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Invited for this month's cover is the group of Matthias Beller at the Leibniz Institute for Catalysis in Rostock in collaboration with Muhammad Anwar and Sarim Dastgir at the Qatar Environment and Energy Research Institute in Doha. The image illustrates a hydrodehalogenation of polybrominated diphenyl ether (PBDE) using a heterogeneous nickel catalyst supported on titanium oxide and dihydrogen. The Research Article itself is available at 10.1002/cssc.202102315.

Catalytic methods for the site-selective scission of C(sp3)–C(sp3) bonds remain scarcely explored in contrast to the vast literature on C–C coupling. In view of this, we report a means of oxidative...

The selective cleavage of thermodynamically stable C(sp3 )-C(sp3 ) single bonds is rare compared to their ubiquitous formation. Herein, we describe a general methodology for such transformations using homogeneous copper-based catalysts in the presence of air. The utility of this novel methodology is demonstrated for Cα -Cβ bond scission in >70 amines with excellent functional group tolerance. This transformation establishes tertiary amines as a general synthon for amides and provides valuable possibilities for their scalable functionalization in, for example, natural products and bioactive molecules.

The kinetic and thermodynamic stability of C(sp3)–C(sp3) bonds makes the site-selective activation of these motifs a real synthetic challenge. In view of this, herein a site-selective method of C(sp3)–C(sp3) bond scission of amines, specifically morpholine and piperazine derivatives, using a cheap iron catalyst and air as a sustainable oxidant is reported. Furthermore, a statistical design of experiments (DoE) is used to evaluate multiple reaction parameters thereby allowing for the rapid development of a catalytic process.

The energetically-favorable coordination of aldehydes and ketones – but not esters or amides – to Ni0 during Suzuki–Miyaura reactions can lead either to exquisite selectivity and enhanced reactivity, or to inhibition of the reaction. Aryl halides where the C–X bond is connected to the same π-system as an aldehyde or ketone undergo unexpectedly rapid oxidative addition to [Ni(COD)(dppf)] (1), and are selectively cross-coupled during competition reactions. When aldehydes and ketones are present in the form of exogenous additives, the cross-coupling reaction is inhibited to an extent that depends on the strength of the coordination of the pendant carbonyl group to Ni0. This work advances our understanding of how common functional groups interact with Ni0 catalysts and how these interactions affect workhorse catalytic reactions in academia and industry., Aldehydes and ketones can have beneficial or detrimental effects on nickel-catalysed reactions. When present on the aryl halide, excellent site-selectivity can be achieved; when present as additives, they inhibit the reaction.

Summary How does one deal with a shortcoming in a public service when even a state “pocket of effectiveness” is unlikely to fill it directly? In the Belgian colonial era, South Kivu Province in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo had a vibrant animal production system, which then was shattered by successive wars. The regeneration of Kivu's livestock industry is greatly constrained by the unreliability of the province's state and private animal health services, which have become commercialized and are unable to overcome the asymmetric information problem inherent to the professions and provide the trustworthy effectiveness farmers need to use them effectively. The Congolese state is unlikely to be able to fill this gap itself. Nonetheless, it can be an architect of solutions to the problem. We were able to identify in the local institutional repertoire at least four possible ways policy-makers could use non-governmental organizations to provide missing trustworthiness to the market. This conclusion is hopeful for places with development potential that have weak states and imperfect markets. © 2017 International Livestock Research Institute. Public Administration and Development published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

This chapter considers the effectiveness of institutional agricultural technology systems (IATS) in relation to four criteria: integration, relevance, responsiveness and adoption. It deals with the external factors which inhibit integration, relevance and responsiveness, and which deflect attention from adoption. The chapter focuses on two major sets of factors: those arising from historical institutional legacies, and those related to the contemporary sodo-political structures of most low-income countries. Four groups of people can exert forces which might lead to better integrated and more effective IATS: national policy makers, external donor agencies, farmers’ organizations and commercial firms. The “classic” extension organization in a patron-client society is poor at promoting integration with research. Under default conditions, the part of the IATS that is oriented toward the rural majority tends to be fractured rather than integrated, and its components have no incentive to coalesce. Forces related to the international environment have a mixed impact on national IATS.

The selective cleavage of thermodynamically stable C(sp3)−C(sp3) single bonds is rare compared to their ubiquitous formation. Herein, we describe a general methodology for such transformations using homogeneous copper‐based catalysts in the presence of air. The utility of this novel methodology is demonstrated for Cα−Cβ bond scission in >70 amines with excellent functional group tolerance. This transformation establishes tertiary amines as a general synthon for amides and provides valuable possibilities for their scalable functionalization in, for example, natural products and bioactive molecules.

