Multi-Level Governance in the African Union. The Role of Civil Society Organisations in the African Union’s. Post-Conflict Reconstruction and Development Policy

This paper argues that supranational structures like the African Union (AU) can help to facilitate democratic participation of various actors in decision making procedures that have very little chance to influence the politics of their respective national governments otherwise. To make this possible, it is necessary to shift the focus from 'government' to 'governance', as the Multi-Level Governance (MLG) theory suggests. However, in order to apply this theory effectively to the AU, it is necessary to make a number of conceptual adjustments. It will then be shown, on the example of civil society engagement in the framing of the AU's Post-Conflict Reconstruction and Development (PCRD) Policy, that MLG is taking place in the AU, albeit under different preconditions as known from the European Union, where the Theory emerged from.