed her about the results of Turkeys historic referendum granting President Recep Tayyip Erdoan sweeping new powers.

What does it mean for Turkeys long experiment with democracy now that President Recep Tayyip Erdoan has gained more autocratic power through this referendum?

First of all, it needs to be acknowledged that the months of campaigning prior to the referendum were neither balanced nor fair nor free. Every day and night the yes vote was propagated all over Turkish media, both print and TV, most of which are blatantly pro-government. The no vote was not given an equal voice or a free platform to express its concerns. Most of the states resources and news outlets were unilaterally used by and for the yes campaign. People who publicly dared to say that they were going to vote no were intimidated, bullied and attacked by trolls on social media and some of them even lost their jobs. President Recep Tayyip Erdoan included, the AKP [or ruling Justice and Development Party] elite repeatedly accused supporters of the no vote of siding with terrorists. We therefore need to understand the turbulent background to this referendum. Turkey has become the worlds biggest jailer of journalists. Academics have been sacked for signing a peace petition. The co-leaders of the pro-Kurdish HDP, [or Peoples Democratic Party], alongside the local mayors, have been detained and imprisoned. In such a climate of fear and intimidation, how can there be a free, fair and balanced referendum and especially on such an important issue that will alter the countrys entire political system?

This referendum is going to have a massive impact on Turkeys destiny for generations to come. And Turkeys journey will have an impact on an entire region. A decision of such magnitude has been taken through an unfair, one-sided campaign with a slight margin of electoral victory in the end. Given the fact that the governments propaganda has been so widespread and systematic, it is remarkable that only 51 percent have voted yes eventually and that with some serious questions as to the validity of the total number of votes. What the electoral board did at the last minute changing the rules and deciding to count the votes without unofficial stamps was totally unexpected, scandalous. So I am sad about the outcome and worried about my motherland. The referendum has not solved anything. If anything, it deepened the existing cultural and ideological divisions. There is no national consensus, there is no culture of coexistence. Sadly, there is no unity among the opposition either. Turkey is going through not only a political crisis, but also an existential one. Ours is a nation in a deep identity crisis.

Umit Bektas / Reuters

What do the referendum results mean for Turkeys relationship with Europe?

Turkeys relationship with Europe has already hit a rock bottom. The governments rhetoric is jingoistic nationalist and anti-Western, especially with Europe. So we can expect an escalation in that kind of language now. But these things can change and fluctuate, depending on the politics and the interests of the day, for both sides. We should also bear in mind that Turkey is a society of collective amnesia. Last year, Russia was the enemy. This year, it was our friend. It is amazing how fast feelings and foreign policies change when societies are unstable. In fact, one of the first things Erdoan mentioned in his victory speech was reinstating the death penalty. This means severing ties with the European Union. The hegemonic discourse in Turkey today is shaped by Islamism, Turkish nationalism and Euroskepticism.

Does this mark the most significant turning point for the Turkish republic since Mustafa Kemal Atatrk? In a way, is it the final repeal of Kemalism?

This is the most significant turning point in Turkeys modern political history. It is a shift backwards; the end of parliamentary democracy. It is also a dangerous discontinuation of decades of Westernization, secularism and modernization; the discontinuation of Atatrks modern Turkey. Those who defend the presidential system are trying to play it down by arguing that it will be just like France or America. But it wont. It wont because we do not have the culture of democracy, we only have the shape of democracy. In Turkey, the ruling elite do not understand that you need more than the ballot box for a proper, functioning, pluralistic democracy. Turkey does not have the same checks and balances, rule of law, separation of powers and free/diverse media that the U.S. and France relatively enjoy under their presidential systems.

BULENT KILIC via Getty Images

A little over a year ago you said the crackdown on media in the country and the refugee crisis were causing Turkey to slide backwards and become increasingly polarized. You say the referendum is also a shift backward. The narrowness of the victory, the critique by monitors and Erdoans loss of Istanbul also highlight these divisions. What does this identity crisis mean for the future of Turkey?