Summary The world’s poorest pay for professional services and thus are in a “market,” whether the services are provided in the public or private sectors. The associated problems of unequal information are particularly acute in undergoverned countries, where state regulation is weak. We systematically review the evidence on solutions to these problems in a variety of professions. Payments by clients are more likely to have a positive effect on quality if they are made through locally-managed organizations rather than directly to individual practitioners, particularly if those organizations have an institutionalized history of other—regarding values and incorporate client participation.

The reconstruction of a larger polity in a violence‐torn society such as Somalia requires negotiation of a new social contract between the superordinate body and the local units of governance that have provided citizens some degree of order throughout the conflict. In this article we show that the very different trajectories for state‐building in the north and south of the country result in good part from different attention to this generalisation. The founding leaders in Somaliland and Puntland consulted extensively with the assemblies of elders and were able to create civilian constitutional orders. Military leaders in the south and central regions did not incorporate their elders into their political systems, even though they controlled similar amounts of territory to their counterparts in the north. Ultimately various Islamic movements did build on community‐level governance and used it to successfully challenge the old ‘warlords’ but most of those allied with the Transitional Federal Government remain weak at the community base.

Without appropriate institutional checks multiparty democracy can rekindle violent conflicts rather than help to resolve them. The absolutism of 'imperial presidents' is at the root of many of Africa's civil wars and the restoration of this institution in post-conflict states will not help them find security for their citizens. Following Montesquieu, I argue that 'liberty', in the form of checks on executive power, must accompany or precede multiparty democracy in post-conflict reconstruction.

Since 1991 the international system has struggled and failed to recreate a state on the territory of the former Somalia. Proto-state systems have been formed by Somalis themselves in Somaliland and Puntland and alternative forms of governance and order exist in other parts of Somalia, but none enjoys international recognition. The polities of Somalia offer important lessons concerning our general theories about social contract, the role that states play in creating wealth, indigenous systems of governance, and the failure of existing international approaches to state reconstruction. Contemporary Somali politics is re-explored here to extract these lessons. The article explores the assumptions embedded in the works of the classic Western social contract theorists in the light of Somali experience in order to show that the underlying conceptual structure of international state reconstruction work needs to be rethought. We conclude that it frequently is better to allow for bottom-up, organic, disjointed negotiation of indigenous governance solutions (even though they probably will not conform to Western ideas of liberal democracy) than for the international system to impose top-down answers. The former more closely tracks the history of state formation in Europe and the latter is troubled by the inconsistent and not necessarily benign interests of the international actors involved. Indigenous, local political systems are changed by the stresses of violent conflict, so prompt action to employ them in a post-conflict situation is indicated.

Academics and donors have increasingly argued that African states can enhance their general administrative capacity by improving tax revenue collection. Proponents argue that administratively demanding improvements in tax administration may spillover to other areas of public administration by introducing improved practices, necessitating improvements elsewhere and providing data for other government activities. We make the first effort to test this hypothesis empirically, using an improved cross-country data set for sub-Saharan Africa. We find some evidence that from 1973 until the late 1990s improvements in tax administration tended to precede broader administrative improvements, consistent with the research hypothesis. By contrast, we find no evidence of such a pattern over the past decade. We conclude that these results provide tentative support for the hypothesis that improvements in tax collection can be a catalyst for broader gains in state capacity, but that such linkages are not guaranteed and depend on the particular character of reform. Points for practitioners Those involved with public administrative reform efforts have long been confronted with the question of whether reform is, or should be, an essentially system-wide process, or focused on developing ‘pockets of effectiveness’. This debate is particularly relevant to tax reform: a growing academic literature has argued that tax reform can be a catalyst for system-wide change, but the dominant reform model has focused on the creation of autonomous revenue agencies to achieve rapid but focused capacity gains. This research examines the case for believing that tax reform can be a catalyst for broader reform, and thus the case for adopting a reform model that focuses more explicitly on system-wide change.

