Understanding Military Takeovers in post-Cold War Africa: The Cases of Mali and Burkina Faso

Recently, Africa is experiencing a gradual rise in military takeovers – a turnaround in a pro-democratic era of the post-cold war Africa. This phenomenon harkens back to earlier years of surge in military takeovers that destabilized post-independent African states. Scholars have been intrigued by the nature of political regime types that have encountered this sudden displacement of government, as well as the underlying sociopolitical and economic causes and effects of military takeovers. The recent tide of military removal of duly elected governments seem to be prevalent in Western Africa, and at a moment of global socioeconomic strain resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. What are the proximate causes to this known political disruption in Africa? This research effort examines military takeovers at a time of post-cold war democratic progression in Africa, based on the examples of Mali and Burkina Faso. Given this periodic context, this work considers some significant causes within a conceptual framework that highlights two schools of thought in the causes of military takeovers: the state\u27s socioeconomic and political environment versus the indiscipline of the military in question. Based on gross domestic product (GDP) values, corruption perception index (CPI), and fragile states index (FSI) for a decade, the study affirms the socioeconomic and political causes, but with much needed nuance