Senegal: Sustaining Secularism
The French colonized the region of West Africa now known as Senegal from the mid-1600s until late 1958, when the country became an autonomous republic within the French Community.
At the end of one year of federation with Mali, Senegal became an independent state in 1960, with political power divided fairly evenly between President Leopold Senghor and Prime Minister Mamadou Dia. Following an unsuccessful coup d’etat by Dia in 1962, Senegal promulgated a new constitution that gives the president more power than the previous constitution. This 1962 constitution has been revised, but retained by the National Assembly in 1991 and reconfirmed by national referendum in 2001.In comparison to other African countries, Senegal has had a good record of political stability and a relatively high degree of respect for constitutional principles under the leadership of Senghor, a Catholic who ruled a predominantly Muslim population from independence until he retired in 1981. His political successor, Adbou Diouf, a Muslim, presided until 2001. Under these two long-term presidents, the executive branch has retained most of the power in Senegal, with the legislative and judicial branches as secondary institutions. However, the system has been described as quasi-, partial, and semi-democratic (Schaffer 1998: 117). Its multi-party system is seen as nominal since The Parti Socialiste (PS) actually exercised hegemonic control over the government from independence until 2001.
President Diouf was defeated in 2000 by Abdoulaye Wade, his longtime rival and leader of the Parti Democratique (PD), but PS retained control of the National Assembly. Wade’s election was probably facilitated by the 1997 National Electoral Observatory which secured transparency in elections. Lacking the constitutional power to dissolve the Assembly and call for new elections on his own, Wade organized a constitutional referendum in 2001, and by popular support amended the constitution to allow for new elections.
In the April 2001 elections, Wade’s party captured 89 of the 120 Assembly seats. The amended constitution also grants more power to the legislature and less to the president than used to be the case, though the judicial branch of government still remains rather ineffectual compared to the other two. With Wade’s election and subsequent constitutional reforms, constitutionalism in Senegal seems to be recovering from the legitimacy crisis of the late 1990s, when Diouf and the PS exercised excessively hegemonic control over both the executive and legislative branches of government (Villalon 1999: 132).For the purposes of this chapter in particular, however, Senegal is also experiencing a surge in Islamic militancy against the secular constitution, and mounting claims for implementation of Shariʿa law. This recent phenomenon appears to be associated with several factors. The economic crisis of the 1980s, with its particularly negative impact on agriculture, has severely affected the daily lives of many Senegalese (Coulon 1989: 157). The effects of the economic instability are compounded by social instability as Senegalese Muslims struggle to maintain a moral and social identity in the face of Western hegemony. This complex economic and social context has apparently affected the relationship between the state and the marabout Islamic leaders in Senegal, which is particularly important for the development of constitutionalism in the country, as explained below.
The broader question of how Senegal came to enjoy this relatively good degree of constitutional and democratic governance is beyond the scope of this book. What I am concerned with here is why and how Islam has played a positive role in Senegalese constitutionalism, where Muslims constitute more than 90 percent of the country’s population, while it has been so problematic in the cases of Sudan and Nigeria. It is possible to approach this specific question in several ways or at different levels of analysis.
For instance, one can begin by identifying apparently relevant factors in the local context and trying to understand their role in the constitutional development of the country. From this perspective, the next question would be whether it is possible to abstract broader theoretical implications from the empirical facts of a given situation that can be applied to understanding or influencing the role of Islam in other situations. Even to the extent that it is possible to identify the “correct” relevant factors and actors in Senegal, and accurately characterize their interaction with other factors and actors in that setting, it may still not follow that the same set of interactive factors and actors will operate in similar ways in countries like Sudan or Nigeria. Since no two situations are identical—indeed, the situation in the same setting can significantly change over time—it is simply impossible to completely isolate and examine one set of factors and actors for comparative analysis. Such comparisons depend not only on factor X being exactly the same in both Senegal and Sudan, for instance, but also on other factors being similar or different to some degree in both settings at a particular time.Thus, the constitutional experiences of human societies cannot be subjected to supposedly precise analysis in a totally controlled environment that allows for the isolation and experimental mixing of various elements in the process. Still, some insights can be gained from comparative analysis for the purposes of the broader thesis of incremental success through process and the notion of the contingent role of Islam. Provided one is sensitive to the limitations of comparative analysis, understanding how the process works in each setting will enable those concerned to plan and implement strategies for facilitating the process through the internal dynamic of each situation. The more specific thesis of the contingent role of Islam can be applied by trying to identify relevant factors and actors, in order to promote those that are positive and discourage or minimize those that are negative from the point of view of constitutionalism.
From this perspective, it seems that the relevant factors and actors in the case of Senegal include the highly organized and centralized marabout brotherhoods and their relationships to the secular state in Senegal. Another factor, though harder to describe or identify, could be that Sufi Islam, to which many Senegalese subscribe, as cultivated by the French during colonialism, is highly conformist and open to the idea of a secular state. Whether or not these or some other set of factors and actors are relevant, another question is why Senegal has witnessed a recent rise in Islamic militancy and calls for the implementation of Shariʿa. That question would then lead to an examination of the factors that may be associated with this recent negative development that can override the role of other factors in favor of a more positive role of Islam. One point to note here is that, whatever the precise factors and dynamics may be, the general analysis is one about the contingent role of Islam, how it has been shaped in a particular way and can change over time. Another point is that such contingency can be useful even when one disagrees about the relevance or role of one factor or another. It may therefore be useful to follow this line of analysis a bit farther to see whether it can yield some useful insights.