Resume Les universitaires et les bailleurs de fonds soutiennent de plus en plus que les pays d’Afrique peuvent ameliorer leur capacite administrative generale en ameliorant le recouvrement des recettes fiscales. Les partisans de cette theorie soutiennent que les ameliorations eprouvantes sur le plan administratif au sein de l’administration fiscale peuvent avoir des retombees dans d’autres domaines de l’administration publique en instaurant des pratiques ameliorees, necessitant des ameliorations dans d’autres secteurs, et en apportant des informations utiles a d’autres activites de l’Etat. Nous sommes les premiers a verifier cette hypothese sur le plan empirique au moyen d’un ensemble de donnees transnationales ameliore pour l’Afrique subsaharienne. Certaines donnees indiquent qu’entre 1973 et la fin des annees 90, les ameliorations dans l’administration fiscale precedaient generalement des ameliorations administratives plus larges, conformement a notre hypothese de recherche. En revanche, rien ne semble indiquer qu’une telle tendance ait existe au cours de la derniere decennie. Notre conclusion est que ces resultats confirment dans une certaine mesure l’hypothese selon laquelle les ameliorations dans le recouvrement de l’impot peuvent susciter des ameliorations plus larges dans la capacite de l’Etat, mais que ces correlations ne sont pas garanties et dependent du caractere particulier de la reforme.Resume a l’intention des praticiensLes personnes associees aux initiatives de reforme de l’administration publique se sont pendant longtemps pose la question de savoir si la reforme etait, ou devait etre, un processus s’etendant essentiellement a l’echelle du systeme ou s’il devait etre axe sur le developpement de « poches d’efficacite ». Ce debat est particulierement pertinent en matiere de reforme fiscale : de plus en plus d’auteurs soutiennent que la reforme fiscale peut favoriser le changement a l’echelle du systeme, mais le modele de reforme predominant se concentre sur la creation d’administrations fiscales autonomes afin d’obtenir des gains de capacite rapides mais cibles. La presente etude verifie l’hypothese selon laquelle la reforme fiscale peut favoriser une reforme plus large, et donc le bien-fonde de l’adoption d’un modele de reforme plus explicitement axe sur le changement a l’echelle du systeme.

Is the analysis of patron‐client networks still important to the understanding of developing country politics or has it now been overtaken by a focus on ‘social capital’? Drawing on seventeen country studies of the political environment for livestock policy in poor countries, this article concludes that although the nature of patronage has changed significantly, it remains highly relevant to the ways peasant interests are treated. Peasant populations were found either to have no clear connection to their political leaders or to be controlled by political clientage. Furthermore, communities ‘free’ of patron‐ clienttiestothecentregenerallyarenotbetterrepresentedbypoliticalassociations but instead receive fewer benefits from the state. Nonetheless, patterns ofclientagearedifferentfromwhattheywerefortyyearsago.First,patronage chains today often have a global reach, through trade, bilateral donor governmentsandinternationalNGOs.Second,theresourcesthatfuelpoliticalclientage today are less monopolistic and less adequate to the task of purchasing peasant political loyalty. Thus the bonds of patronage are less tight than they were historically. Third, it follows from the preceding point and the greater diversity of patrons operating today that elite conflicts are much more likely to create spaces in which peasant interests can eventually be aggregated into autonomous associations with independent political significance in the national polity. NGOs are playing an important role in opening up this political space although at the moment, they most often act like a new type of patron.

It is well established that even in countries that have poor governance and weak public sectors, exceptional well-functioning government and government-supported agencies do exist. What has not been established is where and why these ‘pockets of effectiveness’ are able to emerge. Some attribute their existence to exceptional leadership and good management. Others, while not doubting the importance of these internal factors, believe that these ‘pockets’ are generated by their place in the country's political economy. The literature on this subject is dominated by case studies and the consequence is that a very large number of hypotheses have been generated about what the political processes at work might be. This article inventories the array of available hypotheses and condenses them into five sets of meta-hypotheses. It also discusses how social scientists and practitioners ought to think about something whose occurrence is idiosyncratic. The future of development administration will be enhanced by more informed choice of strategic opportunities—avoiding both political determinism and a naive faith that all is equally possible to those who will it. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

For many Kenyans the outcome of the 2007 presidential election represented a continuation of the betrayal of the promise made by Mwai Kibaki's government, elected in 2002, that a new Constitution would be drafted which would help to deal with Kenya's governance problems. The consequence was a closely contested election, ethnic division, a flawed election process, and serious post-election violence, which lasted well into 2008. This article analyses the underlying political features of Kenya that led to the election failure itself and the fundamental changes to the Kenyan system, including its Constitution, that are necessary to avert a recurrence of the 2007 election violence in the future.

