By-Elections in Botswana : An Examination of Hypotheses about By-elections in an African Context

The traditional study of by-elections has tended to focus on whether or not they are an indicator of shifting political fortunes of particular political parties or unique events governed by immediate circumstances or a politician's personality. However, in recent years, in Africa, by-elections are being taken as a measure of the health of the nation and society, but not just in the sense of a "healthy democracy," although that is one possible benefit from studying by- elections. Rather, scholars working with the Institute for Democracy in South Africa (IDASA) have recently begun to use the occurrence of by-elections as a measure of the health of individual members of parliament and/or local government councils. This project examines the role that by-elections have played in Botswana by using both the traditional approach to determining the role of by-elections in the larger political process and as an indicator of the "health" of the people who make democracy work in the country