‘Beijing Consensus’ and the Experience of China’s Reform

MONEY AND POLITICS: THE CASE OF PARTY NOMINATIONS IN KENYA. INTRODUCTION The impact of money on politics is unquestionable. The availability or otherwise of money has enormous influence on the conduct and nature of general elections in all democracies whether consolidated or transitional. It is now common knowledge that elections have become very costly not only to the governments that have to manage them, but also to the political parties and individual candidates. The high costs of elections have direct bearing on two ingredients of electoral democracy, namely, popular participation and fair contestation. Indeed, it has been argued that the large sums of money spent in elections have had tragic effects on democracy including deterring citizens from political participation.1 There is also the danger that as elections become more expensive and campaign spending increases considerably, effective participation will be absent from the election campaigns. This is likely to lead to the poor losing confidence in the efficacy of their contribution to the democratic process.2 Another effect is that when elections become expensive, fund raising becomes the preoccupation of politicians thereby distracting them from public policy making and their role as trustees of public interest. The role of money in politics is a major concern, for any nation that adheres to democratic tenets. This raises concern because wealth creates unequal opportunity for participation.3 The source of funding itself is also a vexing issue, given that corporate funding of the political process generally increases non-participation in self-governance; it can be said to have the perverse effect of minimising democracy and promoting the inevitable elite plutocracy. However although it is evident that the cost of elections is high there is lack of comprehensive data showing, on the one hand, what the political parties and their candidates spent in any given election, and on the other hand, what state