Since 1990 contested elections have again become a regular fixture of the political systems of sub-Saharan Africa. But what do they mean? In this issue of the Journal of African Elections we consider four important sets of African elections and the lessons that can be drawn from them, both for democracy and for best electoral practice. None of these elections was 'typical' for the continent. All were fiercely contested. Those in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Sierra Leone came after extended periods of civil war; Kenya's provoked a major outbreak of violence after the results were announced; while Nigeria's saw opposition wins at the sub-national level and loss of life around the polling itself. Each has something important to say about the meaning of elections in Africa and the challenges that arise in running them well.

This study evaluates Sierra Leone's 2007 and 2008 elections, the role of the international community in supporting them, and their implications for the country's democracy. The 2007 presidential and parliamentary elections in Sierra Leone, the third generation of elections since the end of the civil war, were deemed substantially fair and resulted in a change of governing party, with Ernest Bai Koroma as president and the African Peoples Congress (APC) in the majority in Parliament. The 2008 local government elections were less successful, but gave the APC an even more decisive win. The restoration of peace in Sierra Leone, the succession of reasonable elections since 2000, and the change of regime via the ballot box in 2007 are all rightly seen as major accomplishments. This article examines the institutions of Sierra Leone's society and government that combined with international assistance to produce these positive results. Nonetheless, the structural conditions that gave rise to the civil war in the country - under-development, resource flows (diamonds and now, increasingly, drugs) that are difficult to control, a corrupt and remote political elite, marginalised youth, and strong regional divides in politics - all continue to exist.

In 2006 the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) held its first multiparty legislative and presidential elections in more than 40 years. Although not without flaws these elections were seen by international observers as acceptably fair. They were also designed as a major milestone on the road to peace in a country that has been torn apart by civil war. The United Nations peacekeeping mission in the Congo and the multi-donor election support that brought about these elections were both the largest and most expensive ever undertaken by the UN. The article poses two questions. One is, is democracy at hand in the DRC? The other is, have elections helped to bring peace? The answer to the first is 'Yes', but only if the term is defined narrowly to mean that multiple parties compete for power and that there is some marginal chance that the prime ministership might move to the opposition in 2011. If the question is rooted in a deeper understanding of democracy as based on the rule of law, protection for the political rights of minorities, a vigorous press, and, above all else, responsiveness of political leadership to the wishes of the citizenry, much is still lacking in the Congo. In most respects Congolese political life seems to be remarkably lacking in accountability. The answer to the second is cautiously positive. The number of warring groups in the DRC has been reduced and the elections gave President Kabila and his international interlocutors the legitimacy they needed to negotiate with Rwanda for the removal of the threat posed to the eastern DRC by General Nkunda.

Summary The Somali pastoral system of production covers at least six political entities. Three of the formal ones are within the borders of the former Republic of Somalia and do not meet the full definition of states. Despite the warfare that has often engulfed the former Somalia, it is a mistake to think of the three political entities that occupy it as necessarily or wholly anarchic. Lineage institutions have survived from the colonial era and been resurrected to provide venues for negotiation, consensus-building and the reduction of interpersonal violence, even if not the authoritative imposition of decisions upon groups of the unwilling. After 17 years of centrality to the continuity of Somali governance and the recreation of quasi-state political authorities, however, these lineage institutions are showing signs of stress. As their great influence came to be recognised they were penetrated by patronage and used by warlords to prosecute sub-clan warfare. They no longer are able to provide consensus representation even in the peaceful political systems of Somaliland and Puntland. Somalis therefore have experimented with new political institutions that could provide a greater basis for cross-clan action and authoritative decision-making – regional nationalism and democracy in Somaliland and Islamic sheria in all the territories but especially by the now-deposed (but far from dead) Union of Islamic Courts. Indeed sheria now is a central, unifying ideology throughout the Somalis, even if there is conflict over its interpretation and the instrumentalities through which it will be enforced. Somali governmental processes thus are present, but weak in their ability to impose decisions and to project their authority into the rural areas. There are public goods that Somalis need which only states can provide. But the transformation of traditional order in the warlord conflicts of the last 17 years will make such states difficult to create.

Niagale Bagayoko-Penone (2003) Afrique: les strategies francaise et americaine, Paris: L'Harmattan, 619 pp. Thomas P. M. Barnett (2004) The Pentagon's New Map: War and Peace in the 21st Century, Ne...

Both governments and private for-profit markets have been disappointing in meeting the needs of the African poor for health care. NGO services provide a much more attractive alternative for this clientele, despite the fees they charge. They do so because they represent an institutional solution to the ‘imperfect information’ problem in health care. Through simulations based on data from Cameroon, we demonstrate that if fee-charging NGOs replace the highly subsidised but poorly managed facilities operated by African governments the poor would be better off. Those NGOs that are decentralised in their financial and personnel management are most effective. The politics of making the recommended changes are assessed.

