Mali

L'Organisation Internationale du Travail (2013) a défini des concepts clefs par rapport au marché du travail lors de sa 19ème Conférence Internationale des Statisticiens du Travail. Ce sont la population en âge de travailler, la main-d'œuvre, la population hors main-d'œuvre, la population en emploi, la population au chômage, et plusieurs autres indicateurs de sous- utilisation de la main-d'œuvre. Tous les indicateurs liés à ces concepts sont ici estimés sur les données d'enquêtes Afrobarometer de 2014-2020, enquêtes régulières et périodiques menées au Mali depuis 2001.

In this year of COVID-19, the ability of societies to work collectively to respond to challenges has taken center stage. In fact, early public support for and adherence to public health measures has been cited as one factor explaining Africa’s far lower per-capita infection and death rates compared to other global regions (BBC, 2020).

After weeks of massive demonstrations demanding President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta’s resignation, thousands of jubilant Malians celebrated the military coup that removed him from office on 18 August (Al Jazeera, 2020). But some observers were left to wonder whether democracy in Mali is dead.

“We’re all in this together” is a mantra of the COVID-19 crisis as leaders and activists argue for global and all-of-society responses to the pandemic (e.g. World Health Organization, 2020; African Union, 2020). At the same time, public fears have highlighted social fissures through acts of intolerance and violence against Chinese people, citizens of Asian descent in many countries, and even Africans in China (e.g. DW, 2020; Guy, 2020; Kandil, 2020; Al Jazeera, 2020).

Education is a powerful tool to fight poverty, enable upward socioeconomic mobility, and empower people to live healthier lives. But while the global adult literacy rate continues to increase, from 81% in 2000 to 86% in 2018 (World Bank, 2019), the challenge of access to quality education remains particularly severe in Africa. Even before the COVID-19 crisis, globally one out of five children aged 6-17 years were not in school; more than half of these children live in sub-Saharan Africa.

More than half of all Africans go without needed medical care at least once in a given year, a new analysis of Afrobarometer survey data shows. Across the continent, citizens identify health as the second-most-important national problem they want their governments to address.

Even before the threat of overwhelming demand due to COVID-19, about one in five Africans faced a frequent lack of needed health-care services, including almost two-thirds of the poorest citizens.

More than half of Africans say their governments are failing them when it comes to one of their top priorities – the provision of clean water and sanitation services, a new Afrobarometer analysis shows. Half of survey respondents say they went without enough clean water for home use during the previous year – a particular concern considering the importance of proper hygiene for preventing the spread of coronavirus and other infectious diseases.

Economic destitution – whether measured as the frequency with which people go without basic necessities or as the proportion of people who live on less than $1.90 a day – declined steadily in Africa between 2005 and 2015. However, the findings of Afrobarometer Round 7 surveys, conducted in 34 African countries between late 2016 and late 2018, demonstrate that improvements in living standards have come to a halt and “lived poverty” is once again on the rise.

Climate change is “the defining development challenge of our time,” and Africa the continent most vulnerable to its consequences, according to the African Union (2015) and the United Nations (UN Environment, 2019). Farmers in Uganda waiting endlessly for rain (URN, 2019), cyclone survivors in Mozambique and Zimbabwe digging out of the mud and burying their dead (Associated Press, 2019) – these images bring home what changing climate and increasingly extreme weather conditions may mean for everyday Africans.

Observers now commonly assert that multiparty elections are institutionalized as a standard feature of African politics (Posner & Young, 2007; Bratton, 2013; Cheeseman, 2018; Bleck & van de Walle, 2019). By this they mean that competitive electoral contests are the most commonplace procedure for choosing and changing political leaders across the continent.

Almost all African states face pressure to deliver improved public services to their citizens. In both emerging democracies and persistent authoritarian regimes, politics profoundly shapes how states distribute public goods such as roads, schools, health clinics, and electricity access (Briggs, 2014; Dixit & Londregan, 1996; Harding & Stasavage, 2014; Kramon & Posner, 2013; Min, 2015; Weingast, Shepsle, & Johnsen, 1981).

Protection of individual rights and liberties has been on both the African continental agenda and the global agenda for decades, shaped especially by the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights. But the reality on the ground is often a far cry from the high standards set forth in these documents. 

Africa has long been characterized as a continent of strong societies and weak states (Migdal, 1988; Chickering & Haley, 2007; Henn, 2016). This image suggests that, compared to an informal sector rich in networks of self-help, mutual aid, and private entrepreneurship, public sector institutions are ineffective at getting things done. As a set of formal structures imported during colonial rule, the centralized state for decades remained “suspended in mid-air” – that is, above society – with limited aptitude to address the everyday needs of ordinary Africans (Hyden, 1983; Boone, 2006).

By 2050, it is projected that one in every four humans will be African as the continent doubles its population, accounting for more than half of global population growth (United Nations, 2015; World Economic Forum, 2017). Even with a land mass greater than India, China, the United States, and Europe combined, and blessed with one-third of the earth’s mineral resources (Custers & Mattlysen, 2009; Bermudez-Lugo et al., 2014), will Africa be able to provide the livelihood opportunities its people demand and need?

For democracy to be “lived” by ordinary citizens, their ability to engage with others and the state must be protected. While civil freedoms and rights are thus considered core elements of democracies, their mere existence on paper does not mean that citizens will use or benefit from them.

A l’instar de tous les pays de l’Afrique de l’Ouest, le Mali est frappé par un changement climatique très avarié. A cet effet, l’économie malienne, essentiellement basée sur l’agrosilvopastorale, fait face à des conséquences graves, y compris la baisse de la pluviométrie de 30% depuis les années 1998 et l’intensification de l’insécurité alimentaire (Stewart, 2013; Arsenault, 2015).

Much of the rhetoric ahead of Mali’s national elections in July has focused on security and reunification in the face of a continuing armed rebellion in the North (Bekow, 2018). Perhaps less obviously, the stakes are also high when it comes to what Malians demand from their government and their democracy.

ONLY AVAILABLE IN FRENCH.

Le présent rapport traite des questions portant sur les plus importants problèmes auxquels le Mali fait face et auxquels le gouvernement devrait s'attaquer. Il traite successivement de ces problèmes tels que révélés par les citoyens dans l'enquête Afrobaromètre de 2017 au Mali, des domaines de développement que recouvrent ces problèmes, et enfin des Objectifs de Développement Durable (ODD) qui peuvent en être tirés, objectifs correspondant à ceux de Nations Unies à l'horizon 2030.