In most resource-rich countries, natural wealth does not translate into prosperity for the majority of inhabitants, but instead leads to environmental and economic devastation, and hampers democratic reform.

Only an informed public can hold leaders to account. Yet local reporting often overlooks the legal, economic, and environmental implications of resource extraction. Covering Oil: A Reporter's Guide to Energy and Development, a collaborative work of the Open Society Institute's Revenue Watch program and the Initiative for Policy Dialogue, aims to encourage rigorous reporting on these issues by providing practical information about the petroleum industry and the impact of resource wealth on a producing country.

The guidebook comes out of a series of workshops for journalists in the oil-exporting countries of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and Nigeria, during which participants expressed a need for more information to help them understand the issues surrounding resource exploitation. In response to these consultations, Covering Oil outlines the fundamentals of petroleum contracts, provides a glossary of relevant economic theory, and presents case studies of major public policy issues.

Covering Oil is the second in a series of Revenue Watch guidebooks targeting various audiences involved in the promotion of transparency and democratic accountability. The first, Follow the Money: A Guide to Monitoring Budgets and Oil and Gas Revenues, was aimed at nongovernmental organizations.

Why does Nigeria have a history of failed republics, failed governance as well as false starts and dead-ends on the path to economic development, social coherence, and peace? Is the Fourth Republic condemned to the fate of previous ones, or can it rise above the heavy weight ofthe past and chart a different path for itself? In this volume of 26 chapters, put together to honour one of Nigeria's foremost political scientists, four generations of political scientists, economists, political economists, sociologists, psychologists, international relations experts, lawyers, historians and specialists in literature from Africa and North America provide fresh and succinct insights on these and other posers in original essays that range from the theoretical to the analytical, from those that are historical and comparative to those that focus on the current situation in that important African country.

The essays focus on. four cardinal points that sin post Nigeria's perennial struggle for democracy and good governance as cause, effect and terrain. These are the structure, history, processes and dynamics of the country's putative federal system; governance issues; the formation and transformation of identities; and the global contexts of the production and reproduction of the Nigerian state, economy and society.

The book will be of great value to Nigerians, friends of Nigeria, and all those interested in understanding the path that has led Nigeria to its present, state and in finding alternative pathways to a future that is more democratic, better governed, and more developed.

After more than a decade of reform efforts in Africa, much of the optimism over the continent's prospects has been replaced by widespread "Afropessimism." But to what extent is either view well founded? Democratic Reform in Africa plumbs the key issues in the contemporary African experience - including intrastate conflict, corruption, and the development of civil society - highlighting the challenges and evaluating the progress of political and economic change.

Case studies of Botswana, Mozambique, Nigeria, and South Africa complement the thematic chapters, exploring the complex interactions between democracy and development.

Among the constellation of states with interesting constitutional stories to tell, tiny Moldova holds a unique place. It is one of only a handful of countries that has ever switched the structure of its constitutional system midstream without experiencing a democratic breakdown. Whereas some countries, such as Nigeria, have been able to adopt a different kind of constitution following their return to democracy - after a military or authoritarian regime has been swept from power - only a handful have ever managed to change their institutions midstream without experiencing such an intervening crisis.

Oil Boom: Peril or Opportunity? Sub-Saharan Africa is in the midst of an oil boom as foreign energy companies pour billions of dollars into the region for the exploration and production of petroleum. African governments, in turn, are receiving billions of dollars in revenue from this boom. Oil production on the continent is set to double by the end of the decade and the United States will soon be importing 25 percent of its petroleum from the region. Over $50 billion, the largest investment in African history, will be spent on African oil fields by the end of the decade.

The new African oil boom -- centered on the oil-rich Atlantic waters of the Gulf of Guinea, from Nigeria to Angola -- is a moment of great opportunity and great peril for countries beset by wide-scale poverty. On the one hand, revenues available for poverty reduction are huge; Catholic Relief Services (CRS) conservatively estimates that sub-Saharan African governments will receive over $200 billion in oil revenues over the next decade. On the other hand, the dramatic development failures that have characterized most other oil-dependent countries warn that petrodollars have not helped developing countries to reduce poverty; in many cases, they have actually exacerbated it.

Africa's oil boom comes at a time when foreign aid to Africa from industrialized countries is falling and being replaced by an emphasis from donor nations on trade as a means for African countries to escape poverty. The dominance of oil and mining in Africa's trade relationships, coupled with this decline in aid flows, means that it is especially vital that Africa make the best use of its oil.

CRS is committed to helping to ensure that Africa's oil boom improves the lives of the poor through increased investment in education, health, water, roads, agriculture and other vital necessities. But for this to occur, these revenues must be well managed. Thus, this report addresses two fundamental questions: How can Africa's oil boom contribute to alleviating poverty? What policy changes should be implemented to promote the management and allocation of oil revenues in a way that will benefit ordinary Africans?

Reynolds brings together the leading scholars to discuss the successes and failures of constitutional design. Arend Lijphart and Donald Horowitz debate their own contributions to the field. Emerging scholars then present important new evidence from Europe, the CIS, Latin America, and Africa. Chapters analyse the effect of presidential and parliamentary systems, issues of federalism and autonomy, and the varying impact of electoral systems. The book concludes with case studies of Fiji, Ireland, Eritrea, Indonesia, Nigeria, and India. The Architecture of Democracy is the culmination of the study of constitutional engineering in the third wave of democracy and sets parameters for this crucial research as democracy diffuses across the world.