The use of a new traction-flexion device(Jilco Chair) is described for treatment of chronic low back pain. A 65-yr.-old male patient suffered from chronic back pain associated with degenerative joint disease (L5 spondylosis with disc narrowing and facet arthrosis). The Oswestry Low Back Pain Disability Questionnaire and the Visual Analog Scale were used as measurements of improved functional capacity and pain mitigation. The use of specialized traction-flexion combination exercises using the Jilco Chair protocol resulted in Oswestry reduction from 42% to 24%, reduction of pain by up to 50% (VAS), and improved range of motion within a three week period.

Summary The authors review a number of critical issues in the structural reform of animal health services for both small and non-commercial livestock producers in Africa and highlight several problems that others concerned with the privatisation of this service area have tended to neglect. Most notably, attention is called to the following: a) the need to retain a central role for paraprofessional s in the new delivery system b) the important and problematic relationship between the veterinary and paraveterinary professions c) the importance of developing state contracting procedures for assisting the private delivery of animal health services that will avoid the problems of local monopoly d) the central role that professionalism will have to play in this area, if collective goods and the public interest are to be served.

This study reviews and extends the considerableliterature demonstrating that the various College Boardexaminations (most importantly the Scholastic AptitudeTests) make a small underprediction of women's college grades relative to those of men in allfields except engineering. This finding persists evenwhen corrections are made for differences in the fieldsthat women and men study and for sample selection bias. Because of this underprediction, womenmost probably are underrepresented relative to theirmerit in freshman classes and scholarship competitionsat selective public universities. The differences in predicted grades are small, but account foran underrepresentation of women by at least 5% of thefreshman classes of the University of California atBerkeley (200 to 300 a year) in the late 1980s. Various solutions to this underprediction by the SATsand the dilemmas they pose for public universities suchas Berkeley are explored.

This article reviews a number of critical issues in the structural reform of animal health services in Africa. Using the New Institutional Economics, it highlights several problems that others concerned with the privatization of this service area have tended to neglect. Most notably it calls attention to: (1) the need to retain a central role for paraprofessionals in the new delivery system; (2) the desirability of competition between the veterinary and para-veterinary professions; (3) the importance of developing state contracting procedures for assisting the private delivery of animal health that will avoid the problems of local monopoly; and (4) the central role that new and strengthened professional associations will have to play in this area if collective goods and the public interest are to be served. The article's larger purpose is to demonstrate that the New Institutional Economics has a great deal to contribute to the older precepts of neo-classical economics in anticipating and thinking through the fundamental changes that privatization of professional services in Africa are posing. In this sense it is a first step in a larger programme of empirical and theoretical research.

Summary The problems of poor performance by African civil services would be partially alleviated through an increase in professionalism, which would assure both higher standards and greater attention to collective goods in public policy. Such professionalism can be enhanced through increased attention to African professional associations and the integration of their members into international professional networks. A preliminary proposal is advanced for the creation of several international professional ‘grand corps’ of African administrators so as to meet the structural requirements for high performance in the service of African states. Resume Les problemes des administrations publiques africaines peu performantes seraient alleges en partie par une augmentation du professionnalisme, qui garantirait a la fois des niveaux de performance meilleurs et une attention plus soignee aux biens collectifs dans la politique de l'administration publique. Ce professionnalisme serait mis en valeur en consacrant une plus grande attention aux associations professionnelles en Afrique et a l'integration de leurs membres dans les reseaux professionnels internationaux. Une proposition initiale est avancee pour la creation en Afrique de plusieurs grand corps internationaux des professionnels de l'administration, dans l'optique de repondre aux exigences structurelles d'une performance excellente, soutenue, et dediee au service des etats africains. Resumen Los problemas de pobre actuacion por parte de los servicios publicos Africanos podrian ser aliviados parcialmento con un incremento en el profesionalismo, que aseguraria al mismo tiempo niveles mas altos y mas atencion al bien comun en las politicas oficiales. Ese profesionalismo puede ser acrecentado a traves de una mayor importancia a las asociaciones profesionales africanas y la integracion de sus miembros a redes profesionales internacionales. Se ofrece en el articulo una propuesta preliminar para la creacion de varios ‘grand corps’ de administracion para satisfacer los requerimientos estructurales de alto rendimiento en los servicios de los Estados africanos.