Turkey has been sliding backwards for many years now. It is not new. But there have been accelerating factors and moments when the decline in our democracy became faster, sharper. The collapse of relations with the EU was one watershed moment. The abandonment of the peace/reconciliation process with the Kurdish PKK [Kurdistan Workers Party] was so sad, if not dangerous. Another horrible moment was the bloody coup attempt in July. Then came the purge. Today, politicians and pro-government newspapers tell young people that it is better to abandon any prospect of joining the EU and walk in the other direction and enter the Shanghai Pact [also known as the Shanghai Cooperation Organization] with Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Russia and China. Its true that this would be the right place for any country with a depressing freedom of speech violations record.

Last summer you described the coup attempt in Turkey as a nail in the coffin of democracy and said we are heading into a Kafkaesque world. Where does Turkey go from here? What are you most concerned about?

The coup attempt was wrong, shocking, sinister and it made everything worse. Turkeys liberals and democrats do not want another military takeover. They dont want a military or a civilian dictatorship. What we need is a proper, functioning, pluralistic democracy. I do not wish anyone in Turkey to have extraordinary powers, to tell you the truth. Whoever has power, demands more and then more. It is never enough. So, primarily, I am concerned about the monopolization of power, the crackdown on diversity and dissent. Turkey is fast becoming yet another Middle Eastern country. Once we used to think this country was a successful and sui generis synthesis, blending a majority-Muslim culture with secularism and Western democracy. No longer.

OZAN KOSE via Getty Images

U.S. President Donald Trump recently congratulated Erdoan on his win. How might his victory impact U.S.-Turkey relations? Do you think Erdoansnewly won power will give hope or momentum to other populist leaders worldwide, specifically Marine Le Pen ahead of the French election? If so, how so?

What is very worrisome is how democracy stopped being a priority, both in the East and in the West. This is the trend we need to reverse across the globe. How can we make democracy a priority again? After decades of globalization, whether we like it or not, we are all interconnected. That is why the kind of isolationism that populist movements champion is neither feasible nor realistic. Populists are encouraged by each other, for sure. The erosion of democracy in one country gives pretext for the erosion of democracy in another country. Extremism in one country breeds extremism elsewhere. Turkey holds important lessons for the world. Turkeys story is a lesson in the fragility of democracy vis--vis populist demagoguery.

Are there any benefits to this result? Stronger defenses against terrorism or a reunified Cyprus, for instance?

That is what the proponents of the presidential system claim they say Turkey will be stronger and decisions can be made speedily. They also say that in the Middle East, we need to choose between stability and democracy. But this is a false dichotomy. Those who believe in this have learned nothing from history. History has shown us time and again that top-down monopolization of power, no matter by which individual, group or party, will bring only unhappiness, and unhappy nations cannot possibly be stable.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

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Turkey Is A Cautionary Tale Of Fragile Democracy, Says Turkish Novelist - Huffington Post

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (Image via Wikipedia)

Turkeys April 16 referendum will be long remembered as a turning point in the countrys political history.

Turks were asked to grant additional executive powers to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, bringing an end to the separation of powers. The 18 proposed constitutional amendments grant the Turkish president sweeping authority over the executive, legislative and judiciary branches, including power to dismiss the Turkish Grand National Assembly and autonomy in drawing the state budget with minimal parliamentary oversight and directly appointing 12 members of the 15-member Constitutional Court. The post of prime minister will also be eliminated to make way for an executive president.

The meager 51.4 percent yes vote shows a divided Turkey. In main urban centers and western Turkey, people overwhelmingly voted against the executive presidency, while rural and poorer segments of the Turkish society mostly voted in favor of strong-man rule.

The no campaign has called for the cancellation of the vote due to fraud. They argue that the High Electoral Board unlawfully allowed for the count of 1.3 million unofficiated yes ballots halfway through the count, tilting the result in favor of Erdogan. A group of international observers has also voiced concerns over the legality of the referendum.

Lets take a look at how a once trustworthy NATO ally, an aspiring EU candidate and an emerging power came to the brink of autocracy.

Erdogans AKP, the Justice and Development Party, has been running the country since 2002. This 15-year-long journey started with a series of democratization reforms supported with steady economic growth.

