Constitutionalism and Developmental Authoritarianism: Power, Law and Legitimacy in Post-Genocide Rwanda

The general aim of this chapter is to contribute to the scientific debate about 'presidents for life' in Sub Saharan Africa. More specifically, based on the analysis of Paul Kagame`s leadership in Rwanda, our goal is to understand which legitimizing criteria may explain the resilience of personalized and authoritarian regimes, and to what extent these criteria compromise the consolidation of constitutionalism and democracy. This article is divided into three sections. Section 1 briefly examines the phenomena of personal rule and power legitimation in Sub Saharan Africa, and how it was impacted by colonial rule, independence, 'Democracy`s third wave' and by the more recent period of 'democratic recession'. Section 2 analyzes the case of Rwanda through three different perspectives: history, power and law, and relates them to the justifications adopted by the RPF regime to legitimize the 2015 constitutional review process. Section 3 presents some preliminary findings.