Such rural development programs are quite demanding in their organizational requirements. First, the implementing agency must have a special commitment to the delivery of program services to the rural poor. In social systems it is unnatural for benefits to be dispensed equally, much less redistributed toward the disadvantaged. Some inner or outer dynamic force must motivate the organization to overcome the momentum of inequality.

The new institutional economics offers a range of analytical tools and insights which can be used in restructuring the animal health services of a country. This paper discusses three of the most important--externalities, transaction costs and asymmetric (unequal) information. These tools can be used to craft a system which is sensitive to the particular institutional heritage of a country and to its political, social and economic realities. Institutions are important in this process and the best way for one society is often not the optimal choice for another.

We used factor and path analyses to identify the causal paths or relationships between variables affecting the demand and use by subsistence farmers of the various services offered by government-employed veterinary livestock technicians (VLTs) in Zimbabwe in 1996. We examined whether the farmer had implemented the VLT-recommended livestock-management procedures. Various factors that have been reported or theorised as important in the demand for veterinary services by subsistence farmers are described. The important factors positively affecting whether farmers had sought veterinary assistance in the last 24 months included familiarity of the farmer with the VLT, if situated closer to the VLT’s base, and if the farmer received further training in agriculture (either through courses or from attendance at demonstrations on animal husbandry conducted by the VLT). Factors affecting whether farmers implemented the recommended management practices that had a monetary cost included familiarity with the VLT, proximity to the VLT’s premises, farmer literacy, club membership, and farmer’s wealth. There was a difference in the paths generated for preventive measures that had a monetary cost versus those measures that involved only a labour or effort costs. For the former practices, the VLT played an important role informing farmers by extension and demonstrations, and farmer’s membership of a club increased their performance.

In African health care the "miracle of the market "has not occurred. Patients exhibit willingness to pay for health care and yet practitioners are unable to sell their services. Simultaneously non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are running successful health facilities for which patients are willing to pay. We develop a model of the demand for health care in the presence of asymmetric information that allows us to view African health care in the framework of the New Institutional Economics literature. We use previously published empirical results to support the validity of this view and show that NGOs have the institutional capacity to deliver high quality health care, whereas private practitioners, even with good intentions, will not easily succeed. Having arrived at the well documented conclusion that NGOs provide high quality services through theory allows us to draw policy conclusions on ways to extend the provision of health services.

Summary Summary It has become customary to despair at the quality of African public sector management, and to attribute the problem to an inhospitable social and political context. Yet we can discover success stories even in the usual sector in which failure is most prevalent. By looking at these cases we can attempt to discover the ‘secret of success’ and thus some indications about how to deal with less successful cases. This article attempts to do this by looking at the life and career histories of four prominent Kenyan officials who were able to endow success on many enterprises that they led. It concludes that the way in which they were able to maintain the autonomy of their organisations was by establishing effective links with the political leadership; it explains how their commitment to good administration derived from and was reinforced by a strong sense of professional vocation; how their capacity to raise resources was reinforced by their ability to maintain the support of donor agencies; how they sought effective methods of balancing Africanisation against the need to retain expatriate staff; and how their willingness to take risks depended upon their ability to make a good living outside the state service if need be. Resume Resume Les Secrets du Succes du Management africain Il est devenu courant de desesperer de la qualite du management du secteur publique africain, et d'attribuer le probleme a un contexte politique et social defavorable. Pourtant on peut trouver des succes meme dans le secteur rural, ou normalement l'echec est le plus frequent. En analysant ces cas, nous pouvons essayer de decouvrir les ‘secrets du succes’ et ainsi trouver quelques indications sur la maniere de resoudre ceux qui ont moins reussi. Cet article se propose de presenter cette analyse en s'appuyant sur un expose de la vie et la carriere de quatre important officiels du Kenya, qui ont mene au succes bien des projets qu'ils ont diriges. Il analyse la maniere dont ils ont reussi a maintenir l'autonomie de leurs organisations en etablissant des liens efficaces avec les dirigeants politiques; aussi comment leur engagement pour une bonne administration provenait et etait renforcee par un sentiment profond de vocation professionelle; comment leur aptitude a augmenter les resources a ete renforcee par leur competence dans le maintien de leur soutien Ils ont recherche des methodes effectives pour equilibrer l'africanisation et le besoin de conserver le personnel etrange; Ils ont aussi recherche comment le fait qu'ils etaient disposes a prendre des risques dependait de leur aptitude a gagner leur vie en dehors de leur fonction publique si cela etait necessaire.