Ever since his days as the mayor of Istanbul during the 1990s, Erdogan has built his political career as a crafty politician willing and capable of making temporary deals with nonconventional partners against common enemies. For example, Erdogans persistent struggle against the Turkish militarys influence over the regime helped him gain the alliance of the secretive Fetullah Gulen network.

Id argue that liberals in Washington, D.C. and in European capitals misread Erdogans ambitions. They saw him as an open-minded reformer who could bring Islam and democracy together at home and abroad. Barack Obama visited Turkey on his first major foreign trip in April 2009 to underline Turkeys unique role in the Middle East. I myself recently edited a volume that examines a period (2007-2011) when Turkish diplomats and businesspeople served as mediators in different parts of the world from the Western Balkans to Somalia, from Golan Heights to Afghanistan.

But that period was short-lived. The turning point in Turkeys slide toward authoritarianism came as the result of a major miscalculation in international politics.

In 2011, in the wake of the revolutionary uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, Libya and Syria, Turkeys former Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu saw a great opportunity for Erdogan and his AKP to leverage Turkeys liberal Islam model elsewhere in the Middle East.

Erdogan unconditionally supported Islamist groups across the region under the disguise of supporting democratization against dictatorships. Even after the revolution in Egypt failed, Erdogan persisted in pursuing pro-Muslim Brotherhood policies across the Middle East. As the Syrian civil war raged on, Turkey allowed jihadist fighters to cross from Turkey into Syria to fight against the Assad regime.

With time, Turkeys sizable democratic and liberal-minded population began to react against the growing government intervention in their way of life. The Gezi Park protests in summer of 2013 started against the demolishing of a central city park in Istanbul to build a shopping mall. However, it quickly turned into a widespread pro-democracy show of force against Erdogan and his brand of Islamist politics. This drove Erdogan to relinquish his ties with his former liberal allies.

Another thorny issue for Erdogan has been making peace with the countrys 14 million Kurds. Kurds have been demanding political and cultural autonomy from the central government in Ankara. Clashes between the the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) and Turkish military have cost lives of more than 40,000 people over the last four decades.

When official peace talks began between Abdullah Ocalan, the imprisoned leader of the PKK, and President Erdogan, a sense of optimism prevailed in the Kurdish towns of Turkey. But the peace process lacked parliamentary oversight, and it collapsed when Ankara refused to help the Kurdish fighters surrounded in September 2014 by the Islamic State in Kobane, Syria just a few hundred yards from the Turkish border.

The following summer, the AKP lost its majority in parliament when a pro-Kurdish party won a record number of seats. As a result, Erdogan unilaterally ended the peace process with the PKK. He built a new alliance with ultra nationalists that carried out retaliatory attacks in Kurdish population centers, further alienating the Kurds from the countrys political mainstream. Many elected Kurdish MPs and mayors have been imprisoned since the failed coup attempt in July.

Erdogans last and most formidable enemy turned out to be his former ally, the U.S.-based cleric Fetullah Gulen and his secretive and extensive network. Erdogan believes the Gulen network was behind the failed coup attempt of July 2016. He alleges the Gulenists wanted to retaliate against Erdogans punitive measures against their education, business and media networks in Turkey which began after corruption allegations against Erdogan and his family.

Turkey has been living in a state of emergency since July 2016. Erdogan claims that the new executive powers granted him in the referendum will allow him to single-handedly cleanse the enemies of the nation from the judiciary, military and media. Already, thousands of people have been forced out of their government jobs and put in high-security state prisons due to allegations of being a member of the Gulen network.

Is democracy dead in Turkey?

The 51.4 percent yes vote certainly seems to mark the beginning of the end for Turkeys fragile democracy. However, Erdogans clear defeat in Turkeys urban centers and in the western part of the country suggests that a self-confident pro-democracy movement could make life much more difficult than Erdogan expected in the coming months and years.

Doga Ulas Eralp, Professorial Lecturer, American University School of International Service

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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A Turning Point For TurkeyAnd Democracy Across The Globe - GOOD Magazine