In principle, the 2007 African Charter on Democracy, Elections and Governance
(ACDEG) could be a powerful instrument to bring the African Governance Architecture
to life and to help ensure that its universal values, including respect for human rights and
the rule of law, are implemented across all African Union member states. Yet how
serious in reality are the latter on this question? Ratification of the African Charter has
taken five years and, as of late 2019, the implementation of its compliance mechanism is
still pending. This article asks how these empirical puzzles can be best addressed. In the
absence of robust data on member states’ preferences and with a view to developing
hypotheses for further research, this article inductively interrogates how data on the
various regimes’ political liberties may or may not relate to the ratification of the African
Charter and the implementation of the ACDEG compliance mechanism.