The Challenges of Data Collection in Unstable Countries:Perspectives from the Africa Integrity Indicators
Author: Mziwandile Ndlovu, PhD
Collecting reliable governance data from all 54 African countries is a monumental task that the Africa Integrity Indicators (AII), a project of the African Institute for Development Policy (AFIDEP), has successfully done for over a decade. Despite this success, it is still an onerous task, involving the differing contexts of the countries with varying levels of stability and security. Governance data is also very sensitive as it broadly defines a country’s international profile. Several multilateral institutions, notably those focusing on economic issues, sometimes make generalisations for the continent despite having failed to gather reliable data in certain countries due to considerable difficulties. In all its history, AII has gone out of its way to ensure that data is collected in all countries against all odds.
Security of Contributors and Sources
The AII project relies on in-country lead researchers to lead data collection and expert reviewers to assist with quality control and peer review. They work on data revolving around judicial independence, electoral integrity, corruption, public procurement, political finance, freedom of expression and assembly, as well as minority rights which many authoritarian regimes would rather shield from public scrutiny. The AII project management team has faced significant difficulties in recruiting reliable researchers and peer reviewers in some unstable countries such as Sudan, Mali, Guinea, Eritrea, Somalia, Ethiopia, Libya, Central African Republic, Mozambique, Niger, Chad and Burkina Faso. These countries are either under military administration or are experiencing civil war/social strife. Several AII in-country contributors have faced harassment and victimisation for their work, and, in the worst of cases, some have endured arrest as was the case of the Algeria contributors for the 2022–2023 cycle.
The AII project has faced difficulties securing contributors in unstable countries, with these having mostly no responses following public calls for contributors. This is mainly because potential researchers fear the repercussions of working on a project of this nature. In some instances, researchers for such countries tend to be found in the diaspora communities of these countries, mainly in Europe and the Americas, who enjoy relative safety to work on sensitive issues of their countries of origin. Conducting research remotely comes with challenges, such as having reliable access to sources and data.
The AII project also highly relies on key informant interviews as a cornerstone of its data. It has proven to be challenging in unstable countries to get informants who are prepared to consent to interviews on the record. To circumvent this problem, the project allows for anonymous submissions. The project management team battles to limit the number of anonymous sources for unstable countries as too many sources prefer to be anonymous in order to insulate themselves from any repercussions.
Censorship
Unsurprisingly, the best data on the AII project, are from the most democratic countries with high levels of open governance and public information on multiple platforms. The opposite is usually true in unstable countries where data is relatively scant as there are hardly any functional websites or repositories for public institutions. If they are available, the information is usually outdated or largely inadequate. Emergency legislation, necessitated by war, is generally used as a convenient scapegoat for withholding as much public information as possible. At the worst of times, especially during elections, the internet is jammed, and there are arrests and intimidation of journalists. For these reasons, researchers struggle to access the required data and have to go out of their way, sometimes putting themselves in harm’s way, to access information. In countries like Libya with rival administrations, it is a big challenge to collect reliable data which is representative of the country.